Can The Trains Take The Strain?

Neville Dalton is a journalist with the BBC News website and a Portsmouth fan of 40 years. His expressed views are his and not necessarily those of the BBC.

You just knew our biggest match for God knows how long would be accompanied by rail engineering works!

I notice that a fair few fans are looking to use the scenic (but normally considerably lengthier) route via Victoria rather than those so-loved replacement buses between Woking and London.

But are the railways ready for our invasion?

Apparently not quite - but they were at least on to it.

I had a chat with Southern Railway, which runs services between Victoria and the South Coast, in the course of my day job and mentioned the thousands who could be cramming on to the company's trains on semi-final day.

Can you cope? I asked the official.

"I'm sure we will," he replied.

He did say Southern had already spoken to the club, although how clued up it is over public-transport issues remains to be seen. And he said more consultations were planned.

If the Portsmouth Mad message board is anything to go by, a good chunk of our south-coast support heading for London that day will be going "cross-country".

Being a "customer" on Southern's Victoria route virtually every day of the week (of my life, it feels like!), I can tell you that on weekend match days the trains can sometimes be almost as busy as the Sardine Expresses I catch throughout the week.

The prospect of thousands of extra passengers piling on before the trains get to Croydon is enough to conjure images of blue-and-white-clad fanatics (and ordinary passengers) watching helplessly on windswept platforms as trains pull away with their Wembley compatriots pressed equally helplessly against the windows (though with the considerable advantage of being on the inside).

So I suggested to Mr Southern Railway that he might like to take a look at our esteemed message board and gauge for himself the level of interest in forsaking South West Trains for the Victoria cattle trucks that day.

He said he would - and has - and has promised to pass them on to "our train planning boys".

He said he hoped there would be scope to tag on extra carriages to existing services and maybe even a little "elasticity" to allow Southern to run extra services that day.

No guarantees, but at least they're trying.

So if you find the train really can take the strain that day, you can enjoy your semi-final even more in the knowledge that you've helped shape part of Britain's rail network on such a historic day.

And if it can't, don't say you weren't warned.