Saturday 25th November - Kick off 3pm Distance from Coventry Building Society Arena to The New Den - 123 miles (197km). Travel time 3hr 15 mins. Before we begin, we drew at home to Stoke last week. The rot has been stopped. Or has it……??? So this is the big one. An away day to Millwall. 

Millwall are known as The Lions. And their ground is called The Den. They have a reputation of being the hardest firm in the country. An intimidating away day, in South London. You have to have your wits about you. It is no place for the faint-hearted. This could get tasty. Welcome to The Lions Den. 

It all started so nicely. Blogit popped to McDonalds for a cheeky sausage muffin before boarding the coach with a bag full of goodies. He’d got his hands on a family-sized bag of caramel M&Ms, courtesy of The Queens Pantry. And when I say family-size. American family size. I had to book an extra seat for them. Scarpa, as always, slept. It’s tough being a 16 year old. Although, if anyone asks, Scarpa is 15 years old. It means that he can’t be searched when we go into the grounds. 

The journey is in 2 parts. The first bit, nice and easy. 90 miles, down the M40, through the beautiful Warwickshire and Oxfordshire countryside. England's green and pleasant land. It’s cold, but the sun is shining, the weather is sweet. It makes you wanna move those dancing feet. Buoyed by the draw against Stoke, there’s an air of anticipation. In the air. Mixed with an air of trepidation. But that’s not in the air. That fear is mainly centred in the back of the trouser department. It is Millwall away, after all. 

We leave the M40 and hit the outskirts of London. The Den is situated in the South East of London, in the borough of Bermondsey. So we’ve got to go from the North West of London to the South East. On a Saturday. It’s slow, it’s boring, but the anticipation of what awaits keeps us on out toes. Blogit decides to kill some time by reading up on the history of Millwall FC…. Formed in 1885, that’s about as interesting as it gets for Millwall when it comes to football. They haven’t really won anything of importance, but they are known for their hooligan fans. They have a rivalry with West Ham, as they were both formed in the docks in the East End of London, and their early games were marred by fighting dockers, from rival dockyards. In fact, one of the stands at The Den is called The Dockers Stand. And that’s where the new Millwall firm watch from. 

There is a history of football violence involving Millwall and lots of other clubs, especially during the 70s and 80s, and their hooligan element was called The Bushwhackers. Perhaps the biggest event was against Luton in 1985 (there are Youtube videos). Thousands of fans went on the rampage, in and out the ground, resulting in severe damage to the stadium and further enhancing Millwall's reputation. But. They haven’t come up against our 2 tough boys from Royal Leamington Spa yet. 

After 2 hours of crawling, slowly, heading towards our destiny, we arrive at a pretty pleasant part of London, actually. It’s all a bit gentrified. There’s more food trucks than people. Turns out, it’s not the 70s and 80s anymore. The hooligans of a bygone age are now fat, balding men, who couldn’t fight a cold. And the youngsters are too busy falling over their trousers and tik tokking to worry about a rumble. 

We jump off the coach, and the first person we see is City goalkeeping legend Steve ‘Oggy’ Ogrizovic. He rushes over and asks for a picture. We duly oblige. Oggy has obviously been reading our blogs. We are then accosted by the local radio station to give our thoughts on the match. Blogit goes for 2-1 Cov. Scarpa says 3-1. After fulfilling our media duties, we head into the ground. We decide not to search for a KFC. We’re on dodgy ground. Instead we plump for a pie, and it’s actually one of the better ones. South Londoners are known for making great pies, and the Millwall Pie doesn’t disappoint. T

here is a great atmosphere in the ground. ‘No-one likes us, we don’t care’, sing the Millwall fans. ‘Millwalls a s***hole, I wanna go home’, the Cov fans sing back. It’s getting heated and tensions are rising. We turn our attention to the pitch. There’s a game going on. City look revitalised, and the rot has been stopped. A goal in the first half, followed by 2 in the second sends the City fans into raptures. ‘Is there a fire drill’? The City fans sing, as with 5 minutes to go and at 3-0 down, the home fans leave in droves. ‘Millwall get battered, every where they go’....the Cov fans sing. There’s a cocky confidence that only comes about when there are 3,000 of you, half of the Millwall fans have gone home, and there’s 300 riot police between you and the remaining, deflated Bushwhackers. The game ends. We get on the coach and out of Dodge. Millwall away? Completed it mate.