Monthly Archives: April 2013

What’s in a D anyway?

30 Tuesday Apr 2013

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Monday 29th April 2013 ko 18.15

Witney & District League Premier Division

HANBOROUGH FC 3 (Haggle 56p 90 Lewis 59)

WEST WITNEY 2 (Sparkes 22 Lewis 73)

Att 41

Entry FREE

Nothing for sale

If you drive along the A4095 from Witney to Blenheim Palace in Woodstock, you do pass though some beautiful countryside. From North Leigh (pronounced locally as “Nor Lye”) and the spectacular Eynsham Hall, through Freeland, then its on through Long Hanborough, and Bladon to Woodstock.

Long Hanborough is aptly named, being an example of ribbon development along the main road. The only exceptions are along the roads out to the Blenheim sawmills at Combe, and the road out to Church Hanborough. You can see the spire at that village in a couple of the pictures.

The Oxford, Worcester and Wolverhampton Railway was built past Long Hanborough in 1852, with Hanborough station between Long Hanborough and Bladon being opened to serve the village. The station is best known for being where on 30th January 1965 the body of Sir Winston Churchill arrived at on a train hauled by Battle of Britain Class locomotive Winston Churchill. From there the funeral cortege proceeded by road to Bladon Parish Church, where he was buried.

The problem with the station was devilishly simple though, it was misspelt! From opening to 1993 the station was known as Handborough even though the spelling had long since been standardised!

In more recent times the village has been a byword for quiet affluence, its close proximity to Oxford and the major commuter routes pushing up house prices. Former Neighbours and Spooks actor Craig McLachlan used to live here.

The mathematics of my game at the end of Roosevelt Road was straightforward, West Witney needed draw to take the championship. I don’t know why I don’t watch more of this league, its well run and its website is painstaking maintained. It nominally is a feeder to the Oxon Senior League, which again nominally leads to the Hellenic League, but the practicalities mean little or no transfers take place.

West Witney are well used to winning this league, and warming up they looked confident so it was no surprise when Ian Sparkes fired them into the lead. I thought that would open up the floodgates instead as time wore on they got more and more nervous. Hanborough began to exploit a weakness on the right channel, but Dan Haggle’s penalty following Shaun Rayfield’s poor challenge still saw the visitors with one hand on the trophy.

That changed when Tom Lewis put Hanborough into the lead soon afterwards, but the shock galvanised West Witney, and another Lewis, this one named Kevin equalised with the goal of the game, a fine 20 yard drive. Time to breath more easily? Not a bit of it as the nerves once again frayed as the clock wound down. Jokes were nervously told, substitutes paced and a dog looked nervous.

There was just enough stoppage time for Hanborough to float one more free kick into the 6 yard box. Keeper Kev Trethowan came for it but his weak punch went straight to Haggle whose header went back over Trethowan’s head, and with time almost standing still, gently dropped into the net.

There was no time for a second equaliser, but West Witney will have a chance of salvation next Tuesday evening at home to Charlbury. I wouldn’t bet against them!

 

The Vulture Job

28 Sunday Apr 2013

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Saturday 27th April 2013 ko 15.00

Southern League Premier Division

BASHLEY 2 (Gamble 49 90p)

BANBURY UNITED 0

Att 196

Entry £10

Programme £1.50

In groundhopper parlance the Vulture Job is visiting a ground purely because it’s about to disappear. And which ever way you look at it that’s the case with Bashley’s Recreation Ground or is it? The waters seem a little muddy.

The club play in the grounds behind the village hall (no cats?!!!). The hall was built in 1946 and 1948 an additional 3.5 acres were purchased “to enhance the life of the inhabitants of Bashley.” A lease was granted to the football club to use the grounds and it would appear that the relationship between the two is the root of the club’s move two and a half miles to Wessex League outfit New Milton Town’s Fawcett’s Field. That in turn creates two issues, firstly the FA has banned mergers that would allow a club to improve their standing by artificial means, and secondly Wessex League rules forbid ground sharing.

The result as it stands is a merger by default, with the new club provisionally named Bashley New Milton, with New Milton resigning from the Wessex League. The trouble with this is that the Southern League have vetoed the name change so the club are awaiting a decision from the FA as to whether to overturn the Southern League’s decision.

In the meantime planning permission has been gained for a stand at Fawcett’s Field so as to fulfil Southern League ground gradings, and the move does look set to go ahead, but you wonder if the Recreation hasn’t had its last hurrah, a charity game this Thursday excepted.

And to be honest I don’t really need much of an excuse to visit the beautiful New Forest in any case. The village lies in the centre of the medieval forest, and you do have to watch your speed, in case you encounter the famous ponies, cattle, or in my case a donkey waiting for a bus, on my way out in Burley! Burley Fire Station, incidentally, is thought to be the only fire station in the country with a cattle grid at the entrance.

Another reason to be there was the opposition, I used to live in Banbury, and the Puritans are a wonderful example of a small club who season after season defy the odds to maintain their Southern League Premier status. They do the little things well too, for example their programme is always exceptional.

With all the build-up and conjecture, and the fact that I absolutely HAD to be back in Oxford at 6.30pm without fail, perhaps it was inevitable that the game wouldn’t be a classic. Banbury claimed to have 7 out for various reasons, and although they named two substitutes there seemed scant evidence of them being present, let along actually used. If the team was lacking, then the support certainly wasn’t. They made up over half the crowd, and many wore flat caps in honour of manager Edwin Stein.

Stein is the former manager and player at Barnet, and on the day when they agonisingly lost their Football League status, his current charges ran out of steam in the second half to lose 2-0. The difference ultimately, was forward Mark Gamble. His drag back and shot followed Rob Gradwell’s through ball to open the scoring just after half time.

Bashley lost midfielder Matt Finlay to a red card to two poor challenges, but try as they might, Banbury couldn’t find the energy from tired legs to a find an equaliser. Deep into injury time, a tired challenge brought down Gradwell and Gamble stepped up to score from the penalty spot. It was a fitting final word on Bashley’s tenure on the ground…..probably!

 

 

Battle of Chalgrove Field

26 Friday Apr 2013

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Wednesday 24th April 2013 ko 18.30

Oxon Senior League Division One

CHALGROVE 5 (Godfrey 38p K Coleman 40 Skiller 60 68 75)

YARNTON 2 (Johnson 57 Chalal 80) Johnson sent off 80 (dangerous play)

Att 32

80 minute game

Entry FREE

Nothing for sale

The village of Chalgrove lies about 10 miles southeast of Oxford, and was the site of a small English Civil War skirmish, the Battle of Chalgrove Field on 18th June 1643. The result was a Royalist victory, and the Parliamentarian John Hampden was wounded in the battle, as a result of which he died six days later.

Hampden was one of the 5 members of Parliament whose attempted unconstitutional arrest by King Charles I in the House of Commons in 1642 sparked the Civil War. The towns of Hampden, Maryland, Hamden, Connecticut and Hampden, Maine, as well as the county of Hampden, Massachusetts are named in his honour. A statue of the great parliamentarian is to be found in the Market Square, Aylesbury, and a monument near to where he was shot is in Chalgrove Field.

The football play at the Back Rec’ and it certainly is well named. The only clue I found to its location was the full car park at the village hall. You walk across a smaller pitch, then beyond the tennis courts, then its over a footbridge to the pitch. It feels like you’re walking out of the village and into the countryside. Its bucolic at the end of April, but I can imagine it being bleak in summer. The 13th century parish church of Saint Mary the Virgin provides a quintessentially English backdrop.

This is Chalgrove’s first season in the OSL. They had applications for both this league, and the North Berkshire, Chalgrove lies comfortably in both League’s footprints. Both Leagues accepted them, in fact when I attended the NBFL’s AGM there was a constitution with Chalgrove’s name on it, crossed out! They plumped for the OSL as they felt they would have to travel less.

It’s worked out well for them, as they went in to this game needing a point to confirm promotion to the Premier Division. Perhaps understandably, it was a tight nervy opening few minutes with for me the visitors looking marginally the more promising. One decision, the penalty for an ill-advised tackle, altered the entire game. Yarnton were adamant is wasn’t a penalty but then Chalgrove were just as certain it was! I thought it looked harsh, but it didn’t worry Simon Godfrey who buried the spot kick. That lead was doubled on the stroke of half time by Keith Coleman who fired home following some poor defending.

The second half saw Yarnton come on strongly, and Jay Johnson’s long distance strike was justice at the very least. However, Chalgrove brought on Nick Skiller and in a mere 15 minutes he’d collected a hat trick and won his side promotion.

The final action saw Johnson be on the receiving end of a tough challenge on the right wing. Before the referee had a chance to blow for the foul, he got up, and scythed his opponent down, the ball an irrelevance. Johnson was dismissed, his season now over, but the was correctly awarded to Yarnton. That was floated in, and evaded everyone except for Jordan Chalal who tapped in at the back post for the final touch of the game.

An odd coda to an interesting game that attracted a decent crowd on a warm evening. I for one will watch Chalgrove’s progress in the higher division. They look a well-run club. Just allow yourself a little extra time to find the pitch!

Blessed

25 Thursday Apr 2013

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Tuesday 23rd April 2013 ko 18.00

Banbury, District & Lord Jersey League Division Four

G.Y.F.T.I.D. 7 (S Saleh 14 A Williams 22 Ali 27 Robertson 30p 53 80 Vikanis 37p)

WOODFORD UNITED “C” 0

Att 16 (head count)

Entry FREE

Nothing for sale

On the face of it a game in the bottom division of a local league, on Pitch 2 of Easington Rec’ in Banbury isn’t the type of game to inspire. Add to the mix that the opposition are the 5th XI of a side rock bottom of the Southern League Central Division, with real money worries, and I did wonder whether we’d get a game at all. A few groundhoppers will read this and think, “Well I don’t do reserve sides,” well my only comment on that would be to state that you missed a real gem this evening.

The Easington district of Banbury is a classic case of a village being swallowed up being up by its larger neighbour. It was first noted in 1279  and was a rural estate attached to the former Calthorpe Manor. Over the years the land was slowly built on to the extent that the 1919 Housing Act was followed by the building of the Easington housing estate of 361 council houses in what was one of the first slum clearance schemes in the country.

Easington Rec’ or Park, if you believe the notice at the entrance is a benefit of that planning, a wide expanse of green, with two football pitches, a children’s play area, and a changing room denuded of its windows. On a warm evening it was a pleasure to spend a couple of hours in the company of the Banbury and Lord Jersey League.

Inevitably I had to get one question answered. Yes, you’re probably thinking it too! The answer is Global Youth For Talent In Diversity, and their Twitter biography states that they are “A dynamic organization creating change in the lives of young people.” They are very much the brainchild of Rev Browne, whose quiet authority was an obvious guide to everything his young charges did. GYFTID are a diverse group of people brought together by a love of sport, and it was clear that the whole group pulled together despite obvious differences in race, culture, and experience.

It reminded me of many years ago when I captained my university’s 6th XI. Being the bottom team at college, I got the players no one else wanted, plus those who turned up fancying a game on a Wednesday afternoon. One day I had an away tie, and 3 Asian lads turned up who I’d never seen before. They were dressed “Gangsta” style, in bandanas and tracksuits and on the coach kept themselves to themselves, speaking in Urdu during the journey. Once however they were kitted out and ready to play, everything changed and they were great lads to play alongside and socialize with afterwards. The 19-year-old me learned a valuable lesson that day and I suspect it’s a similar one that the Rev Browne is teaching his young charges.

Except one of them isn’t quite so young. I hope centre half Steve Hatt won’t mind me mentioning his age, he’s 52, and there’s a sparkle in his eye; he clearly loves playing alongside lads half his age. He said, “I don’t mind, I pass the ball, they do the running!”

I enjoyed a chat with stand-in goalkeeper Darius Browne. He’s “Rev’s” son and didn’t mind playing in goal, although he did produce a few saves that did seem to be purely for the spectators, and League Rep’ Paul Harper was serenaded with a few bars of “Ain’t No Sunshine When She’s Gone!”

Paul was there to help referee Gino Spiro in his first adult game, and I if Paul hadn’t told me, I wouldn’t have noticed. He did well, although Rev Browne’s influence was enough to make sure nothing unsporting could happen. When you live by your principles its easier to influence others by them. Rev chose to name himself as a substitute, and it reminded me of the genesis of another local football club started by another Reverend, the Rev John Scott-Tucker in 1893. That club was Headington United, now Oxford United.

Woodford did their best, but bottom with 4 points all season points to a team playing for nothing more than pride, and they will certainly finish the season with that intact. GYFTID could and should have reached double figures, only profligate finishing in the second half prevented that.

In truth, the game rather petered out as Woodford wilted and GYFTID realised that the hard was work was finished. Of course they play for more than just victory in a mere football match, I was amazed when the players came to me to shake my hand at the final whistle. I strolled back to my car having come to a conclusion. Yes my hosts are gifted, but more than anything else, they’re blessed.

 

 

Kim’s Miners’ Welfare

24 Wednesday Apr 2013

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Saturday 20th April 2013 ko 18.15

Notts Senior League Senior League Senior Division

KIMBERLEY MINERS WELFARE 7 (Chaplin 14 Fisher 22 26 50 Baker 54 Beecham 63 Wilmott 90)

KEYWORTH UNITED 0

Att 369

Entry £3

Programme £1

Badge £3

The Nottinghamshire town of Kimberley was known as Chinemarelie in Domesday Book. With the accession of William to the throne Kimberley came into the possession of William de Peveril, and over the centuries the estate changed hands with the turning of each political tide, eventually being sold piecemeal in the 19th century. The town became a centre for coal mining, brewing and hosiery manufacturing, but one by one these closed, the final one, the brewery closing in 2006, after being bought out by Greene King.

When organising these events it is always handy to have an ace up your sleeve, something that will attract the stragglers. Potentially this was Kimberley MW’s last first XI game at Digby Street, as they have taken on the Stag Ground, the home of the now defunct Kimberley Town. That ground needs work to get it fit for use, so the move may be delayed, but I reckon it may well have concentrated a few minds!

Near to here, in 1817, the last attempted English Revolution took place. The Pentrich Revolution started in the village of Pentrich, north of Derby, where they discussed an uprising and a proposed march on London.  It was badly supported and ill-fated, and an agent provocateur infiltrated their ranks, and this ultimately led to their capture and execution. The 9th June 1817 was to be the start of a national uprising that was to include men from Huddersfield, Wakefield, Leeds and Nottingham. Their forces were to meet at Nottingham and then march to London to overthrow the government. Despite the promise of a wider national uprising it was only the men of Pentrich who marched that night. They reached Kimberley, were met by government troops and fled. The ringleaders Jeremiah Brandreth, William Turner and Issac Ludlam were all found guilty of High Treason and were hanged then beheaded on 7th November 1817.

The issue for footballers playing at Digby Street over the years was where to get changed! The players have at various times changed in a local kitchen and in the basement of the local bowling alley. There’s a lot to like here and congratulations to MW for putting a club history in the programme, I’m sure I’m not the only one who likes reading them. The ground lies next door to where the Digby Colliery once stood. The light industrial units, and the railway waggons on the nearby roundabout are the only clue of the coal mining that once took place here. The issue was dealt with once and for all in 1995 when the changing rooms were bought from Calverton Cricket Club!

The club had thought intelligently about how to host their game. Many clubs do barbeques, to the point that when I organise a groundhop I generally advise against them- there is burger overkill after a while! MW’s was an honourable exception to the rule, the queues spoke volumes for its success.

In the clubhouse a printer was set up, allowing up-to-date teamsheets to be produced, but it was the merchandise stall that intrigued me. Kim Hedwall from Stockholm, Sweden is a good mate of mine, we organise a groundhop in Sweden each year, and one of the MW’s shirts caught my eye. It transpires MW’s change kit is yellow and blue, Swedish national colours, and with the shirt having IKEA as the sponsor, well it was a match made in…..well Kimberley!

It set things up nicely for the final game of the hop which looked unlikely to be anything other than a home win. Keyworth needed a win to escape from the bottom two relegation spots, but their resistance lasted a mere 15 minutes. MW rolled in 7 and in all honesty could have made double figures had it not been for some poor finishing. The plaudits should go to Jake Fisher for his hat trick, but this was an excellent team performance from a friendly club, who did themselves and their town proud in the time quite literally in the sun.

The other person they did proud was organiser Rob Hornby. I’ve been there myself, you give clubs an opportunity and an idea, what they do with it is up to them. I’m sure when Rob finished his drop-offs, and the coach was back in the garage and him back home in Mansfield, he looked back on his hard work on the first NSL hop, and feel quietly satisfied. The rest of the hopping world will be grateful he still does it. Thanks mate!

The Forty Bridges

23 Tuesday Apr 2013

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Saturday 20th April 2013 ko 15.30

Notts Senior League Senior Division

AWSWORTH VILLA 3 (Saxton 20 90 Board 57)

COTGRAVE FC 0

Att 266

Entry £3

Programme £1

You really don’t need to look too hard to find evidence of coal mining in this part of the world, although in this part of east Nottinghamshire there was no pit wheel, the mine was open-cast.

Coal mining started here in the 16th century and Huckerby’s Pit seemed to be staffed by 90 or so children with a predictably high level of deaths and injuries. The pit closed in 1899 but the site was re-opened in the 1970’s, again for open cast mining. When that finished for good, the site became the Shilo recreation ground, where the village’s football team now play.

The area was also a centre for glassmaking, and the area behind what’s now the clubhouse was where the factory once stood, suitably close to the coal mine for fuel. Passing both factory and mine was the railway following the route of what’s now the path on top of the grass bank by the pitch side. That branch line curved away northwards to Pinxton. It crossed the Awsworth Viaduct, almost half a mile in length across the Giltbrook valley, but in the local area the span was known as the “Forty Bridges,” though the actual combined number of arches and girder spans was 43!  This viaduct is no more being demolished to make way for the by-pass, but the smaller Bennerley Viaduct is still in place. Unusually the line closed first to freight traffic, in 1943, and to passenger traffic in 1964.

The ground has a peaceful vista over the Erewash valley. One visitor, Kim Hedwall, from Sweden enjoyed in particular enjoyed it in particular, if only because of the huge IKEA superstore in his sights. ” The Swedish Embassy,” he explained.

The grass bank was a popular place for the crowd to sit, eat the delicious stew and dumplings, and watch the game. Awsworth were my choice for best hospitality, the catering was excellent, they had enough merchandise, which Rob Hornby helped sell, and their team sheet was accurate. It set the tone for an excellent home performance against a Cotgrave side who lacked punch up front. In fact it was only the excellence of Jonathan Garton in the visitor’s goal that prevented a rout.

Eventually the Cotgrave defence had to crumble and a reverse pass found Kieran Saxton who fired home from the edge of the box. The goal of game, if not the entire hop doubled the lead, Josh Board’s curling effort finding the top corner in spectacular fashion. That would have been more than enough for Awsworth to win the game but they added a third in stoppage time, Saxton getting his brace from 12 yards out.

As the game wound down I spotted the hoppers quietly checking their phones, and it took a second or two to work out why. You do tend to lose track of what time it is on these events. They were checking their teams’ results, but for those of us on the hop, we’d already had 3 to ponder, and there was another to go!

 

Under Notts Wood

21 Sunday Apr 2013

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Saturday 20th April 2013 ko 12.45

Notts Senior League Division One

UNDERWOOD VILLA 2 (Townsend 45 Tring 45)

WEST BRIDGFORD 2 (S Prince 5 Charlesworth 10)

Att 341

Entry £3

Programme £1

Badge (last one!) £3

Thanks for the excellence of Selston’s traffic operation we were in the village of Underwood in plenty of time. Like our previous location this is a hilltop village with views over the Erewash valley, towards the southern outcrops of the Pennines. It’s a former colliery village, but seemingly has escaped from the deprivation often seen in former mining towns.

The mining heritage is reflected in the club badge with a mine headstock together with a football, bracken, St Michaels church & the crest of the Chaworth-Musters family. Bracken Park is on land owned by the Chaworth-Musters, and they have allowed the club to expand their operations to an area of 5 acres! The current project is a new pavilion which sadly wasn’t quite completed for our visit, but the kitchen part was, so the club made a good profit selling that Midlands footballing staple- Pie and Peas, except that on this occasion there was a choice of 3 types of pie!

Once again the team sheets were inaccurate, and I’m indebted to ace-blogger Peter Miles for giving me the correct line-ups. There wasn’t a moment to be wasted either as the visitors made a flying start. A poor clearance from a corner fell to Sam Prince who volleyed home in spectacular fashion.

Now there is one sure fire way of guaranteeing a goal in a groundhop game is to get Chris Berezai to either visit the toilet or go and buy some food. I’d wondered whether it only worked at events we’re organising, but many thanks Underwood, you proved that his talent is without restriction. Off he went to buy Pie and Peas, and that’s when Jurgen Charlesworth’s stunning, curling volley rocketed into the top right corner!

It set a pattern for the half, with the visitors dominating but all that changed in the final, mad minute of first half stoppage time. Firstly captain Ian Townsend blasted home from more or less the half-way line, then a few seconds later some appalling defending allowed him to round the on-rushing keeper Liam Johnson and slide the ball towards the goal. Did the ball cross the line before Sam Tring applied the final touch? Hard to tell, but if I was Townsend I wouldn’t be very impressed with his team-mate!

The second half couldn’t possibly have lived up to the standards of the first. The sides huffed and puffed but little of note happened. But then Chris didn’t need feeding or anything else. For that I take full responsibility.

 

The Naked Brewer

21 Sunday Apr 2013

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Saturday 20th April 2013 ko 10.10

Notts Senior League Senior Division

SELSTON 2 (Barnes 4 Moore 90)

WOLLATON 2 (Ranson 47  Ranshaw 82)

Att 358

Entry £3

Programme £1

Badge £3

I’d stayed overnight in Long Eaton, so a 10.10am kick-off held no fears for me, particularly as my responsibilities added up to nothing more than turning up and watching the game!

The Ashfield-based village of Selston lies to the east of Nottinghamshire, and its leafy hilltop location was in contrast to our urban environs the previous evening. The local St Helen’s Church dates back to 1150 AD. An older Saxon church is thought to have occupied the site, the monolith in the church yard is evidence of this, and that may well have been of ceremonial importance for pre-Christian pagans in the area.

The football club play behind the Parish Hall, and I was impressed at the way the parking was organised as the street outside is narrow and the potential for a bottleneck both before and after the game was massive. Nevertheless the traffic management was excellent, and there were no delays even when leaving the ground.

The club clearly had decided on a tilt for organiser Rob Hornby’s hospitality award; a marquee had been erected and a local brewery had been invited to sell their wares. That proved to be interesting as the brewer Sarah Webster aka The Naked Brewer uses 13.5-tog duvets to warm her containers in her 5-barrel custom-insulated plant attached to her pub, the Corner Pin in Westwood.

Merchandise was sold and the bacon rolls were fantastic! Where the club fell down slightly was the vexed question of line-ups. Many hoppers, me included, like to jot down the line-ups before the game and the normal method of dealing with this is to get the club to use a flip-chart to record the information. For this hop the modus operandi was team sheets, but Selston printed theirs the night before, and they were inaccurate, negating the whole point of producing them. Still I found referee Andy Rolph enjoying a big cigar, and recorded the line-ups direct from the official paperwork and passed the information on to those interested.

It didn’t detract from a superb morning’s entertainment, with Wollaton hitting the bar after a mere 20 seconds! It didn’t take long for Selston to take command, and Richard Barnes slotted home from a good cross from the left. The trouble was that Selston failed to capitalise and the game got rather mired in ugly tackles and still uglier back-chat. In the final analysis Mr Rolph did well to keep 22 men on the field.

Of course if you don’t take your chances you end up paying, and Dave Ranson’s low finish after a good passing move was a real shock to Selston’s system. It got worse for them as Rich Ranshaw’s superb strike gave Wollaton a lead that looked barely credible 45 minutes earlier. And if Wollaton had carried on pressing, they surely would have won the game. Instead they tried to defend the last few minutes, and paid the price.

The Selston keeper Luke Wigley went up for a free kick from the right, and it was his scuffed header that Tim Moore managed to back-heel in to equalise. It was the last kick of the game. A choker for Wollaton, and a game that the hosts could have won, but fantastic entertainment for the bumper crowd.

 

The Mission

21 Sunday Apr 2013

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Friday 17th April 2013 ko 18.30

Notts Senior League Senior Division

MAGDALA AMATEURS 2 (Sutton 10 48)

BILBOROUGH TOWN 1 (Lucas 22og)

Att 245

Entry £3

Programme £1

Badges sold out

If there’s one thing I like more than a groundhop weekend, its a groundhop I’m not involved in organising! Rob Hornby, apart from being a good friend, is a wizard of organising events in and around his home in Mansfield. He organised the sadly finished Central Midlands League Groundhops, but has now switched to the parallel status Notts Senior League for his annual Bonanza. The format was one game on the Friday, followed by 4 on the Saturday, and with none of the clubs having floodlights it was set to be a busy weekend!

My mistake, in retrospect was not taking half a day off work; Friday night traffic meant I missed the first few minutes of the game, that apparently kicked off a touch early. Never mind, that’s my fault, especially as the Stuart Clarke influence in me likes to get to a ground early and soak the place up.

The club play behind the ROKO Health Club, in West Bridgford, in South Nottingham, and their unusual name takes a little explanation! They were formed in 1895 by the Rev. Gwynne as the side of the St Emmanuel Sunday School based on Magdala Road nearby. They took the name as Notts Magdala, but when a reserve side was added they promptly broke away and became the Magdala Amateurs of today! The first XI carried on, and eventually changed their name to Nottinghamshire FC and also play in the Notts Senior League, just north of the city.

For a club less than 2 miles from a major city’s centre, the ROKO centre’s pitch is quite arboreal in location! It made for an attractive meeting point, in the setting sun, although I did feel sorry for the owner of the car wash in the car park, who must have thought his Christmases had come at once as 10 times Magdala’s attendance arrived only to drive straight past him!

Rob had clearly got the club working along the correct lines, as everyone looked busy. The catering was contracted out to a local sandwich bar, and the merchandise stall did a roaring trade. I found Rob, and donated a bag of programmes towards his charity stall. Then I actually managed to relax and watch the game!

It didn’t take long to work out that Magdala were clearly the stronger team, and they took the lead through Lee Sutton. Only poor finishing and the woodwork stopped them adding to the score and the profligacy was punished when Bilborough equalised when a cross spun off Magdala defender Richard Lucas for a bizarre own goal.

Sutton doubled his tally just after the break and that was to be the end of the scoring, although both sides had chances, the majority falling to Magdala. I watched Rob as the final whistle blew. The first game is always the most nerve-wracking as organiser but his smile spoke volumes. I gave another hopper a lift into the centre of Nottingham, then disappeared into the night.

Saint Nicholas the Wonderworker

18 Thursday Apr 2013

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Wednesday 17th April 2013 ko 18.30

Oxon Senior League Division One

NORTHWAY 3 (Welby 37 Simpson 62 Albin 66)

YARNTON 4 (Steele 4 Marsh 17 Webb 25 83) Marsh missed penalty 34

Att 17

Entry FREE

Nothing for sale

The Parish of New Marston, in Oxford used to be part of Headington, and the cottages and stone fronts of Old Headington soon give way to the red brick and concrete of the newer estate as you head down the hill on Dunstan Road. The vast majority of the estate was built in the  20th century, when the County Borough of Oxford developed estates of council houses around Marston Road and north of Headley Way. The County Borough had built 138 council houses at New Marston by 1938 and added another 70 after 1950. More recently the influx of Eastern Europeans saw the local church in Ferry Road become Russian Orthodox and be restyled Saint Nicholas the Wonderworker. A small gold cupola has been added too!

In the middle of it all is the Northway estate, and the huge Plowman Tower which dominates what is in all but name, a village green surrounded on three sides by roads. The Northway club is a community centre and social club here with the shops and buses leaving city centre bound from opposite the club. It’s nothing if not convenient if you want to watch a game, especially if you happen to live in the first few floors of the tower! As convenient as it all is, Northway cannot progress further than Oxon Senior League football here, assuming they’d want to. There is no hard standing, its barely enclosed, and there’s no cover save for the odd tree. But then again, do they really need more?

And if the delights of the Oxon Senior League aren’t to your taste, the floodlights of Court Place Farm, home to Oxford City are clearly visible a couple of hundred yards away. In fact my only regret in attending this game was that one of the shops wasn’t a Fish and Chips Shop. Sometimes on a windy night, only a bag of chips will do!

Not that there was anything wrong with the entertainment on offer, with two contrasting sides on view. Yarnton are former Hellenic Leaguers and the well-to-do village has been inhabited since Bronze Age times. They looked highly organised with no lack of trainers and looked smart in their club tracksuits. In contrast Northway’s manager did everything, and had clearly arrived straight from work.

Maybe that was why Yarnton made such as good start, they scored 3 in 25 minutes, and missed a penalty 10 minutes after that. What was noticeable was that the Northway heads didn’t drop, and the manager was positive throughout. The comeback started with Lewis Welby’s fine strike before half time, and they managed to keep the momentum going after the break.

I wondered when Yarnton would fine their feet again, but Northway kept piling on the pressure. Anthony Simpson mugged the keeper for the second and when Nick Albin nodded home from a corner there looked to be only one winner, but when a game is this good, there’s sting in the tail.

The Yarnton bench castigated striker John Webb for not tracking back, and clearly stung by the criticism, he let fly from 20 yards, and the ball fairly whistled in! Cruel on Northway, who had nothing left with which to respond. Breathless stuff on a windy night, with 2 friendly sides whose company I enjoyed. I feel a trip to Yarnton coming on!