There is nowt like watching your teams lose ignominiously. Trudging home in the rain after a bleak, gutless loss, sending you into a whirl of existential despair. There will also likely be a cancelled train involved, just to top the day off.

Even watching on the telly can be a truly grim watch, with the only saving grace being that you have the option of utilising the remote control and watching old episodes of Homes Under The Hammer instead.

Yesterday, I suffered “one of those days”. With bells on. A day so brutal, I really went completely off sport for a while. It started at 4am, because that is a perfectly normal hour to be setting an alarm to watch football. Thanks to my wife’s origin story (she’s from New Zealand), I decided one day I would support the only (at the time) Kiwi team in the Australian A-League: Wellington Phoenix. When we were down in Kiwiland for our wedding, the Phoenix were on a great run towards the end-of-season play-offs. Once back in the UK, I continued following them on the television, getting up at obscenely early hours to watch them ultimately fall in the play-offs. The following few seasons were spectacularly less successful, not that that stopped me tuning in to watch games at a time when other channels are showing advertorials for steam cleaners and memory foam mattresses.

The addition of Auckland FC to the A-League gave Phoenix a proper derby. Away games are usually a three hour flight away, with the “Distance Derby” against Perth Glory being approximately eight hours. Now, we had proper Rivals. Not that it has felt like that – Auckland have won all the previous derbies, Phoenix being abject in various calamitous ways. The alarm on my phone brought me to life in a way the same alarm on a way day could only dream of. I pulled on my vintage (ahem) Phoenix top, made myself a coffee, and then sat myself on the sofa to watch the Nix hopefully break their derby day hoodoo. The Sky Stadium, otherwise known as the Cake Tin, hosted easily the largest contingent of away fans for a match probably outside of a visit by the British & Irish Lions.

You may have seen Auckland’s first goal. It had gone viral before the half-time whistle. Have a quick watch of the video above. You can watch all the goals if you want, but the first one is, well, surreal. It was only on viewing of the multiple replays that I realised that yes, I was actually awake and this wasn’t some surreal, cheese-before-bedtime-induced nightmare. Phoenix were 4-0 down by half-time, the keeper was substituted at the interval, we lost by five and the manger had resigned within an hour of the full-time whistle. A truly, brutal watch. Yes, I had the chance of turning over and watching an old Taskmaster episode, but that bit of me that likes suffering – I was brought up as a Catholic – insisted that I must sit and watch until the end (there is also the part of me that thinks, somehow, we will launch a stirring late comeback.

So, having my day already ruined before the sun had come up, I had to plan the rest of my sporting day. Ireland were due to play England at Twickenham in the Six Nations Championship. Even a welling up of national pride couldn’t disguise the fact that Ireland had been awful in the previous two rounds, and I didn’t fancy watching another pummelling from my armchair. Hendon, my mirror of averageness, were at home to Metropolitan Police, a team I had seen them lose 5-1 to before Christmas. Nope, a trudge up to North London to watch them get crushed again didn’t appeal. The only other option open (apart from staying indoors and watching the Winter Olympics) to me was in the delights of the Thames Valley Premier League FA Cup. Maidenhead United versus Fleet Spurs. The prospect of a cup upset, even with the overwhelming weight of evidence suggesting otherwise, was far too much to resist.

When they met as divisional peers last season, Maidenhead won 10-1. Since then, Maidenhead have settled in the upper-echelons of the TVPL Premier Division, whilst Fleet have consolidated their position propping up the division below. Results and tables don’t always tell the full story – there had been a marked competitive improvement in the performances, and only weather-related games in hand on the clubs above them had them bottom. I don’t think I seriously thought that Fleet would win. But hope springs eternal.

Another reason to turning up was the possibility that I may need to double-up as Assistant Referee. The thing about being at the thirteenth tier of the English footballing pyramid is that there is a lack of officials. All games get a referee, but it’s a bit much to expect a full set of match officials, so clubs are relied upon to provide somebody to wave the day-glo flags. Sometimes, it’s a club official or coach. Usually it’s a reluctant substitute, the ignominy of not being picked to play in a level just above park football added to by being packed off to the far-side touchline to wave a flag for the referee to decide whether to ignore or not. In Fleet Spurs case, their linesperson is usually me. A supporter. I did it once because the one-man band who runs the first team, John, asked if I could do it. Sure, why not I thought. I do believe I am genuinely neutral, unlike some others at this level, and I have refereed previously so know how hard it is to get anything approaching competency as assistants.

So, rocking up at the 1878 Stadium, home of Burnham FC and their lodgers, Maidenhead Town, I did so on the basis that I would likely be called into emergency action as official flag bearer of Fleet Spurs. And lo, it did come to pass as Chairman/Manager/Physio/sometime midfielder John saw me enter the ground and asked if I could help. Of course I could, once I sorted out my footwear issue. I had worn comfy trainers, knowing that I would have a bit of a trek to and from Burnham train station. The issue was that surface – a 5G pitch doesn’t work well with normal trainers (for reasons I really don’t understand). Luckily, there was a player who had similar size feet AND a spare pair of boots – cheers Jamie – so I was able to take my place on the touchline.

The thing about the story of David versus Goliath is that, well, if you simulated that match-up on Football Manager, 999 times out of 1000 Goliath would absolutely batter David. Yesterday, was not the day for David to claim that one victory. The first half was all about damage limitation, which Fleet did fairly well to be fair. By half-time, Maidenhead “only” led 3-0, which counts as a moral victory. Whatever the opposite of that is better describes the second half – the hosts scored early and often, missed a few chances that fell into the category “easier to score”, and hit the woodwork at least four times. With Fleet Spurs defending deeper as the game went on, I rarely got to foray up to the half-way line. Even when Fleet were awarded a consolation penalty – one I doubt would have been given at 0-0 – the gift wasn’t taken as the keeper made an excellent double save. Full time brought about a chance to change my boots, tell John that I’d see him next week (I won’t, I forgot until I was back home that I am at rugby next weekend), and then shuffle back to the station.

Once there – via Burnham’s finest fried chicken emporium – I caught up on all my other supporting crushes. It was a grim tale. Hendon were three down at home to Met Police, got it back level, before conceding a winner in injury time. Harlequins Women, playing the Enya game (Sale, away), lost on what appears to have been a swamp, their lurid pink second kit indistinguishable from their hosts nay blue. My Torquay supporting mates have now got me fully on that bandwagon, just in time for them to lose away at bottom of the table, newly managerless Eastbourne. Subsequently, today, Celtic have lost at home to Hibs for the first time since 2010. A truly grim weekend.

Except. My watch kept buzzing into life whilst I was shuffling the line at Burnham. Ireland hammered England for a record victory at Twickenham. My English and Irish friends were disbelieving their own eyes for different reasons, the amount of swearing on my watch notifications reflecting the nationality of the message sender. I haven’t had a chance to watch the game back yet. I had foolishly decided that running the line in a shooting-fish-in-a-barrel contest was a better idea than watching my nation at Twickenham. Or was it foolish? Because I absolutely KNEW that Fleet Spurs were going to get beaten, but still felt that I needed to go and offer my support, and my help to John. Ireland could look after themselves without me watching – and World Rugby are good at providing touch judges for games at that level – but Fleet Spurs don’t have many fans (last count of regulars is 1) me and 2) my daughter). So, there really was only one option, even though the ten goal hammering that unfolded was a tad on the depressing side.

Still, it did briefly take my mind off Auckland’s first goal.