I have to admit, I’ve had some good away days at West Brom over the years but deary me, what an absolute shithole the area round the ground is.
The first time I went I got there a little early, in dire need of a piss. There wasn’t an away friendly pub near the ground at the time and so I elected to go in one of those standalone public toilet buildings at the side of the road. Now, these are never nice places and I was fully prepared for a bit of unpleasant graffiti and those neon anti-smackhead lights. I was not, however, in anyway prepared for what greeted me.
The only way I can describe the scene is as a sea of human faeces. I’m not exaggerating, it was wall to wall with shìt, as if someone had started their project in one corner and tactically voided their bowels over time in order to complete their masterpiece. The stench, as you can imagine, was rancid. Put me right off the post-match curry I was planning on having.
Another time, I did make it to the pub. A real scuzzy little place not far from the ground. A team of police forensics were back and forth out of a small terraced house across the road. I asked the barman if he knew what was going on - apparently someone had been ‘chopped up’ with a machete. That wasn’t all, he pointed out. It was the second murder of the week, showing me another house a few doors down which had been recently petrol bombed.
On the way to the ground, me and my mates were chased by a group of lads armed with monkey wrenches. We were outnumbered and I’m not sure how well it would have ended had a police riot van not been passing by and intervened.
Just to be clear, this wasn’t the 70s - it was the late 90s / early 00s. Rough place. Nice balti pies though.
