Category Archives: G

Meet On The Ledge

11 Sunday Sep 2016

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Sunday 29th August 2016 ko 11.30

South Wales Alliance Division Two

GARW SENIORS BOYS & GIRLS CLUB 7 (James 8 15 38 49 Jeffries 47 Hughes 60 Davies 90)

TREBANOG 2 (Cory 20 Gowan 30)

Att 257

Entry £4

Programme £1

Badge £3

When the decision was made for the Welsh Hop to return to the South Wales there was much to consider. Where to stay? What format of games? Which coach company? You can I’m sure imagine the conversations. The shortest conversation though was the first club we wanted to visit- that simply had to be Garw’s Blandy Park! Continue reading →

Glenafod

30 Monday May 2016

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Saturday 21st May 2016 ko 14.30

Welsh League Division One

GOYTRE UNITED 2 (Harris 6 Ryan 14)

ABERBARGOED BUDS 3 (Maisey 8 Hughes 46 Meacham 54p) Harding sent off (2nd booking) 90

Att c100

Entry £5

Programme £1

This turned into something of a mad dash! The original plan was to watch Margam-based Tata Steel but a deluge over the Neath/Swansea/Port Talbot area saw my game correctly waterlogged off, so using a little local knowledge I ducked under the M4 and made for Goytre. For the avoidance of doubt this is the Goytre that’s near Port Talbot, not the Goytre who play in Penperlleni, south of Abergavenny. It really doesn’t help that Goytre and Goytre United are in the same division! Mind you I remember when you could watch the local derby that really isn’t! Click here! Continue reading →

Decisions

22 Friday Apr 2016

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Friday 15th April 2016 ko 19.30

Welsh League Division One

GARDEN VILLAGE 2 (Morris 36 Matthews 63)

TON PENTRE 1 (Davis 52)

Att 108

Entry, Programme, and Sausage & Chips- Special GroundhopUK deal £7

Back in 2010 I found myself on a working visit to South Wales, so on the basis that no trip anywhere is complete without a football match I pondered where to head. It boiled down to either Gorseinon-based Garden Village or Mayhill-based West End. I plumped for Garden Village, I’ve no idea why, I haven’t yet got to West End, and so I allowed myself a wry smile when Garden Village became the obvious precursor to the inaugural Carmarthenshire Hop. Continue reading →

Worthy

28 Monday Mar 2016

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Wednesday 23rd March 2016 ko 19.30

Somerset County League Division One West

GLASTONBURY 0 Rahn sent off 85 (2nd booking)

WELLS CITY RESERVES 1 (Pledger 2)

Att 47

Entry £3

No Programme

On the face of it, there are one or two who would look at a game at the 12th level of English football and assume that it wouldn’t be worth bothering with. A few more might look at the fact that Glastonbury won the Western League 3 times in 1948/9, 1950/1 and 1969/70 and assume that the ground is a throw-back to past glories. Inevitably, the truth is more interesting than the assumption. Continue reading →

Daedalus

14 Monday Mar 2016

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Friday 11th March 2016 ko 19.00

Lowland League

GRETNA FC 2008 0 Rea sent off 89 (2nd Booking)

DALBEATTIE STAR 0

Att 366

Entry £5

Programme £1

If last year’s Lowland League hop broke new ground in that it was the first hop organised north of the border, it did create one issue for us at GroundhopUK and that was the format. Last year we went for 1 game on the Friday, 3 on the Saturday and 2 on the Sunday, but for a few reasons that couldn’t happen this time round.

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The Rock

22 Tuesday Dec 2015

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Friday 18th December 2015 ko 20.30

Gibraltar League Division One

LIONS GIBRALTAR 2 (Santos 45 Narvaez 53)

ANGELS FC 0 Larouia sent off 87 (foul & abusive language)

Att 65 at Victoria Stadium

Entry FREE

No Programme

I do wonder whether the Gibraltar FA have fixed their kick-off times around flights arriving at the airport more or less adjacent to the ground. My flight from Luton landed at around 7.15pm, and there was plenty of time to clear customs and complete a first, walking back across the runway I’d just landed on, to get to the ground. But then Gibraltar is unusual. Continue reading →

Characters

15 Thursday Oct 2015

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Tuesday 13th October 2015 ko 19.30

Leicestershire Senior League Premier Division

G.N.G. 1 (R Gill 30)

DUNTON & BROUGHTON RANGERS 1 (Weaver 11)

Att 19

Entry FREE

No Programme

One day an ethnically-based club is going to encounter a group of hoppers, maybe even on an organised event, and they are going to make a massive impression (and profit) from simply being different. Let’s look at that idea for a minute; some of my non-footballing friends express surprise that over 1,700 grounds into this odyssey I can still give them details of the vast majority of the places I’ve visited. They expect them to have merged into one generic footballing soup, and to some extent I’ve surprised myself that so far it hasn’t happened. Continue reading →

Aim For The Plane

21 Monday Sep 2015

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Saturday 19th September 2015 ko 13.30

North Berkshire League Division 3

GROVE RANGERS 4 (Pickering 2 Vaux 18 Cramp 21 22)

BENSON LIONS 1 (Radcliffe 88)

Att 154

Entry & Programme £4

Badge £3

The first clubs on my wish list for this hop were Grove and the Lions. They’d kept us royally entertained at the Defence Academy last time round, so it seemed entirely logical that we’d simply reverse the fixture this time. What I entirely forgot about was the full sized model of the De Havilland Venom nearby, marking the site of RAF Grove which closed in 1974, but also I felt also marking the visitors’ links to the RAF. Continue reading →

Gas Panic

21 Thursday May 2015

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Sunday 17th May 2015 ko 14.00

Conference Promotion Final

BRISTOL ROVERS 1 (Harrison 30)

GRIMSBY TOWN 1 (John-Lewis 2)

AET Bristol Rovers won 5-3 on penalties

Att 47,0229 at Wembley Stadium

Entry £10 (Member clubs’ allocation- “Neutral Zone”)

Programme £5

Now I know the Conference Premier is pretty much League 3 these days. I know it’s almost entirely full-time and I know there are many former Football League clubs in its ranks. The vital word here is “Former” though, and take it from me, a fan of a club that did lose its place in the League, it hurts a lot it when you get relegated. You get used to the comments like “How on earth did you end up there?” and every time you go to a game you cheer your club on straining every mental sinew to get back to whence you came. There’s nothing wrong with the Conference, but believe me the fans of at least half of the clubs in its top flight hate being there.

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But It Was Gone

10 Sunday May 2015

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Saturday 9th May 2015 ko 15.00

FA Vase Final

GLOSSOP NORTH END 1 (Bailey 55)

NORTH SHIELDS 2 (Bainbridge 80 Forster 96)

After Extra Time

Att 9,674 at Wembley Stadium

Entry- Complimentary (Many thanks to the Wessex League)

Programme £4

I do enjoy my annual trip to the Vase final, even though on this occasion I found myself photographing the same people I did a few years ago! There’s something touching about the trip to the hospitality seats and seeing all those officials from Step 5 leagues. These people aren’t the career administrators from the higher echelons, these are the people who do it for the love of it, and I do wonder whether when the event will switch to a joint Trophy and Vase day that flavour will be lost in a sea of professionalism? Continue reading →