https://www.bbc.co.uk/sport/football/49434573
At the age of just 40, former footballer Junior Agogo died following a stroke suffered a couple of
Nothing really, beyond perhaps putting things in perspective. A life ended sadly short trumps a second-half capitulation in a single match, surely? But, there's a slightly more Poppies-centric angle to the story of Junior's earlier career, and a certain game against us while he was a Barnet player.
Anyone who was there on that sunny afternoon at Underhill in April 2003 will never forget what they saw. To put you in the picture, we were winding down a singularly unhappy season in the Conference. We had bounced back into the top flight at the first time of asking after a fabulous afternoon at Tiverton, and we were back where we belonged. Except, as it became painfully and speedily obvious, we DIDN'T belong at this level anymore. Nailed to the bottom of the table for pretty much the entire campaign, Carl Shutt was eventually, humanely fired in favour of the far cheaper Dominic Genovese, who was given the task of shepherding us through our final half dozen fixtures.
One of these last, or possibly the last of these fixtures was away to the old enemy - Barnet, who had already started their yo-yo existence between the Football League and Non-League. This season they were back down with us dead men, and, for once, weren't in the running for promotion. Consequently only over a thousand turned up to watch Martin Allen's Bees run up a cricket score against the already doomed Poppies.
Between 3 o'clock and 4.45pm Barnet, with Junior Agogo much to the fore, Barnet spent 89 minutes and 45 seconds in the Poppies 6-yard box. Every shot or header hit the goal frame, or a defender's face, or the keeper's nuts, or a fellow attacker. It was achingly funny to watch - like a comedic Alamo, and we knew, absolutely KNEW that if Barnet had played all night, they still wouldn't be able to score. We even went down to 10 men and it did them no good.
But what made it even funnier is that in the barely 15 seconds where we booted the ball into Barnet's half of the pitch, they contrived to score an own goal and then let our loanee Lee Clark sprint from the halfway goal to score one of the least expected or deserved goals we've ever achieved.
The final whistle was greeted with laughter and bemusement from all corners of Underhill. We'd won 2-0 despite having only one attempt on goal, and Barnet failed to score despite having (at a conservative estimate) 40 thousand attempts on goal.
The match report here, if anything, paints a postive Poppies spin on the game -
https://www.newsshopper.co.uk/news/6253519.bees-left-with-sting-in-their-tail/
The Barnet fans in the bar afterwards were very chipper and a pleasant afternoon was spent with them. Looking back now, I dread to think what the reaction of elements of our supporters would have been were the positions reversed.
Actually, I don't have to imagine it. I'm seeing it most Saturday evenings! Throw random anger, anonymous social media and a sense of entitlement into a pot and stir vigorously and you have the worst of modern football, and a glimpse of ugly Poppies support circa 2019.
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