Friday 27th October 2023 ko 19:45

Southern Combination Premier Division

SHOREHAM 0

Tims sent off 50 (2nd booking)

CROWBOROUGH ATHLETIC 4 (Murraine 59 Killick 62 Pearson 72 83p)

Att 223

Entry £8

Programme £2

I must admit an organised groundhop for the Southern Combination came as a surprise to me. My regular reader might remember that we’d wanted a southern-based hop for a while. That started in 2015 with my unsuccessful attempt to get the Wessex League on board but out of the ashes of that project two things happened. The first was that late Mark Edmonds contacted us at GroundhopUK to organise a hop for the Western League, and around that time I contacted the Southern Combination.

I can’t say I got turned down, more that a conversation went nowhere. Then a couple of years ago Robyn helped to get the Southern Counties East on board to replace the now completed Western, and by this time I’d made full use of the Southern Combination as my go-to league midweek. With a 2 hour window of opportunity from Oxford I soon discovered there is only one club, Hailsham Town that I couldn’t get to for a midweek game.

So when GroundhopUK’s Chris Berezai phoned me to announce this hop I did allow myself a wry smile, but I did think back 20-odd years to the days of the Sussex County League when I remarked that the league was perfect for hoppers, with good grounds, mandatory programmes, and even team line-ups boards way before other leagues got in on the act. Perhaps it was just a matter of time, but driving along the A34, M3 and M27 through the Wessex League’s hinterland I did think back to how hard some folks worked on that Wessex Hop project. I haven’t forgotten them, and never will.

I did have a few worries. The first was the most obvious, that I really didn’t want this hop compared to other Step 5 hops initially. The fact may be that this hop leaves just the Combined Counties and the Spartan South Midlands as the only Step 5 Leagues that have neither hosted a hop nor approached an organiser with a view to an event, but the fact is these events do take time to bed in and leagues don’t tend to compare notes.

I was very keen to get back aboard a coach. While the incident following the Deal Town game was no-one’s fault and no injuries occurred, those of us aboard were fortunate, I simply wanted to get aboard to dispel an unpleasant memory. I know my wife Robyn felt the same way and she was struggling with an infected ankle. She hobbled from game to game, doing GroundhopUK’s media and trying to keep the offending foot elevated.

But more than anything else the weather worried me. The later into the autumn you hold a hop the more of a risk you take with the weather and as if to illustrate the point Storm Babet had lashed the Sussex coast starting on the Tuesday when Robyn and I were at Sidlesham and had continued for the rest of the week. It was obvious that it would affect attendances, particularly amongst the locals.

But given Shoreham and the league had only GroundhopUK’s briefing notes as a point of reference they did an excellent job. I was particularly taken with the prepaid ticket and programme packs including a league badge, handbook, and a Shoreham FC brochure. Added value is important to reward those who back the event, in advance.

Elsewhere, the barrel of Dark Star’s Hophead bitter proved as popular as it always is at my real ale haven of a local back in Oxford and the idea of having the jerk chicken seller in to take the pressure off the burger bar would have worked beautifully had the sub-contracted caterer managed to produce any hot food before kick-off, that hour before is a real golden hour. That put too much pressure on the two ladies with the special menu and boy did they work hard for their club.

But the best complement I can give Shoreham is that everything they did off of the pitch made you surprised at what happened on it. They didn’t look like a club rock bottom of the table, and despite the drubbing handed out to them by Crowborough I still can’t see them in those terms now. Meeting the Crowborough people at half-time was a pleasure, and yes, they’d like to host next time round, assuming of course they’re not in the Isthmian League by then!

In the end both league and host club should look back on this inauguration with no little satisfaction. We headed to the hop hotel near Arundel with an important task to complete.

The coach wheel incident after the SCEFL hop ended with all aboard safe and uninjured due to the quick thinking and skills of our coach driver Shirley. So back at the hotel Chris made a short presentation to her, with a gift from us all as a token of our appreciation.