Burslem, home of Port Vale, home of the Titanic Brewery Tap, the Mother Town of the city of Stoke On Trent*.
Bulls Head, aforementioned tap, heathenish decision, the Lincoln Green Tuck Porter called, we forsook the more widely known Titanic Plum Porter.
Tuck is a well-rounded and flavoursome beer, it was complimented by a "proper” sausage cob & ketchup opening up the old "sauce” debate once again.
A printed fanzine "Derek, I’m Gutted” offered 40 pages, a throwback to the days of photocopying, letraset and lines that don’t quite tippex out when you paste everything together.
You feel in a time warp of the late Seventies and Eighties when publications were, well if not quite ten a penny, they certainly felt like it.
"Derek’s” main feature is a diary of the closing games from last season which read like every downtrodden and continually let down football fan feels when it never quite goes to plan and you suffer those incredulous decisions such as giving a player his home debut in the last minute of injury time. Of course it then turns out that a single "one minute” is enough to earn a contract for the next three years.
Add in lashings of sardonic humour and a merry-go-round of changes in the close season, (new manager no one has heard of, half the team leaving to be replaced by foreigners nobody has ever heard of).
Then wrap the whole thing off by summarising the season to date, looking forward to games to come and, as expected, poking fun at your ex manager and local rivals.
All for a mere pound, it contains more to entertain than the official programme at £2 for 16 pages which didn’t even include a list of the Derby Players and the one page dedicated to the Rams states; "…we never reached those heights since Clough and Taylor departed”, which is rather unfair on Dave Mackay who won the title in 1974/5.
Still the beer is brilliant as the Rams fans not wearing colours fill the small pub and the company of two lifelong and knowledgeable Valiant’s make for a cracking start to the evening.
Vale Park, once the "Wembley Of The North”, designed for an 80,000 capacity in the days of standing, a record attendance of 50,000 against Arsenal.
It’s incongruous with the lowest attendance for 30 years which sees a mere 1,198 rattle around in the two open stands (we make 120 of that) for a controversial competition; ‘The Checkatrade Trophy’ which now for the first time includes 16 Premiership/Championship U23 teams.
U23 in name only, the criteria are that there has to be six players who were U21 at the start of the season, the balance can be made up from anybody, first team players, young kids, it’s a system open to abuse and you can see why the League One and Two clubs’ fans are organising boycotts of the competition.
Pleasingly though all of the Derby players were Academy product and only Jamie Hanson could be considered as having a modicum of "Experience in the Championship”.
The Valiant’s themselves made six changes from their first team which beat Scunthorpe at the weekend.
A lush green pitch, one of the widest in the league is put to good use by the home side, we are exposed on the flanks and a combination of last minute blocks and poor finishing reflect in a lack of goals.
Both sides play football on the deck, Port Vale are a credit to their division as they seek to pass and move with style and skill. The Rams though compete.
Good chances fall to Alefe Santos who shows flashes of ability but composure is yet to come. In one opening he does all the hard work in latching on to a through ball, beating the last defender, taking the ball around the goalkeeper only to fire into the side netting from a tight angle.
Hanson has a shot on target that is smothered comfortably by Jak Alnwick as both sides share possession.
The better chances though come through the more experienced home side, and Slovakian Goalkeeper Henrich Ravas is time after time well placed to save.
Ravas though is clearly uncomfortable with his kicking both from dead balls and open play, this is quickly picked up by the opposition who in turn force more errors. It is no surprise when Ravas is finally cautioned for time wasting at a goal kick; you do wonder why a defender doesn’t step up to help him out.
Helping out at the back Farrend Rawson was one particular player I was looking forward to seeing play in a competitive environment given his rave reviews on loan last season at Rotherham.
It isn’t though one of his better games, he is lucky to get away with the continual grabbing of fabric on opponents shirts (worse than Bucko) and we are lucky not to concede a penalty at the end of the first half.
The second half sees Derby pressurised as Port Vale up the tempo considerably after the break. Ravas is busy but looks capable until in the 80th minute one of a series of corners sees central defender Nathan Smith rise like a tall majestic tree and thump home a downward header at the back post which leaves our keeper with no chance.
For the last ten minutes we throw everything forward (including Rawson) but we never look like levelling the scores.
At the final whistle, the youngsters get a round of applause from the travelling fans; the team should feel proud of their first encounter at this level which is a big positive.
The slight worry is though that none of them shined long enough to give the manager any thoughts of considering them for possible inclusion in a first team squad, now that to me is a concern.
*Note Stoke On Trent is the city of six towns which include Stoke Upon Trent, just in case you ever wondered… :)