It felt like a throwback - a walk into the past - when I arrived in Ipswich at the weekend.
Somehow, amid the countless trips to watch and report on football, Portman Road had always passed me by, and it was the way that club connected to its place which lifted the soul. 'Always Proud. Always Ipswich, Always Suffolk' read the legend on the wall outside the club store.
There was no mistaking who was in town, because of the strains of 'We're the Park Lane Tottenham' issuing from the railway station at 6pm, after a 4-1 win for the day's visitors.