Category Archives: D

Everything & Nothing

16 Tuesday Apr 2019

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Friday 29th March 2019 ko 20.00

East of Scotland League – Conference B

DUNIPACE 0

BONNYRIGG ROSE 4 (Murrell 6 Currie 60 83p Lough 88)

Att 380

Entry £6

Programme £1

Just like last year Robyn and I were sat having breakfast at the Wetherspoon’s at Beaconsfield Services. Our duties were exactly the same as for previous years’ Scottish Hops; meet Doug and the coach at Hillingdon Underground Station, then with Robyn couriering the coach I’d follow behind in my car to Birmingham International Rail Station to meet Chris Berezai. From there Dave Collins and Craig Dabbs would join us, and we’d aim to reach the first ground on the hop 90 minutes before the coach (not difficult with Doug’s mandatory stops) and use the time to make up the programme and ticket packs. Continue reading →

The Pocket Borough

26 Wednesday Sep 2018

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Tuesday 14th August 2018 ko 19.45

Wessex League Division One

DOWNTON 2 (Hooper 67 Prentice 78)

TOTTON & ELING 1 (Gain 58)

Att 78

Entry & Programme £5

There are no end of settlements called Downton, in fact there are at least two in the Wessex League’s footprint. This Downton is a pretty as a picture village in South Wiltshire, the nearest city is Salisbury and you pass by several military bases, to get here, Porton Down being probably the most well-known. Downton is also remembered as being the village that managed to elect an MP without the candidate knowing! Continue reading →

Re-Visitor

30 Thursday Aug 2018

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Monday 16th July 2018 ko 19.15

Surrey FA Meadowbank Launch Event/ Pre-season Friendly

CHELSEA U18 4 (Ballo 23 38 Wiggett 49 Clark 84)

OXFORD UNITED U18 0

Att 600

Entry FREE (by advance ticket)

Programme FREE

Teamsheet FREE

If the visit to Bath City’s Twerton Park was visiting one of the grounds you simply have to see before you die, then back in the day Dorking FC’s Meadowbank Ground was another on that list. Dorking were already struggling following relegation from the Isthmian League and when I visited in 2013 it was to be the club’s last season here. When the ground’s owners, Mole Valley District Council closed Meadowbank down on health and safety grounds, their exile at local rivals Dorking Wanderers’ Westhumble home was to be the death knell for the club. Continue reading →

The Grateful Dedd

13 Wednesday Jun 2018

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Tuesday 24th April 2018 ko 18.00

Banbury & Lord Jersey League Premier Division

DEDDINGTON TOWN 5 (Cook 11 17 49 Atherton 15 Ametller 71)

CHARLTON & DISTRICT 1 (Ball 24og)

Att 13 

Free Entry

If you’re old enough, and you’ve travelled between Oxford and Coventry before the M40 was extended, there’s a fair chance you’ve passed through Deddington. It’s on the A423 between Kidlington and Banbury and in so many ways acts as stopping point between the two. You really ought to pay the “Pie Face” pub for a pre-match pie and a pint.  Continue reading →

Six Ex

14 Wednesday Mar 2018

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Tuesday 6th March 2018 ko 19.45

Western League Division One

DEVIZES TOWN 4 (R Mitchell 25 28 Russell 27 Enderby 80)

BRISTOL TELEPHONES 1 (Britton 75p)

Att 65

Entry & Programme £5

Growing up I suspect I was older than my years. These days one thing I have in common with my younger self was a liking for country pubs, with log fires and wing-back chairs. There was one I used to frequent regularly, the Star (now the Talk House) at Stanton-St-John. I’d sit there, talk complete rubbish with friends and the whole experience was washed down with pint after pint of Devizes’ own Wadworth’s 6X. It seems to me the whole pub had been created in Devizes’ own image, a rural town, based around tradition, a stone castle, and the beer still delivered by horse-drawn dray. You can therefore imagine my surprise when I opened the door to the clubhouse at Nursteed Road, and saw a chap defending himself from being stabbed! Continue reading →

Diamond Lights

15 Sunday Oct 2017

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Saturday 16th September 2017 k0 10.45

North Berkshire League Division 3

DRAYTON 7 (Dennis 8 29 55p 68 S Bolton 15 C Bolton 51 Hughes 57)

UFFINGTON UNITED 1 (Harfield 66)

Att 112 at Rutherford Appleton Laboratory Pitch, Chilton, near Harwell.

Entry by programme £4

In so many ways the North Berkshire Hop is the Hummingbird of the organised hops. We’re off pyramid, we’ve only ever been a one-day event, and we’ve even had another league schedule a rival “Hop” against us. But despite some folks turning up their noses up at us, and a few even telling us it wouldn’t work, just like the hummingbird, that the laws of physics say shouldn’t fly, we’re still here, and still doing things our way.  Continue reading →

Stretching It

04 Wednesday Oct 2017

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Tuesday 5th September 2017 ko 19.45

Eastern Counties League Division One

DOWNHAM TOWN 1 (Sykes 66) Bailey sent off 59 (2nd Booking)

NORWICH UNITED RESERVES 3 (Stewart 7 Will 21 Jackson 74p)

Att 95

Entry & Programme £5

 

A fixture in the Norfolk town of Downham Market is just about as far as I can manage midweek, and it did help that was a slight delay to kick off for a rather unusual reason! Continue reading →

Train Time

28 Wednesday Jun 2017

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Saturday 24th June 2017 ko 14.30

Pre-season Friendly

DENBIGH TOWN 4 (13p 73 77 86og)

C.P.D. LLANUWCHLLYN 2 (82 90)

Att 45 @ Ty Isa, Rhewl. (Rhewl FC)

Free Entry

And Llangollen Railway

Return ticket from Corwen East to Llangollen £15

It was a day of coincidences, another chance to watch a Welsh pre-season friendly in June, and another chance to double it up with a heritage steam train ride. This time the railway was full-sized, although the Llangollen Railway runs on tracks once part of the Ruabon to Barmouth line axed under Beeching. That route included the now Bala Lake Railway which we’d travelled on the previous week! Continue reading →

The Centre of Things

26 Thursday Jan 2017

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Wednesday 18th January 2017 ko 19.45

West Midlands (Regional) League – Division One

TEAM DUDLEY 2 (Pinches 11 Knight 90)

ST MARTINS 2 (Passmore 52 Melusio 54)

Att 115

Entry & Programme £2

I live in Oxford, a city that in parts hasn’t changed much in the last two hundred years, even down to the 17th Century burial route that’s now an alleyway. That certainly is in contrast to much of the Black Country where the soot of heavy industry has gradually given way to the service economy. Nevertheless places such as Dudley, Coseley and Wolverhampton still evoke the past even if their raisons d’etre have long since gone. Continue reading →

Can’t touch Diss

08 Sunday Jan 2017

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Monday 2nd January 2017 ko 15.00

Eastern Counties League – Division One

DISS TOWN 2 (Blakely 34 Webb 74)

DEBENHAM LEISURE CENTRE 1 (Dixon 68)

Att 151

Entry £6

Programme £1

It was regular travel companion Chris Garner that suggested this one. I was scanning the fixtures without success when he pointed out that since the last Eastern Counties League club we’d visited was the Ghosts of Fakenham Town, the next really ought to be Diss Town. He was of course entirely correct, even if you do need to be aware of the music of the The Specials to understand his joke! Continue reading →