Am back In Genova after an amazing day yesterday. I had heard about a pub in Torino showing the Palace/West ham play off match on a Palace email list. So I took the train there, walked to the pub where I found two blokes in Palace shirts standing outside. Turns out the pub was still closed, no sign of the owner who had promised to be there an hour before the match. By this time it was 15 minutes to kick off. This was the worst part of the day by far - I really thought I was going to have come all the way on a hot crowded train for nothing. But, about a minute before 4pm the owner arrived, and had the place unlocked a couple of minutes into the game. By that time I had established I was the only Englishman there, all the others were Italian fans of English football. Everyone was very friendly, to the limits that team loyalties would allow, and we shared chips during the match and talked about games we'd seen and stuff. With only ten of us there, I had an excellent view of the big screen for the whole game, which was an agonising experience, Palace had some good chances but so did the hammers and it was really in the balance. About an hour in, Palace got lucky as Andy Johnson found some room to shoot and the keeper couldn't hold it, and our captain Neil Shipperley was in the right place to bundle it into the net. Then followed a long, long half an hour as West Ham had two offside goals (correctly) disallowed and a decent penalty shout turned down, but in the end, it was our day. There's a photo of me celebrating with Andrea and Carlos, the two brothers who arranged the meet-up, here.

After the match, everyone went for a smoke in the park by the river, and talked about the great victory/egregious defeat. Andrea and Carlos invited me to stay at there place and go out in Torino that night; naturally I accepted, and we had an excellent Italian meal with their family (pasta first course, meat and salad second, fresh strawberries from their country house and then Andrea's birthday cake to finish). Andrea's father only half joined in - he was busy watching Palermo winning promotion to Serie a on TV.

At about midnight we went into town and the brothers showed me all the stuff I'd missed on my last visit, like the 'Polenta Palace', a building that starts about 5 metres wide and thins down to less than a metre at the end. It was designed by the same guy who built the Mole Antonelliana. And the palace with a cannonball still wedged into one wall. We also tried some "gianduja" ice cream, chocolate with fine ground toasted nuts, a Torino speciality, bought from what is apparently the most famous Gelateria on the Via Po. All the while cars were driving by waving Palermo flags and shouting, and we were waving back and shouting about Palace. It was an excellent night. Andrea had to go to Bologna the next day, so I got a very early train home, and spent today on the beach resting..