Matt Grimmer was determined to save the tickets so he could take his two sons to the big game - and so he tried to tape them up
We've all heard the 'dog ate my homework' excuse, but a football fan was left flaming after his dog chewed up tickets to a Wembley final.
Norwich City fan Matt Grimmer, 41, was devastated after his three tickets for the Championship play-off final were chewed up by the beloved family pet.
Mr Grimmer was at a work meeting when his wife Emma, 39, sent a text message on Wednesday to tell him to call home urgently.
Fearing a relative had died, he called his wife and was told that his two-year-old pet cockapoo Freddie had grabbed the tickets from a shelf and made a meal of them.
Car sales manager Mr Grimmer returned to his home in Bradwell near Great Yarmouth, Norfolk, to find that the tickets had been wrecked.
He and his wife tried to stick the 20 remaining pieces together with Sellotape so that he and sons Mitchel, 16, and Myles, eight, could get to the match against Middlesborough.
But when he took them to the Canaries ticket office on Thursday, he was told that they would not be accepted at the Wembley turnstiles.
Father-of-three Mr Grimmer spent several anxious hours waiting for the club to make inquiries to see if he could get replacements.
Finally he got an email on Thursday evening saying that new tickets were being printed for him and his sons.
He has been told to pick them up from the Wembley ticket office at noon on Bank Holiday Monday - three hours before kick-off.
Mr Grimmer said: "Freddie never usually eats things so I don't know why he had a go at the tickets. Maybe he was attracted by the fresh smell of them.
"He must have been wandering around and jumped up to reach them on the shelf.
"He was certainly in the doghouse for a while until we got it sorted out.
"My mates joked that Freddie might even have been Ipswich Town fan.
"But we know that he was born in Norfolk rather than Suffolk as we bought him from down the road in Gorleston."
Mr Grimmer said he had put the match tickets and his Norwich City season ticket on the shelf of a unit in his living room for safekeeping after they arrived.
He said: "When they were delivered, they were on the breakfast bar in the kitchen with the rest of the post.
"I thought I would put them somewhere safe in the living room because I didn't want to risk them being thrown out with the junk mail for recycling in our green bin which was due to be collected.
"Then I went to work and got the message form my wife, saying to call home urgently. I was expecting it to be some terrible news.
"When I called her, she said, 'You won't believe what has happened. Your dog has eaten your tickets'.
"When I got home, I found they were ripped to shreds. I thought he had eaten the season ticket as well, but then we found it pushed under the rug.
"It was desperately hoping that the club would be able to get us some new tickets.
"My youngest son kept saying, 'We are going to go, aren't we dad.'"