Exeter City 0 - 0 Everton

Half-time: 0 - 0

Everton's league form is hardly a warming prospect, with just three measly points in a very poor run of seven winless matches against a tough sequence of opponents. And 0-0 may not be a total surprise. Everton were largely in control, with many chances to score, but Naylor in the Exeter goal performed well in the first half to keep them in the game, before he got injured.

The second half was much the same, with Everton attacking persistently but ineffectively, poor finishing combining with numerous offside decisions. Joe-Max Moore made a late debut as substitute but it was the usual story for Smith's moribund substitution tactics: too little, too late.

So the sides return to Goodison Park – where they both wanted to play in the first place – and the faint odour of a rat permeates the Devon air...

And like all sane and reasonably intelligent people, according to the trick-cyclists, occasionally you wonder if you ARE sane. (Yes, I know trick-cycliatry isn't a branch of medicine, or science even....more akin to witch doctory than anything else, but they do award themselves degrees 'n' stuff so they're bound to get the odd thing right.)

1. The Drive Sarf

Anyway, I was afflicted by such a moment on Friday night while driving down to Exeter. The journey down started in that maddeningly incessant, peculiarly English patter-de-patter rain. It has the same kind of insanity-inducing audio mantra of your Grandfather Clock ticking loudly in the hall. By the time we got to the Birmingham transition of the M6 to the M5, it was the kind of misty deluge which must have inspired a hundred Stephen King stories. Being the Midlands, it was like trying to drive through dirty treacle.

Which might be why I asked meself, "Are you right off your freakin' CAKE la... all this for a footy match against a team of no-marks in an area of the country where they still visit the local druids to see how the crop will fare?"

This might have been the motivation to stop at the Frankley service area. Time to gather thoughts and get the navigator to figure out the route. So we went into the Little Chef and had our second surreal experience of the night. Now, I have been accused of many things in me life. Being invisible isn't one of them. Why then did the waitress, who could've passed for Richard Dunne's and Unsie's ma combined, walk passed us as though we weren't there....not once, but three bloody times? Why are the English the worst service people on the planet, including the Parisian/ennes?

So we came out and went to the Burger King for a piece of cardboard with burnt strings and hiccup causing fizzy water laughingly titled "cheeseburger and fries with Sprite." Was this life imitating Michael Douglas' art in "Falling Down"? Nope, I didn't have the semi-automatic or the entire dump would've been in danger.

But I digress. As usual.

Back on the road. Away from Baum and the rain eased off a lot and finally petered out around Bristol. The names flew past... Bromsgrove... Worcester (where, you remember savagely, the rednecks suffered a terribly humiliating FA Cup defeat at the hands of non-league City in 3,000 BC....until you go, "Hang on. We're playing Exeter." Concentrates the mind wonderfully.)... Cheltenham... Gloucester... Bristol... Glastonbury...

Suddenly the air seems so much cleaner, brighter, lights sparkling away off the motorway. Nice. And not a sign anywhere of Edward Woodward burning inside The Wicker Man. Couldn't see the locals eating their young either.

2. Sleepy Hollow

Then, right at the end of the M5... Exeter. Even in the dark it's a very pleasant little city, Quaint even. But as all Englishmen know, quaintness has it's price. Finding your way through the narrow streets is one of them. And somehow or other some brilliant thick twat in the planning office has devised a one-way system that makes our city centre look like Paris. So we asked the locals, only to be given a mystified look that would have done credit to Forrest Gump. Sod it, stop at a petrol station and, of course...."Oo ar... you've just passed it, squoir." Yes, I looked over me shoulder but he wasn't there. Too far from L25.

First sight of the hotel and me heart sank. But it turned out we were approaching from the back and all the rooms are at the front. I didn't want to think about the kitchen. I needn't have worried. It was a reasonably clean place with a good, warm and friendly atmosphere, particularly in the bar....better than most English basic accommodation. Dumped the gear in the room and went down to the bar for a couple of nightcap bevvies.

So help me, the barman was the living SPIT of Alexander Solzhenitsyn, beard 'n' all. Good friendly buzz about the place, no hassle, no drunk loonies. There was a group of babbling women in the corner who were so ugly it looked like a Christmas reunion of the Moose Club. The beer was damn good though. It compensated and sent me off into a sound sleep when head finally made contact with pillow.

3. The Morning Before

The phone rang.

"Huh? Wha?"

"Phone call for you surr."

It was Terry on the mobile from the bus at Bristol. He'd woke me at 8.30 am, right on the button. Might still have been in the sack if he hadn't. Meet him at Cullompton, the Market House.

"Where the FUCK'S that, bollocks?"

"Oh it's off the M5 somewhere. Check the map." Click brrrrrrrrr...

Breakfast. Now one of our few culinary gifts to the world is the Full English Breakfast. And bejaysus it never tasted better than this one. Brilliant. Feeling good I asked the very shaggable waitress where I could find the meet. Will someone tell me why beautiful women always look so thick when they're puzzled? Another Forrest Gump look. Finally got directions via the manager, checked out and I was off a short distance back up the M5.

It was Farmers' Week in Cullompton. A banner stretched across the "main" road and mingled with the Crimbo lights and said so. Nice little place though. The bus was indeed outside the Market House. Except that, according to Terry, "You can't leave your car here and come into Exeter with us and collect it afterwards because we're already overloaded." I almost threw me ale over him. But I couldn't because the pub manager, a real Exeter City fan, gave him directions to the ground using a B road which avoided motorway madness. We had a few ales, swapped expletives about each other's parents and got back on the road, me following.

4. St James Park

The directions took us right to the ground. It was surrounded by local bizzies, tooled to the hilt and all wearing those yellow identification body-warmers they've all got these days. The incongruity was, and you'll like this, is that most of them had those dead old fashioned bobby helmets on....the ones with the knob on top and the VERY large peaks fore and aft....honest, you kept looking round for Inspector Le Stroud or Sherlock Holmes. Terry stopped and asked for parking directions. Another Forrest Gump look.

Terry drove straight on and I made a left. Bloody hell! Look! An empty parking spot right next to a pub wall! No sweat, in, park up and a five-minute walk to the ground.

The bizzies had a cordon round the ground that would have done credit to the SS at a Nuremberg rally. Seems they'd had real problems with a visit from Aldershot fans and weren't taking any chances. Just shows (again) how a few loonies can fuck things up for everyone.

Didn't have time to walk around the ground. But there's not much reason to think it was any better on the outside than it was on the inside. Which is to say, dire but somehow endearing, like most grounds in the lower reaches of the game. The fact is, these are the clubs and fans who REALLY keep the game going....salt of the earth, all of them. While we're moaning about millions and winning things and how great a club we are, THEY keep going on sod all – a few nails in old corrugated iron and a very distant prospect of... whatever.

A commendable effort at a new stand was being constructed behind one goal and we were behind the other on a narrow strip of open standing terracing maybe twenty steps wide. People, DON'T listen to any idiot who tells you he yearns for the return of standing room. It's bleak, it's crap, it's dangerous, and it's hateful. Good riddance to it.

The main stand was along one touchline and the City fans' "cowshed" along the other. Both looked decidedly rickety. Corrugated iron covering has that sort of visual affect. Looks a bit like a council allotment full of pissed up fans.

5. The Match

This was a BIG game for Exeter. So much so, the local rag had an eight page pullout supplement. And the City fans were up for it. So was the tannoy announcer (and I do mean TANNOY. Honest) who kept trying to whip 'em up into a sort of rural frenzy, soft prat. The fans don't need that kind of phoney manufactured idiocy. They make their own atmosphere.. .and the city fans cheered everything their team did to the echo... including throw-ins. To be brutally honest, that's all they got most of the match. Not a dig, just a statement of fact. It's equally true to say we played with lazy over-confidence and threw away a hat-ful of chances which would normally have been buried good style.

In was an interesting experiment:– Abel Xavier went to right back, Unsie on the left and Dunne-Weir in the middle. Nicky was right midfield, Mark Pembridge on the left, The Don and Collins in the middle. KC and Big Ears did their usual double act up front. Equally interesting, Abel got some tackles in which earned him the annoyance of the locals, but all in all I think it worked. Might not against the Prem of course.

The pattern of the match was set from the kick off by City. The ball was played to the right to a diminutive little nark named Rees and he booted it straight down left centre. Where it went out for a goal-kick with no Greek remotely near it. And that was the real sum total of City's tactics and threat.

So the game went on with us regularly carving holes through the City defence. And just as regularly hitting it straight at their keeper or hitting it wide or over. I counted eight clear easy chances though there might have been more.

No question we would've scored loads by half time if it hadn't been for their keeper, a real character named Stewart Naylor, ceaselessly bated by our 1,000 or so travelling Blue Bellies and grinning right back at them. Got a bit worried for the lad when KC burst through for the umpteenth time and knocked him out cold in a one-on-one. When he eventually came to he was completely disoriented and had to be replaced... but not before he made another couple of outstanding saves. Hope he's OK. His replacement, Jason someone or other, acquitted himself well too.

For what it's worth, I thought our man of the match was Nicky Barmby despite annoyingly missing as many chances as KC and Franny.

Towards the end, Walter must have been as totally pissed off as we were with the way chances were being squandered. So he took Mark off, moved Nicky to the left and brought on Joe-Max, fresh from the Land of the Free, on the right. Terry took one look and said, "Bloody 'ell....he's GREY." Well, he didn't let us down. He played the ball four times in the little time he was on the park and only messed up once, took a few heavy tackles without flinching and generally tried hard. But he's not match-fit yet. Judgement postponed.

Exeter never gave up. They're a side of mostly big lads, supplemented towards the end by yet another big 'un in Flack. On occasions they even played neatly. For all that, they were clearly well out of their depth.

But still... this is the glorious FA Cup. Anything can happen. In the last ten minutes play was mostly confined our side of the half way line. And in the FA Cup, at 0-0, ten minutes to go, one slip and it's off you go, rapidly. I don't mind telling you my bottle went. After all, Dunney hadn't made his Weekly Howler... and Davey kept making back passes to Paul that had everybody getting edgy. The Exeter fans sensed it all and raised the noise level as the closing minutes arrived and we kept missing chances as regularly as an efficient laxative.

Me, I was as well relieved when the whistle finally went.

6. Apres Match

Back to the car, ready for the offski. Except it turned out it was a private car park owned by the next door garage. The guy in reception had obligingly parked across the rear of me motor. So there was a terse exchange of words, with me getting steadily angrier until he moved out of the way. Isn't it funny how these sort of things happen when you're already out of sorts with the world?

Back to Cullompton for a few bevvies with The Bus. Where, it transpired, there had been an equally short tempered exchange with some locals before I arrived. "Sod this" I thought, and retired to a quiet section of the pub with Terry and some other more sensible members of The Bus. It gets really tedious when you feel you might just have to punch someone's lights out merely for some peace, a bevvy and a chat about the footy. Anyway, it all subsided quickly enough... long enough for us to happily greet the exit of some other hapless Prem clubs at the hands of less exalted brethren.

It's great the FA Cup isn't it. Especially when you're still in it... for the moment.

Exeter's ground, the away section anyway, uncovered with a toilet facility to accommodate only 6 of the 1,200 Evertonians that went to the game, had one door in with the same door for coming out.  You can imagine the chaos that ensued.

The Everton faithful who embarked on the round trip of 500-plus miles surely expected more from Everton in the 3rd Round FA Cup tie.  While the antiquated facilities offered by their hosts may have accounted for the apathy amongst the team, Everton really should have taken one of the numerous scrambled chances. 

Even when Exeter lost their keeper at half-time, the Blues were unable to exploit the inexperienced replacement (who until recently, was playing non-league football).  His saves when called upon, earned him the sponsor's Man of the Match award, and quite deservedly so, too, for it was him, and him alone, who kept Exeter's hopes alive and if we are all honest, they wanted what Everton wanted just as much towards the end – a replay back at Goodison Park.  In the great scheme of things, both clubs could do with the money. 

• Gerrard – 6 – virtually unemployed
• Xavier – 5 – looked uncomfortable and out of position 
• Dunne – 6 – looked comfortable
• Weir – 6 – as usual, solid and dependable
• Unsworth – 5 – unable to create chances
• Barmby – 5 – busy but ineffectual
• Collins – 5 – poor performance and lacked control of midfield
• Hutchison – 5 – transfer rumours may explain his quiet performance
• Pembridge – 5 – buy but not able to exert any real influence
• Campbell – 5 – poor performance and was easily beaten
• Jeffers – 5 – poor service, but squandered what chances came his way

Joe-Max Moore came on as substitute.  He may be short in height, but let's hope he has big shoulders, for he will have a lot to carry over the forthcoming months.

Only the Park End of the ground was open, £8 (£5 Kids & pensioners).

Screen was about on the penalty spot, not as big as I was expecting, probably no bigger than some clubs have installed permanently, but the picture quality was good, and before the game they were showing videos of derby victories from recent years.

Match programmes were available.

By kick off time, the Park stand was pretty full.

Pictures were the BBC MOTD pictures with the BBC commentary.

Overall, I was quite impressed with the set up and would go again.

It was apparently better than for both the league cup v Liverpool in 87 (?) and the FA cup game v Liverpool in 67 (?) ( though that game was at GP televised across the park. The performance wasn't better though!

Less said about the game the better I think, couple of early offside 'goals', thought it was just a matter of time, Their two keepers played well, we finished poorly, they never looked like scoring, Collins was abysmal, Dunne looked good, Barmby worked hard, that's about it.

We're still in the cup, and I guess that's all that matters.

On the balance of play, Everton should be looking forward to a fourth-round tie in the new year, and though a replay at Goodison Park on 21 December should hold no fears for them, manager Walter Smith was not best pleased with his strikers, who should have buried at least one of the eight golden chances on offer. That Exeter can anticipate a handy pre-Christmas windfall was due partly to the profligacy of Kevin Campbell and Francis Jeffers, but, let romance roll, mostly to the brilliance of Stuart Naylor in the first half and, when the veteran goalkeeper was forced to retire at half-time with a head injury, to Jason Matthews, playing only his third senior game after his transfer from Taunton Town.

Though the gulf in class was readily apparent from first kick to last, though Everton's commitment was a tribute to the motivational powers of Smith, Exeter thoroughly deserved their standing ovation at the final whistle. Urged on by the regulars in the Cowshed, surely the only stand in the League to be serviced by a tea trolley, they harried Everton all over St James Park, and just for the odd second or two, particularly downwind in the first half, had the Everton defence in some disarray.

"We're pretty upset at getting a 0-0 draw," said Gary Alexander, the club's leading scorer. The hyperbole was understandable. Exeter's recent League form, five defeats in six matches, had not suggested a classic Cup upset, but then neither had Everton's – no win in eight games – inspired much confidence.

But the Cup would not be complete without its unlikely heroes. Just before the start of what he anticipated would be his first season in retirement, Naylor had applied to the Post Office for a job interview. Halfway up a ladder in the summer sunshine, quietly decorating the outside of his house, his thoughts of a quiet winter were rudely interrupted by the familiar voice of Peter Fox, the Exeter manager, on the other end of the telephone. Moments later, the former England B international and West Bromwich Albion goalkeeper heard himself accept another contract. "I did two days of pre-season training, which, at my age, was about right," he said.

More than once in the first half Fox must have given thanks for his foresight as Exeter's ragged offside trap and the neat movement of the Everton forwards forced the 37-year-old Naylor to make a number of fine saves. Campbell and Nick Barmby had already put the ball in the net only for the linesman to flag for offside both times, but twice just before the interval Naylor's lanky frame came to Exeter's rescue. First, Jeffers ran on to David Unsworth's through-ball, but clipped his shot into Naylor's advancing body; moments later, Campbell galloped through only for Naylor to pull off another smothering save, catching Campbell's boot in his head in the process.

As the Exeter goalkeeper lay prostrate in the penalty box, play was unforgiveably allowed to carry on around him by referee Steve Bennett. Naylor survived to half-time, but was then counted out by the club doctor and replaced by Matthews, an electrician until his arrival at St James Park in August. "He was on decent money as an electrician," Fox said. "Now he's not." But no price can be put on Cup glory, not even by the Football Association.

Having blocked the hapless Campbell's close-range shot within minutes of coming on, the 24-year-old foiled Barmby before thrusting out a left hand to parry Campbell's point-blank header just before the hour mark.

Exeter had long since resorted to pumping long balls into a swirling wind in the hope that Alexander or Lee Boylan, their nimble forwards, might profit from a mistake. Everton, to their credit, kept the tempo high and the passing slick, but once Matthews had saved that header and blocked another from Jeffers, Exeter sensed their luck was in. "I thought when I made the save this might be our day," Matthews said. "It's a dream for me to play in the Cup. You couldn't tell the story better."

Everton pressed to the end, bringing on the American Joe-Max Moore from the New England Revolution for his debut as Barmby switched wings, without threatening to deprive Exeter of their place in the fourth-round draw for only the third time in 20 years.

Jason Matthews, substitute goalkeeper at Exeter City, gave up his job as an electrician to try his luck in professional football. The career move is costing him nearly £300 a week.

"I am a lot worse off coming to Exeter but being a professional footballer is the best job in the land," Matthews said. On days like this, especially.

Matthews, a free transfer from Nuneaton Borough, made a string of fine saves on Saturday to keep out men whose signatures cost Everton several millions. Yet as a goalkeeper who spends most Saturdays warming the benches of the Nationwide League third division, his £300 weekly wage amounts to little more than half his former income as a tradesman and part-time footballer.

Matthews, 24, was named man of the match, twice stopping the £5.75 million Nick Barmby and once denying the £3 million Kevin Campbell in instances when the FA Carling Premiership raiders looked favourite to score. In so doing, Matthews secured a replay at Goodison Park and a payday for his club worth at least £150,000.

Stuart Naylor, the first-choice goalkeeper, was concussed when diving at the feet of Campbell in the 43rd minute. Though he wanted to return for the second half, the club doctor refused to allow it. Thus the match became a tale of two goalkeepers at either end of their careers. Naylor, 37, had been released by Bristol City and was with Weymouth when the call came from Peter Fox, the Exeter manager, himself a former goalkeeper at Stoke City.

Bearing in mind that he is not the oldest goalkeeper in Devon – Neville Southall, 41, defied Queens Park Rangers to earn Torquay United a replay – Fox may feel he can persuade Naylor to play on beyond his one-year contract.

More imminently, though, Fox does not know whether he will have him for the replay tomorrow week. Kofi Nyamah, the Exeter midfield player, was concussed nine days ago and told not to play on Saturday. Should Naylor be passed fit, Matthews would expect to be back on the bench.

Though it was an extraordinary outcome, given that the disparity in chances created fully reflected a difference of 73 league places, neither neutral nor fair-minded Merseysider could begrudge the Third Division team their achievement. It was a tale of two goalkeepers, one a veteran persuaded to emerge from retirement, the other a late entrant to the professional ranks – and both were required by Exeter.

The 37-year-old Stuart Naylor, who was unable to reappear for the second half after having been accidentally knocked out by Kevin Campbell in making the last of four excellent saves, seemed to have done enough to merit man-of-the-match honours should Exeter survive. But the name announced to delighted Devonians shortly before the final whistle was that of Jason Matthews, a 23-year-old erstwhile electrician whose contribution after replacing Naylor had, if anything, exceeded his senior's.

"I wasn't surprised by Jason's performance," said the Exeter manager, Peter Fox, "and nor were the players. He's determined to make it and I'm sure he will."

How odd, then, that only a few months ago Matthews should have been playing for Taunton Town in the Screwfix Direct League; he impressed Fox, himself once a goalkeeper of some note, in a friendly. He has yet to start a match and after this, his third appearance as a substitute, Matthews admitted: "I was dead nervous at first." He concealed it splendidly in three times thwarting Nicky Barmby, who cost Everton £5.75 million, and, from point-blank range, denying the £3 million Campbell.

Exeter were pitifully poor relations. The cost of their entire squad – £30,000 – would barely cover the weekly pay of some of Everton's stars. Even the windfall that the result put Exeter's way, increasing their revenue from the tie by an estimated £200,000, merely served to emphasise the widening economic gulf in English football. But the Cup's equalising properties did their stuff, Everton missing plenty of opportunities as well as running into these inspired goalkeepers.

First Naylor. You may recall that he gained three England B caps during a decade with West Bromwich. But, after being released by Bristol City in March, he felt the time was right to quit and started going for job interviews. Then Fox intervened and his suspicion that there might be useful life in the old dog was certainly confirmed yesterday; though Naylor has not made a habit of keeping clean sheets in the Third Division, the occasion fairly rolled back the years.

Advancing expertly to smother Campbell, then catching an effort from John Collins, he was authority itself, and even when Francis Jeffers, the brightest blue, broke clear, Naylor was there to save with his legs. It was after a one-two with Jeffers that Campbell surged through and as he jumped over Naylor, caught the goalkeeper's head. "I saw Campbell trying to avoid me," Naylor said afterwards, "and that's the last I remember."

He may have to give way to Matthews again for the replay, but the younger man will have done his confidence no harm. Like Naylor, he brought off a quartet of memorable stops, the pick being one from a Campbell header when Matthews had initially been going the wrong way.

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