MKT65
Vital Reserves Team
Forest supporter 54 years. Season ticket over 40 years til I retired here 11 years ago. Been to most of Forests major triumphs and disasters, just wanted to share this with all of you.
My "second" team ( very much second) is Chiang Mai FC who play in Thailands version of The Championship. Never been promoted to the Thai Premier League.....until now! You couldnt write a script for this story!
Coming into the final game of the season, Chiang Mai are 3rd on 49 points, and in 4th are Khon Kaen FC on 48 points. Final game of the season? Khon Kaen away....and who were hot favourites, they almost never lose at home. KK take the lead. We then score twice in 5 minutes. Score stays at 2-1 until 10 minutes from time when they equalise. After that, its kitchen sink time, they have two big European strikers, and they resort to Wimbledon style lob it in the box....we clear off the line, they have a penalty turned down (VAR was in use!), they have about half a dozen corners, we re all in pieces ( fully expecting a Forest style last minute loss!) but we hang on, 2-2....and bloody promotion.
Khon Kaen is about 500 miles from Chiang Mai, about a 12 hour drive or a one hour flight. We took about 1000 fans who outsung and outchanted the home fans non stop for 90 minutes ( well, 96 minutes with added time!).
At the end of the game, and heres the thing, the Chiang Mai players, Coaching Staff, the Chairman, spent about 20 minutes behind the goal celebrating and singing with us....and as we left the ground, loads of the Khon Kaen supporters, absolutely gutted, as we would have been, and all they did was shake our hand..."good luck to Chiang Mai, you deserve it"....Can you imagine anything like that in UK?!
Then later in the evening, the Foreign guys who support Chiang Mai were all gathered in a bar to celebrate, when who turns up? The whole team....not to drink, but, get this, to say "Thank you to our supporters we couldnt have done it without you" !! Every single one of them ( and they are full time professionals, we have a South Korean international and a couple of decent Brazilians in the team) were really humble, posed with us for photos etc etc. At the airport the next day ( a bunch of us flew to avoid the 12 hour drive) the team were on the same flight, Air Asia, a bit like Easyjet....first class? Not a bit of it...they checked in just like us, queued up, sat where they were allocated, amongst the rest of us....bloody brilliant! Even the coach, Carlos, a Brazilian guy came over and spent ten minutes chatting to us about the game and the controversial incidents etc.
If any of you feel like seeing the highlights, theyre on Youtube. Search "Khon Kaen FC v Chiang Mai FC 2-2" easily found. Not the greatest football around, probably League 2 standard.....but the sheer passion, and exhilaration, and non stop fan support a lesson to a lot of our clubs!
All in all, one of the best football experiences of my entire life....not quite up there with the greatest of Forest....but still bloody great!!
My "second" team ( very much second) is Chiang Mai FC who play in Thailands version of The Championship. Never been promoted to the Thai Premier League.....until now! You couldnt write a script for this story!
Coming into the final game of the season, Chiang Mai are 3rd on 49 points, and in 4th are Khon Kaen FC on 48 points. Final game of the season? Khon Kaen away....and who were hot favourites, they almost never lose at home. KK take the lead. We then score twice in 5 minutes. Score stays at 2-1 until 10 minutes from time when they equalise. After that, its kitchen sink time, they have two big European strikers, and they resort to Wimbledon style lob it in the box....we clear off the line, they have a penalty turned down (VAR was in use!), they have about half a dozen corners, we re all in pieces ( fully expecting a Forest style last minute loss!) but we hang on, 2-2....and bloody promotion.
Khon Kaen is about 500 miles from Chiang Mai, about a 12 hour drive or a one hour flight. We took about 1000 fans who outsung and outchanted the home fans non stop for 90 minutes ( well, 96 minutes with added time!).
At the end of the game, and heres the thing, the Chiang Mai players, Coaching Staff, the Chairman, spent about 20 minutes behind the goal celebrating and singing with us....and as we left the ground, loads of the Khon Kaen supporters, absolutely gutted, as we would have been, and all they did was shake our hand..."good luck to Chiang Mai, you deserve it"....Can you imagine anything like that in UK?!
Then later in the evening, the Foreign guys who support Chiang Mai were all gathered in a bar to celebrate, when who turns up? The whole team....not to drink, but, get this, to say "Thank you to our supporters we couldnt have done it without you" !! Every single one of them ( and they are full time professionals, we have a South Korean international and a couple of decent Brazilians in the team) were really humble, posed with us for photos etc etc. At the airport the next day ( a bunch of us flew to avoid the 12 hour drive) the team were on the same flight, Air Asia, a bit like Easyjet....first class? Not a bit of it...they checked in just like us, queued up, sat where they were allocated, amongst the rest of us....bloody brilliant! Even the coach, Carlos, a Brazilian guy came over and spent ten minutes chatting to us about the game and the controversial incidents etc.
If any of you feel like seeing the highlights, theyre on Youtube. Search "Khon Kaen FC v Chiang Mai FC 2-2" easily found. Not the greatest football around, probably League 2 standard.....but the sheer passion, and exhilaration, and non stop fan support a lesson to a lot of our clubs!
All in all, one of the best football experiences of my entire life....not quite up there with the greatest of Forest....but still bloody great!!
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