Mrs Nedved Saves the Day

I have a lot of nice things to say about Wales, and not just because Mrs Nedved hails from a large Welsh family. We visit her relatives regularly, and there were few places better to be this rainy bank-holiday weekend than in Auntie and Uncle's farmhouse. It is in a valley so remote even some sheep need a map to find it. We arrived Friday afternoon and I spent Saturday playing with the children, going for walks in the hills, and (from 3 pm onwards) pretending that I was not desperate to find out how City was doing away to Dorchester. No one was really fooled by this, of course.

I was able to hold out for a long time, actually, because following the match at all was virtually impossible. Sean's City Updates website was not available to me because the Internet has not yet reached this particular valley. Even the phone lines are touch and go. That is because at one point the phone line runs across a field (on the ground, not on a pole) and if a sheep or cow steps on it then Auntie and Uncle won't be making any calls for a while. I'm not making this up. So, to sum up, the information super-highway hasn't built an exit there yet.

Thank goodness for satellites! Auntie and Uncle may not subscribe to Sky channels (if it is not on BBC One or Two they generally don't see it) but they do have a Sky box in order to be able to receive any television signal at all. At about 4:30 my resolve broke down and I barricaded myself in the sitting room in order to watch the BBC vidiprinter (a sort of soccer ticker tape that the BBC run). The vidiprinter is a wonderful invention, but Conference South matches only show up on it for half time and full time scores. Since full time was at least a half hour away I had no real justification for watching it. Regardless, I still felt compelled to sit alone in a dark room to wait while the family frolicked outside on the one sunny afternoon of the visit.

"Dorchester 2-2 Bath City" came through a few minutes before 5pm. I had been hoping for a victory, and three points, but it is hard to know with a scoreline like that if City had blown a lead of battled back bravely. No texts from friends were going to penetrate the communications black hole I was in. That was all the information I was going to get. I successfully managed to get back outside without gnawing on any furniture.

The next morning Mrs Nedved and I drove to the nearby town to do some grocery shopping. Sometimes the supermarket there carries the Non-League Paper, which would have carried a City match report, but alas, not that day. Feeling a distinct absence of football, I came up with a cunning plan. As we moved into the dairy section (where all cheese is MADE IN WALES and has a fierce looking red dragon on it), I decided to make my move.

We had been planning to drive home Monday evening - too late for me to attend the afternoon home match against Worcester City. Was it fair for me to go an entire four day weekend with no football? Of course not. The day before I had scoured the local press for anything interesting. I had found a listing in the local paper for a League of Wales match in Llanelli that I could go to that afternoon. Would Mrs Nedved think this was a good idea, or that her husband is just plain doolally? I decide to start with a feint, to draw attention to the fact that I will be missing the City match the next day.

"What time are we planning to set off tomorrow?" I asked.

Unexpectedly, she responded with, "I was thinking maybe we should leave early in the morning. As soon as we are up, really. It would be nice not to get back too late."

This undermined my cunning plan, but was amazingly good news! As I said, getting home in time enough to still make the City match had not been on my radar. I had to think fast, and after a split second analysis I decided the best plan was not to say anything at all. Being a very intelligent woman, though, Mrs Nedved was able to read me like a map.

"Is there a football match?" she asked.

I will spare you the rest of the small talk and marital maneuvering. I want to make it clear to everyone, though, that Mrs Nedved is the most fabulous, wonderful woman in the whole world. And not just because she let me tear through the misty Welsh countryside in the Nedvedmobile this morning, family in tow, to make it home in time for kick off. And not just because she was content to eat her packed lunch in the driveway of a dog obedience school outside Pontypridd (it was quicker than finding something more scenic). No, she is wonderful and fabulous for many, many reasons I cannot begin to list here for fear of boring everyone. Needless to say, though, a wife who will indulge her husband's sporting obsessions has worth far above rubies.