The FA staff piled onto the coach outside Jury’s Hotel in Cardiff’s city centre - there were nearly 50 of us - but the first 100 yards of the journey back home took 36 minutes. Actually getting out of Cardiff was the hard part and it was nearly midnight when we got back to Soho Square.

The following afternoon there was a women’s game between Dagenham and Woking in prospect, a play-off for a place in next season’s South East Combination. It was 20 stops on the Central line from Lancaster Gate to Fairlop and a walk of more than two miles across windswept farmland to the Elmbridge Sports Centre.

I arrived at the ground, with barely five minutes to spare, to find that the ref had just called the game off. Apparently the Woking officials had thought the goal frames were unsafe, which is their right of course. But it was a poor show, really, and the walk back to the station seemed particularly long.

On Tuesday evening there was some London League action at Paddington Rec. A team called "Invisible FC" beat Visa 3-0, though to be honest I couldn’t see them getting a result. (That joke will be discussed by a panel of experts on "Newsnight" on BBC 2 tonight.)

The next game was extraordinary. The mighty "Reds", whose season in the League had been relatively disappointing, quickly went behind and looked to be out of it at half-time. But after the break they were nothing short of inspired: one goal, then another, then another. We didn’t know whether to laugh or cry during this amazing rollercoaster of a game.

Let’s just savour that final scoreline again...Boodle Hatfield 1 BBH 5. No one who was there will ever forget it.

But, to be serious, last week's European Cup Final was probably the craziest ever. I was a student in Liverpool when the real "Reds" won it for the first time and went to all the home legs at Anfield up to and including the semi. My football predictions have tended to be ridiculed since tipping Japan to win Euro 2004 but I did say it would go to penalties in Istanbul.

Then there were two more games to see before the nightmare they call "the close season" began: Mauritius Sports v Brentford New Inn in the Middlesex County League on Saturday (2-1) and John Brown v Hudson in the London League last night (3-5).

Mauritius, it transpired, needed three points to secure runners-up spot and their burly No.9 bravely forced home the winner in the ninth minute of injury time. It was a dramatic finale to a game played on a rock-hard pitch with a gale blowing. Any player who tried to run with the ball would suddenly find it was five yards behind him.

A record (for him) 204 games in the 2004-05 season have brought "The Barber" up to an all-time total of 4,892. What’s next? A game or two in the Women’s European Championship later this month. I can highly recommend it!