The Holloway era wasnt a pleasant one for most Leicester City supporters, after the brisk run for the door Gary Megson had made to Bolton Wanderers the loveable wurzel was appointed with six months left of the season to save the Foxes's collective skins. Struggling to get the side playing as a whole we stupidly decided to fork out for tickets for an away match on a freezing cold weeknight in Suffolk at a stadium that has seen more streakers than Leicester City away wins.
Leicesters previous victory at Portman Road came all the way back in 1997 with Mark Robins (remember him?) bagging the odd goal to send City through in the Coca Cola cup which they would then go on to win. Such antics of equally epic proportions were going to be required in this one as League One was fast becoming a reality for the Foxes proud tradition of never being out of the top two divisions.
So with a heavy heart and a lighter wallet we set off on the long and arduous journey down the A14 (which seems to last forever) landing up in farmer country not too far from the sea as it turned out. Memories of the service stop some 50 miles from Ipswich having done a coach average speed of 55mph for the past 3 hours to be told by one shop worker 'don't worry,you're nearly in Ipswich'...must be a regular thing.
Having set off in the light of the afternoon sunshine it was now dark and the heart melting sight of floodlights came into view. We had arrived. Portman Road appears a very tidy stadium with three stands of equal finesse yet trust us to be sat in the considerably older Cobbold stand with the breeze blasting our collective chops. The view was faultless which going on the nights events i'm not sure was ideal given the performance we were about to witness.
Starting out on the Leicester Flank was Youtube sensation Hossein Kaebi, Iranian international, world cup sensation and all round good guy.....until he came here that is. A series of touches more associated with local resident Steve Wright were enough to have 800 hardy City fans agasp and annoyed. More was to follow after an opening strike from Pablo Counago when the officials incompetance lead to centre half Patrick Kisnorbo heading for an early bath after a foul outside the area and the linesman failing to notice the covering defender.
Insult to injury was the added prior to Kisnorbo's dismissal by the awarding of a penalty despite the offence taking place outside the box, up stepped Alan Lee to slot home the second of the night leaving City it all to do. Hope then came in the form of striker Iain Hume, lobbing the ball over Neil Alexander and making 800 freezing travellers a heck of a lot warmer.
Sadly the tunnels of the great escape soon caved in as John Walters finished from 6 yards hammering the final nail into the nights coffin, 3-1 and yet another sad ending to an outing at Portman Road and another timid step towards life outside the top two divisions for the first time ever.....still not to be too downhearted, another ground ticked off the list and the exciting prospect of the A14......
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