I HAVE been steeling myself for the day and it will soon arrive. On a Saturday afternoon, the Hornets will be taking the field at Turf Moor and I will be 600 miles away. I will miss my first Watford match in 25 years.

The day will come when I will start to miss a lot of Watford games for then I will have retired and although it is going to be a little hard to come to terms with, I know I have to face it.

Years ago, I never thought about having a weekend off or a holiday during the football season and, as former staffmen like Andrew French would tell you, I was none too struck if staff took their breaks during the football season.

To my mind, it was an essential part of my job to cover every Watford game, although I was not brought up that way.

In days before motorways, the local journalists at the West Herts Post and The Watford Observer used to miss games beyond Nottingham or below Southampton. They would get a local reporter to write up the game.

The local newspapers and having worked for both, I know what I am talking about did not budget for such travelling expenses.

When I took over in October 1964, having covered a couple of away games in previous seasons, I prepared to follow the similar trend although I looked to push the boundaries somewhat. In order to come to terms with the job, I felt it was essential I watched as many Watford matches as possible.

Ken Furphy had just started as Watford manager and, one day, he imparted to me the news that the opposition football writer was not intending to cover the Hornets at their away game somewhere in the north.

He seemed surprised and I explained such was the custom I had inherited. I did not have the remit to cover every Watford game.

He accepted the situation but on occasions would allude to it, contending that a professional writer covering professional players should watch their every match.

I thought he had a point, but it took some budget-coaxing at the West Herts Post, which was to fold some six years later, to agreed to my travel expenses.

By 1968, the pattern had been established and I became the first to establish an ever-present record in a season. From then onwards, only weddings and car breakdowns prevented me from achieving ever-present records for season after season.

Yet, since 1978, I have watched their every game and some time next season, will have recorded my 2,000th competitive match plus over 300 first-team friendly games.

So it is going to be something of a wrench missing the Burnley game. I knew I had to because I have a small house in France and my wife and I have to see people about work on the property.

I scoured through the fixture list at the start of the year, checked with my wife' work details and we agreed on the Burnley date. There was a clear week beyond it and, it seemed I could miss the game, if I had to miss one, with the minimum fuss.

I booked flights which (thankfully) were subsequently cancelled following a take-over of the airline, but I had already a firm ferry booking, intending to drive down, leave my old car and fly back.

Then the FA Cup run started. Even then I felt relatively comfortable about missing the Burnley game but, next, the postponements started to pile up. By the time the Quarter-Final arrived, I knew I would be missing the Crystal Palace re-arranged game as well. I was feeling uncomfortable.

It was not until Watford overcame Burnley in the Quarter-Final that I realised in the week leading up to the Semi-Final I had scheduled to miss three days.

My attempt to seamlessly slip away, missing one match, had turned into the football equivalent of attempting to leave a party early and unnoticed, only to trip over a mat in the hall, reach out in an attempt to arrest my fall, accidentally grab hold of the front of a woman's dress and rip it off as I fell, knocking her companion's bloody mary all over the wallpaper in the process.

I am going earlier and coming back earlier. Missing one match is bad enough: missing two would be too much. Fortunately, sports editor Anthony Matthews will be at the game.