When selling tickets for the cup draw at Norwich City, the Seagulls' ticket office were careful to tell purchasers of certain limitations.

The away stand, they said, offered an "impaired view" of the game.

A statement of supreme irony and the most magnificent understatement, as over 1,500 Brighton fans were to discover after they'd made the long and snowy haul up to Carrow Road.

In the days leading up to the match the omens were not good. Great swathes of the country were under water and the torrential rain was replaced by snow and ice so it was reasonable to question the likelihood of the match going ahead. But all was well, according to Norwich City who gave out reassuring messages about how well the pitch drained and why, as a result, a postponement was out of the question.

And so the travelling Blue and White striped army set forth early on Saturday morning, hoping that, as on Boxing Day, Delia's Dish of The Day might be 'Stuffed Canaries.'

Arriving in Norwich with time to spare before kick-off, the walk to Carrow Road was accompanied by a small blizzard and many fans were happy to huddle into the refreshment area and warm themselves by eating all of Delia's very nice pies.

Pies of such quality, it has to be said, when looking back on the debacle to follow, that they deserved to be exempt from the universal vote of contempt for the rest of Norwich City's performance.

It was during this piefest that the lights went out, an event received, as expected, by shouts of "Give them 50p for the meter."

And so we laughed - which was our first mistake - because while the rest of our stay at Carrow Road was certainly laughable, the experience was far from funny.

Eventually, after many messages thanking us for our patience, and several bizarre security messages reminding us that "Mr Carrow is in the Ground," the lights were restored.

All was still not well, however, and it became clear that a capable electrician was going to be more use than "Mr Carrow" no matter how many times that gentleman popped in and out of the ground.

To cut this dismal tale short before post-traumatic shock sets in, the match was officially declared off at about 3.40pm - before it had started.

Apparently the electrics were still untrustworthy and the Safety Officer had, quite sensibly, decreed that there would be safety issues if there was another power failure.

Very many unhappy fans filed out of Carrow Road into another blizzard and, while sitting in the endless queue to get out of the car park, many listened to Radio Norwich's phone-in.

During which unhappiness turned to something murderous as various spokespersons for the club complacently invited us to believe that events were wholly "out of their control."

Out of control things certainly were, but if making sure the stadium had working electrics wasn't something the club could control it's an unrealistic leap of imagination to work out who else should bear responsibility.

But as the week wore on things went from bad to worse, starting with the so-called "compensation package" offered to Albion supporters.

As most Brighton fans incurred costs of up to £50 or more travelling to a game that never happened, Norwich City intend to keep our supporters contentedly compensated by means of a £2 refreshment voucher.

This magnificent gesture will only be available to away fans attending the re-arranged evening game next Tuesday which makes it an even more insulting offer especially since they plan to compensate their own fans with heavily discounted travel to an away game of their choice this season.

Top this off with Norwich's announcement of their intention to recoup 50 per cent of their losses from the Albion and you conclude that the current Dish of the Day at Carrow Road is, in fact, Pig's Ear.

roz@southspark.co.uk