My view of the night is a little bit restricted to say the least!!

Let’s start right from the beginning…… 9 ½ months previous to Istanbul. I got lucky!! 4 weeks after this wife announces she is expecting our second child, great I thought, over the moon.

Fast forward to the day after Chelsea…phone calls go around. Are we going to go? How much do you reckon it will cost? The usual questions between like-minded fans.

Now I went to Dortmund on a whim. I booked a flight and took a gamble on getting a ticket out there. It worked and the rest is history.

Back to the present day.

I had looked at prices and they were steep, but had a itchy feet feeling that I had about Dortmund. My mate says no… so do I go on my own……….slight problem to take into account… Baby is due on the 11th May… Give her indoors a couple of weeks to get used to having 2 on her own, 25th should be alright!

Famous last words. We are 2 weeks over and the quack says we are to come in on the 25th to be induced. Now I was in 2 minds, “don’t worry love, it will come out naturally” I kept saying. With each day passing, my faint glimmer of going went.

So cometh the 25th cometh the hospital appointment. In there at 8 am sharp. We get a bed allocated in a ward of 6 each separated by curtains (you know the picture!!). Each with there own individual TV’s.

Well the morning passed with various monitors and midwifes passing by, managed to read ½ of Dan Brown’s Digital Fortress (good book). Time was passing when a lady with a trolley comes around asking if we want a TV. I look at the missus, she looks at me with a knowing look…"You might as well get it just in case”….So we get handed a remote control wrapped in cling film (don’t ask).

6.00 comes around and the missus is starting to feel a bit of movement on the labour front.

7.00 comes around slightly more uncomfortable for her, and anxious glances at my watch for me. We go for a quick walk, it is meant to help start labour.

7.45 I am sat in a maternity ward bed, TV on, wife in labour, trying to listen to the game through headphones we are given. She gets a pain. I turn to rub her back … Maldini scores, missed it, what the feck happened there, I ask her. She looks at me puzzled.

For the rest of the first half I find myself flicking between the TV and back rubbing. I have dropped the idea of the headphones as they just aren’t working out…… Kewell injury.

Then the 2 Crespo goals….

Half time:

“They said to go and have a bath to bring it on” she says. I look at her in despair, not wanting to upset her too much, as I feel that I have been pushing the limit over the last 45 minutes.

“It’s not like you are going to win it now”

Off we trudge, keeping an eye on my watch thinking “quick bath, back in time for the 2nd half”. Oh no, we are in the bathroom for 35 minutes. We walk back to the bed and turn the telly back on, I do a double take, turn to her and call her an unprintable name! 84 minutes on the clock. 3-3 - What the hell has happened.

I watch the rest of the 90 … and extra time… All I can remember is the save by Dudek and Carra’s cramps.

Then the penalty shoot out - now bear in mind the time now… 5 other heavily pregnant women in this ward, all asleep, and a rather nervous LFC fan watching the penalties whilst trying to keep his pregnant wife happy by rubbing her back and saying comforting words…… what a load of crap, she turned around and knew that I was struggling and said, watch the penalties.

I remember them being taken, thinking about Dudek was superb and Bruciesesque. When we scored and Milan missed I would just try to let out a passionate jump and shout, but would end up stifling it to a mere yeeess!! But shaking like mad.

I remember the scenes afterwards and we were then transferred to the delivery suite as her labour had advanced.

At 9.28 the following morning my baby daughter was born…….

I came out of the hospital, listened to my voice messages. I had an Arsenal fan, (who for good luck would phone 15 minutes before every game through out the tournament to wish us luck!!) saying “fair play to you lot.. 5 times now and we can't win it once … hats off to you” (put politely)

And a number of messages from my father in law saying “Please don’t call the child Stan…. IsSTANbul”