His FA Cup runneth over

My press-credential request had met decline, the far-flung hamlet of Los Angeles losing out to excessive demand from Portsmouth and Welsh media. (Fair enough.) My ticket search had been half-hearted and racked by guilt pangs about hogging the seat of somebody who'd suffered decades for this. (I'd non-suffered for 20 months.) I arrived at the pub, the stadium visible out the window, trying to picture the seat I might've had occupied by somebody who'd lived through the 1970s. (That's when Portsmouth languished in the fourth tier of English soccer, or barely north of oblivion.)

"Before the kickoff today, I was in tears," said Pompey fan Ted Hill, who'd spent 40 years craving a day like Saturday as opposed to my two seasons spent crying when "we" beat Manchester United in April 2007 and following a club incessantly in the league's top 10, including eighth for 2007-08, best finish since 1956 -- and now . . . this.

This: the rarest of days, May 17, 2008. The FA Cup, the cherished season-long tournament that runs concurrently with the league season, had its first final since 1991 lacking any of the four mastodons. It had Portsmouth, which two springs ago almost plummeted out of the Premier League, but which won, 1-0, at Manchester United in a quarterfinal in March. It had Cardiff, 12th in the second tier, first Welsh club in the final since 1927.

It had dreamy-eyed fans singing songs on the Jubilee Line of the Tube, the Welsh fans crooning words that indicated a certain distaste for England. It had a blue army against a blue army, both fan bases chanting "Blue Army" to achieve redundancy.

Then it began, and the Nigerian striker Kanu steered in a goalkeeping error in the 37th minute for Portsmouth's goal, and Pompey withstood about 20 closing minutes of intermittent pelting.

"Petrified," Hopkins said.

"I kept thinking they would score," a blue bear said.

"And it just dragged and dragged," Hopkins said.

"Massive relief," Pawsey said.

Finally, a whistle, and I confess to a trace of mist at the big-screen sight of Harry Redknapp, Portsmouth's 61-year-old English manager awarded his first major cup. I relished seeing the 30-something veterans, defender Sol Campbell and goalkeeper David James, seemingly as elated as the fans. And I loved hearing later that a blue bear almost cried and probably would have "if I wasn't in a stupid suit."

I ran back to the stadium to see grins on fans filing out and hear one of many men in curly blue wigs saying, "Heaven! I'm gonna wake up! Pinch me! Pinch me!"

Hill: "Total euphoria, like all your Christmases come at once."

And wearing my navy-blue Portsmouth jacket in a case of clear bias, a fan after years of shunning fandom, I felt just a hint of what fans do feel when daydreams do come. So I guess I probably should get back to the press box and shut up before I become some crowing nuisance.