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(Alternatively titled, The Great Cheesburger Famine of 2005) A chronological look at buying a burger at Egham. 19:15 – Arrive at Egham Town. Proceed into ground in search of sustenance. 19:20 – Our initial glance around the ground brings a certain amount of worry but our hopes are soon raised by a moderately sized ‘Tea Bar -->’ sign. 19:21 – Arrive at the site of the Tea Bar. It is shut. 19:25 – The Tea Bar remains resolutely closed. Little do they know that the seeds of the later disaster are being sown at this very early stage. 19:26 – A reasonable sized crowd is gathering around the Tea Bar. A man with a large kettle walks past and into the hut. Was that a cruel smile on his face as he passes the hungry masses? 19:30 – On his way back out he is stopped by a hungry U’s supporter who braves asking him the all important question. Much to our relief he replies that the Tea Bar will be open momentarily. 19:42 – Tea Bar opens three minutes before kick-off. There is a light-hearted jostle to obtain the best queuing positions. Local police report no casualties. A Tesco carrier bag of goods arriving in the hut suggests that a last minute trip to the supermarket has been necessary. 19:45 – Place order for a cheeseburger and chips. There are no chips. Settle on the cheeseburger, no onions, a Mars bar and a can of orange Tango. £3. Having given our order we move from the ordering queue to the waiting line. 19:48 – News of the wait for a burger begins to reach down the queue. Some plucky individuals cleverly evade the long wait by placing orders for bacon rolls and hot dogs. Later, the bacon roll eaters are heard muttering about the lack of bacon within their rolls. Trade descriptions are called to the scene but rule in favour of the vendor. 19:49 – Speculation mounts of a black market trade in burgers. Allegedly, people near the front of the line are ordering more to sell at profit to those still waiting. 19:50 – The queue of those waiting for a burger now exceeds that of people waiting to place an order. From within the wooden hut the Fryer is heard asking the cashier how many more burgers are required. Her snappy response is that she can’t possibly know how many more are needed when she doesn’t know how many he has already given out. He concedes defeat in the argument. 19:53 – Chaos has broken out within the Tea Bar - who has ordered what has long been forgotten. Three cheeseburgers, all with onions, are delivered to the group in front of us, elevating us into first position in the burger line. 19:55 – Noise from the Sutton end. From our vantage point by the Tea Bar we see precisely nothing of Lewis heading the U’s ahead from a Matt Gray cross. One intrepid cheeseburger ‘waitee’ who had ventured briefly away from the queue returns with a description of the goal. 
Rumour has it that Lewis scored in this goal! (Photo from eghamfc.co.uk) 19:58 – Thirteen minutes after ordering and I’m finally the proud owner of a cheeseburger. Of course, as one final insult, they elect to put onions into my ‘non-onion’ burger. Decide to remove the offending onions myself rather than bring further misery upon myself by pointing out the error. And then it was off to watch the match which, incredibly, failed to live up to the excitement we had got used to whilst waiting for our burgers :-( |
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