Away Day Wiz Diaries #13 – Cardiff (2-0)

The final away day of 2024, and the Wiz go out with a Welsh Bang thanks to Kieffer Moore.

Alan Pickard

And just like that, another year ticked off following the Wizards up and down (and out of in this case) the country. Before Boxing Day, that was 28 fixtures, 12 victories, 43 goals celebrated, Premier League, Championship, FA Cup, League Cup and pre-season friendlies. But most importantly, days out with your mates. And that's the whole point isn't it really? Living your life doing what you enjoy with a group of, well in my case, idiots. Loveable idiots though. Every single one of em.

Cardiff then for the final hurrah of 2024. 07:30 am start. (Pre-warning, swear words might feature at some point in this write-up.) And feeling unbelievably positive about the result. I think it’s fair to say the mood on the coach was probably somewhat helped by Mick and his magical bag of treats.

Heading to Newport for pre-match beers, and here we go again Alan's gonna start moaning about summat. And in the firing line yet again are those boys who operate on the thin blue line. My word, the plod are particularly bad down here.

"Where have you lot come from? Because we were only expecting three coaches and with your two that makes five."

So firstly Officer Dibble, how have you gone about working out that it's my two that you weren't expecting? And secondly, what does it f***ing matter? We're here pumping money into your economy without causing one sodding ounce of bother. And thirdly, it’s South Yorkshire Police who hold the info about who is going where, and that has been passed onto South Wales police, who have in turn given you, Gwent plod, the wrong information. So how does that add up to being my fault? (I feel so much better now I've vented.)

Deep breath. Let's head to that pub over there, that looks nice. Yeah, we'll head there.

"Sorry, no football fans allowed."

Mate, I can literally see people I know through the window so your f***king football fan filter has malfunctioned at some point. Sod it, we’ll go to your competitor over the road then. The Windsor Castle. Not as glamorous as it sounds, but it's very reasonably priced and we’re very happy to have received some extra custom.

I've got to tell you about my mate Giacomo too at this point. Giacomo had a bit of his brain out, literally, a few years back. Which apparently turned him into Forrest Gump. He's much more intelligent of course, but boy, for a bloke that once had a blog that was called "I can't stand running" - he likes running. A lot.

So today, as is seemingly now custom when we are at Cardiff, he set off from his home, in Portishead, at around 1 am to RUN to Newport (33 miles give or take), where he met his mate, and ran Parkrun (probably quite fast). Then came to the boozer (after a shower thankfully) to meet us. I never got a review of his burger but it looked really nice.

1:45 rolls around and we're on our way to Cardiff, via Officer Dibble’s route—the long way around. I really don't like this ground. Of course, this is my opinion, but it's just rubbish. It is. It's soulless, and it's blue. They've also put a pointless upper tier above one side that I've never seen anyone in — though they did see sense when building that by installing red seats instead. Officer Dibble now decides at this point that we're actually OK and he's not going to do coach searches today too. The away end concourse is big enough to have a burger van, the type you normally see at festivals, inside it. Festival prices too. And I know you all read along for my burger reviews so I'll give it a 5/10. It would have been a 3 but for the choice of sauces available.

First half, not much in it. All a bit stalemate. Gus flashed one across the face of the goal and Tom Davies had a tame effort blocked as we looked to make a breakthrough, but truth be told I'm here to tell you about Keiffer Moore and the second half where we really got the game by the scruff of the neck.

Gilchrist with the cross into Moore, who despite having his shirt pulled off, managed to bring the ball down on his chest, swivel and smash a left-footed effort into the top corner, sending the away end delirious. A quite remarkable goal from the big man. His second followed 8 minutes later. Tom Davies slides into a tackle pass to Kieffer who takes a couple of touches before unleashing a 20-yard bulleted daisy cutter into the bottom corner to seal 3 points on our final journey of 2024. Marvellous. Bloody lovely in fact.

We then spent 15 minutes singing about Chris Wilder, I really hope that man gets a new contract in the next few weeks.

The journey home was broken up with a stop for supplies at the services, where we bumped into Tom Davies! What a great sport he is too!

So the year on the road that started with a 4-0 win at Gillingham in the FA Cup, saw only 1 Premier League win at Luton, an unbeaten pre-season, a League Cup defeat at Barnsley, took us north, south, east and finally west, draws to a close.

Today's alternative (Wo)man of the match is awarded to my mate Claire. The amount of work she does sorting coaches and tickets out does not go unnoticed. You're one in a million Claire. Thankyou.

Happy New Year to everyone who is still reading!

See you in 2025 at Sunderland Wiz.