Monthly Archives: August 2012

Above & Beyond

30 Thursday Aug 2012

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Saturday 25th August 2012 ko 1.45pm

Mid-Wales South League

RADNOR VALLEY 2 (Layton-Morris 33 Matthews 41)

NEWCASTLE 3 (Oxford 22 26 Price 47)

Att 212

Entry/ Programme by Hop Ticket

Badge £3

Another first for the hop on this game, the first ever international! New Radnor may be a mere 16 miles from Newcastle-on-Clun, but the latter is on Shropshire, England, and the club plays in Wales by convenience. That convenience doesn’t look all that convenient as Newcastle won the league last season but were refused promotion to to the Mid Wales League….because they’re English! Continue reading →

Canter

30 Thursday Aug 2012

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Saturday 25th August 2012 ko 11am

Mid Wales South League

PENYBONT 8 (Ruell 5 J Bufton 12 Stephens 21 29 Farmer 21 25 K Bufton 76 79)

ST HARMON 1 (Martin 45)

Att 257

Entry/ Programme by Hop Ticket

Badge £3

When my alarm sounded at the Dolforwyn Hotel , I made a beeline for the window, I really didn’t want rain! Avoiding Martin Bamforth’s gaze, he was out having an early cigarette, I was pleased and relieved to see a glorious sunny day. That changed at Penybont, but fortunately there was enough cover for everyone to shelter.

The first two games today saw the hop dip down into one of the Mid-Wales feeders for the first time. This was due to the club we were due to visit, Knighton deciding 2 months earlier that the town’s annual carnival taking place on their pitch over August Bank Holiday would mean that football couldn’t be played on it! In the end it all worked out in the hop’s favour, as we got two grounds in place of one, and still have Knighton to visit on a “Hop-up” at a later date.

The Powys village is the source of the A488, but it was the A44 which also runs though the village which was the key to the day’s hopping, all the grounds were on the road, allowing a straightforward 4 games in a day. The village used to be a centre for sheep and cattle sales, but it now best known for its trotting Continue reading →

Steamed Up!

29 Wednesday Aug 2012

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Friday 24th August 2012 ko 6.30pm

Mid-Wales League Division 2

LLANFAIR UNITED 4 (G Jones 13 80 Gethin 24 74)

ABERMULE 1 (Anthony 31)

Att 261

I should start by declaring an interest in the next 11 articles. The Welsh Hop is organised by GroundhopUK and I am Chris Berezai’s deputy. So what you read will be very much from the perspective of the organiser!

In this case it meant being at the hop base, The Dolforwyn Hall Hotel, near Newtown, around 11am. That’s been the hop’s home for the last 3 years, this year sadly being the last, as we’ve run out of clubs in the Mid-Wales League! Still this year’s event was a good chance to go out with a bang, and with a record number of pre-booked tickets sold, and a second coach in operation for the first time, we were good to go. Continue reading →

The Aylesbury Ring

29 Wednesday Aug 2012

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Thursday 23rd August 2012 ko 6.30pm

Pre-season Friendly

LONG MARSTON 10 (13 15 23 27 32 33 47 57 64 80)

LONG MARSTON RESERVES 3 (39 41 46)

Att 5 (h/c)

The idea of this was to find a game so as to avoid getting to Lee and Gilly’s in Southam too early. I should explain; they very kindly offered to put me up in so as to give Lee and I a shorter journey the next day to Newtown for the weekend’s Welsh groundhop. The thing is that they only got married in June, and this weekend would be their first apart since the wedding. They’d said nothing, but for me the obvious thing to do was to give them as much time as possible, and since when do I need an excuse to find a game?

Salvation came in the form of the Milton Keynes Chuckle Brothers, James Rennie and Chris Garner. Long Marston vs Pitstone, Ivinghoe and Cheddington United. The latter is a team formed to make use of the ground built for Spartan South Midland League Pitstone and Ivinghoe but with a pitch that’s too small for the league’s requirements.

Long Marston represents a place I worked at around 20 years ago. Not much has changed, it’s still just about in Hertfordshire, and is found on the easternmost tip of the Aylesbury ring, a 31 mile walking tour that is never more than 5 miles from the Buckinghamshire town. The village was the scene of the last witch-lynching in the UK in 1751. Continue reading →

Football under water

28 Tuesday Aug 2012

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Wednesday 22nd August 2012 ko 6.30pm

Gloucestershire Northern Senior League Reg Davis Cup 2nd Round

BOURTON ROVERS 4 (Catling 18 Teague 24 60p Acock 39 )

RAMBLERS 5 (Parsons 6 12 63p Modic 70 Nicholls 83)

Att 27 (h/c)

Entry FREE

No Programme

Tea 70p

For a small boy growing up in Oxford over 30 years ago, a school trip to the Cotswold village of Bourton-on-the-water was an annual treat. Whether the trip was to Birdland, or to the model village, the sun always seemed to shine, and as I drove in via Stow I couldn’t understand why everything seemed so much taller. It took a few seconds to work it out, it’s because on every other occasion I’d visited, I’d been sat on a coach!

The ground is notoriously difficult to find Continue reading →

Wriggle

28 Tuesday Aug 2012

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Tuesday 21st August 2012 ko 19.45

League 2

OXFORD UNITED 2 (Craddock 54 87)

SOUTHEND UNITED 0 Timlin sent off 27 (2nd booking)

Att 6,001 (290 away)

Entry S/T

Programme £3

So many questions remain to be answered, but one statistic is beyond doubt, OUFC are top of League 2 and are yet to concede a goal. So no worries then? Hmmm not sure about that! Oxford’s cause was no doubt aided by Mike Timlin’s collection of the only 2 cards of the game, the last being an utterly daft trip on Jake Forster-Caskey.

Yet all the old frailties were there for all to see Continue reading →

My very own mug!

19 Sunday Aug 2012

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Saturday 18th August 2012 ko 3.00pm

Midlands Regional Alliance Premier Division

SWANWICK PENTRICH ROAD 5 (Wilding 62 71 A Whitmore 64 86 Jeffery 78) Jeffery missed penalty 45

NEWHALL UNITED 1 (Balfour 29p)

Att 13 (h/c)

Entry FREE

No Programme

Tea in a mug 70p

I have to say that this charming little club does have a rather particular name. Consider if you will the small Derbyshire village of Swanwick. It’s a former pit village near Alfreton, and is best known for the German flying ace Franz Xaver Graf von Werra, who escaped from the Swanwick Hayes POW camp in December 1940. He reached RAF Hucknall and was recaptured after trying to steal an aircraft in the guise of a Dutch airman. He finally did escape later in the war, and his exploits are immortalised in the flim “The one that got away.”

But let’s look at that name again, to the best of my knowledge there’s no other team in Swanwick so why have a name that’s so specific? Continue reading →

Competition in other places

17 Friday Aug 2012

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Wednesday 15th August 2012 ko 6.30pm

Gloucestershire County League

TAVERNERS 3 (Spring 50 58 Lees 70)

LONGLEVENS 1 (Dunn 51)

Att 20 (h/c)

Entry FREE

Programme £1

Tea-in-a-mug 70p

I knew this one was going to be tight, from a 5 o’clock start a few miles north of Banbury, a 6.30 kick off just south of Stroud was a big stretch. I used every short-cut I knew, it does help having worked in Cirencester, and lived in Banbury! I made it to Nympsfield Road was seconds to spare. Continue reading →

Pass for passes sake

17 Friday Aug 2012

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Tuesday 14th August 2012 ko 7.45pm

Football League Cup First Round

OXFORD UNITED 0

AFC BOURNEMOUTH 0

Att 3,788 (691 away)

Entry £15.50

Programme £3

I seems like an age since I last watched a game at Grenoble Road, a mere shade under 3 months, 52 games and 3 countries ago. A lot has changed at OUFC, a new chairman, and new players, with others still missing. Michael Duberry is out long-term, having just had a worrying neck operation, Andy Whing’s injured too, and no one seems to know what Peter Leven’s prognosis is. On a trivial note what were the club doing charging £3 for a drastically thinner programme? Continue reading →

Lycidas

17 Friday Aug 2012

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Monday 13th August 2012 ko 7.45pm

Hellenic League Divison One East

MILTON UNITED 3 (Parker 13 Fowler 20p 56)

PENN & TYLERS GREEN 1 (Hurst 77)

Att 68

Entry & Programme £3

After a weekend of football I’d made a mental note to have a day off. However there I was at work, when firstly Peter Grant asked how to get from Didcot Parkway station to Milton Heights, then Chris Powell from Flint phoned for suggestions for good pubs in Oxford. The answer to the first was easy, get a lift from me, and second, I suggested the Turf Tavern (where Bill Clinton didn’t inhale) and the Bear, with its cut-off tie collection. It was clear my evening had been organised for me. Amongst others we were joined by Les Bull, the former Wealdstone FC kitman, and Phil Annets, press officer for the North Berkshire League. It was a most convivial evening Continue reading →