Tuesday 19th December 2023 ko 19:45

Isthmian League Cup 4th Round

CHATHAM TOWN 3 (Evans 64p Isiaka 70 84)

BASILDON UNITED 1 (Fitzer 90)

Att 453

Entry £12

Programme £2.50

Mulled wine and mince pies- Free!

In the groundhopping scheme of things, someone travelling from Oxford to Chatham to watch a game isn’t that unusual. What was, was that when I made the decision to head to Kent I was sat in the car park at Ipswich Town’s training ground! I’d arrived there precisely 7 minutes after they’d postponed the game, and with my evening game at Little Oakley quickly succuming to waterlogging too, it was time to play the 3G card.

The catch, if you can call it that that I’d visited the Maidstone Road Sports Ground 17 years earlier. Oddly I watched Quested beat Enfield Rangers 6-2 in the FA Sunday Cup here back in December 2006. It’s fair to say the ground has changed a little since then!

When the changes are this manifest I usually end up finding a quiet spot to allign what I’m seeing with my memories. I’d picked my spot, then had the pleasure of spotting Andy Short. Andy’s secretary at Hythe Town and was instrumental in getting the SCEFL Hop set up a couple of years ago. I knew he’d been unwell so seeing him happy and healthy was a real filip.

Seeing Basildon United again made my smile too. I remember them with their old floodlights, and struggling to get anything like a half-reasonable set of photos when I visited them. I also remembered that they play at one end of Gardiners Close and that oddity of circumstances that saw me and a few other hoppers watch games at both of the other grounds there, on the first Saturday after lockdown!

The Isthmian League Cup threw up a difference of leagues here, with the hosts second in the Premier Division, and United 5th in the First Division North. So you’d have thought by the the score that the game went completely by the form book wouldn’t you? It really didn’t, particularly in the first half.

The truth of it was that Basildon missed enough chances before the break to have caused an upset. But with the game at a stalemate, Chatham brought on the big guns, and little more than a quarter-of-an-hour later had all-but-won the game. There was one little source of amusement to it all though if you have a working knowledge of Basildon, and it concerns Chatham’s choice of goal music.

On just about any occasion playing “I just can’t get enough” by Depeche Mode is neither here nor there. I suspect given the band are from and attended the James Hornsby School in Basildon the tune may just have been a little irritating to the visitors! Equally I’m fairly certain that the PA man didn’t realise either!

But given the slightly frantic nature of my arrival the point was as much the ground as it was the game. It’s obvious Chatham Town are well-resourced and going places, the ground improvements are proof positive of that! The question is of course what I’ll find here in another 17 years!