Category Archives: N

Wheatsheaf

19 Sunday Apr 2020

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With the football season over prematurely due to the Coronavirus Pandemic I’m in the unusual position of actually having this blog up to date! So to keep the content coming, and for something to do, I’ll do some old grounds and games where there’s a story to tell.

Saturday 28th April 2007 ko 15.00

Northern League Division One

NEWCASTLE BLUE STAR 0

WEST AUCKLAND TOWN 3 (Bromley 15 Fairhurst 57p Middleton 87)

Att 42

Entry £4

Programme £1

“Northern Ventures, Northern Gains” 30p

It’s fair to say the Northern League has become good at keeping clubs within its ranks. Few clubs leave upwards, and the league was never an enthusiastic supporter of the footballing “Pyramid” to the extent that it turned down repeated invitations from 1979 and during the 1980’s to become a feeder league for the Alliance Premier League, now the National League. They could have been a Step 2 league, but when they finally entered the pyramid in 1991, it was at Step 5, but even the best part of 30 years later the Northern League is, for my money the strongest league at its level. Continue reading →

New Ground

14 Tuesday Apr 2020

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With the football season over prematurely due to the Coronavirus Pandemic I’m in the unusual position of actually having this blog up to date! So to keep the content coming, and for something to do, I’ll do some old grounds and games where there’s a story to tell.

Friday 15th June 2007 ko 19.30

Division 2 Östra Svealand

NYKÖPINGS B.I.S. 5 (Holmström 39 53 Stensson 64 M Funes 71 Lundgren 85)

AKROPOLIS I.F. 3 (Allyn 64 88 Birras 90)

Att 226

These days there are no lack of “Foreign Hops” aimed primarily at UK-based groundhoppers. Off the top of my head, there’s been ones in Germany, Switzerland, Romania and the Covid-19 pandemic saw one scheduled in Denmark cancelled. The attraction is clear, see football in a new country but have the logistics organised by someone with local expertise. Continue reading →

Wonderland

18 Wednesday Mar 2020

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Saturday 22nd February 2020 ko 14.30

Duchy League Division Two

NANPEAN ROVERS 6 ( Brown 22 R Willmott 35p 66 J Willmott 37 45 L Truscott 81)

BOSCASTLE RESERVES 1 (Joliffe 30)

Att 32

Free Entry

I’m used to the type of groundhopper who’s closed their minds to any football below Step 6. I can understand why they feel that way, the sixth tier of non-league is the lowest where all grounds need to be (amongst other requirements) to be enclosed and have cover. The self-imposed rule acts as an emotional security blanket against the perceived horror of watching a game on a “Field!” What tends to be forgotten is that you can easily see both below Step 6, and sometimes the lack of ground grading requirements is actually a benefit. With that in mind, dear reader, please consider the glory that is Victoria Bottoms. Continue reading →

A Hundred Thousand Welcomes

10 Monday Feb 2020

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Tuesday 19th November 2019 ko 19.45

Leicestershire Senior League – Division Two

NORTHFIELD EMERALDS 7 (Carter-Fell 10 MacIntosh 33 Kewmoss 33 Claricotes 37 Turland 83 Boumedi 83 87)

ST ANDREWS RESERVES 0

Att 36

Free Entry

Here’s a groundhopping top tip. If you fancy an unusual midweek fixture then keep an eye on the Leicestershire Senior League. For a league whose top flight is at Step 7 there are a surprisingly large amount of grounds with floodlights. Moreover, this season the league has expanded so there’s more teams, more grounds and more floodlit games! Continue reading →

Civil 3G

23 Wednesday Oct 2019

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Monday 26th August 2019 ko 17.00

Gwent Premier League Premier Division

NEWPORT CIVIL SERVICE 2 (Edwards 9 86)

ABERCARN UNITED 0

Att 252

Entry £3

Programme £1

If you stick to the basics of it, this year’s Welsh Hop finished at the Play Football Centre in the Bettws district of Newport, but that wasn’t the half of it! Now as organisers we’ve long since used groundhoppers’ liking of matchday programmes as a device to drive ticket sales which in turn give us a steer of numbers, which allows our host clubs plan for crowds far in excess of what they see normally. The modus operandi sees the ticket holders pick up their programmes in a pack at the first game they attend, and with 3 days since the Oak game one of two of the “Big Numbers” hoppers who hadn’t bought tickets had seen the front cover of the Newport Civil Service programme. Continue reading →

Jasper

30 Monday Sep 2019

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Saturday 24th August 2019 ko 17.00

Gwent Premier League- Premier Division

NEWPORT CORINTHIANS 2 (Morgan 32 Brooks 78)

A.C. PONTYMISTER 3 (Clarke 11og Cooper 34 Baston 47)

Att 211

Entry £4

Programme £1

Whoever at the Gwent League that came up with the Welsh Hop’s itinerary clearly didn’t have me in mind! 3 revisits in 4 games on this event is unusual for me, and I’d seen Newport Corries 5 years ago mainly on the advice of Welsh Football publisher Dave Collins. A lot of the reason for going was the backdrop of the transporter bridge. It had been closed back then, so the coach pulled up at Coronation Park this time round with the bridge open, so what did I do? Continue reading →

The Day of the Mad Dog

29 Sunday Sep 2019

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Saturday 24th August 2019 ko 14.00

Gwent Premier League Division One

NEW INN FC 2 (Buncroft 30 James 56og)

RHYMNEY 2 (James 2 Elias 45)

Att 170

Entry £3

Programme £1

If there was one club I really wanted to do well out of the Welsh Hop it was New Inn. Robyn, her nephew Kai and I had visited Woodfield Road 3 years’ ago, we remembered what a lovely hospitable club they were, they thought that they hadn’t looked after us at all well, and I spent the intervening time really wanting them on a hop. So when they popped up on the itinerary the league sent us 3 weeks before the event I was pleased, and then immediately worried. Continue reading →

The Good

22 Wednesday May 2019

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Friday 19th April 2019

12.00 Hellenic League Premier Division

LONGLEVENS 2 (Welch 59 Malshanskij 62)

READING CITY 1 (Darboe 14)

Att 331

Entry £6

Programe £1

15.30 Hellenic League Premier Division

LYDNEY TOWN 2 (Thompson 59p Halford 83)

WINDSOR 0

Att 337

Entry £5

Programme £1

19.00 Hellenic League Division One West

NEWENT TOWN 0

CHELTENHAM SARACENS 1 (Barnard 54)

Att 369

Entry £5

Programme £1

Looking at it selfishly,  the Easter Hop moving from the North West Counties League to the Hellenic was a neat way of me swapping a probable 11 new ticks from 13 games to 11 re-visits. The Hellenic hinterland is my stamping ground, and so many of these clubs I know reasonably well, so for this weekend the pleasure was in the catching up rather than the process of accumulation. Look out for the click-throughs for the grounds as they were when I first visited them. In some cases the changes are remarkable.

Continue reading →

East Isn’t West

24 Thursday Jan 2019

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Saturday 5th January 2019 ko 15.00

Northern Premier League- Premier Division

NORTH FERRIBY UNITED 0

MARINE AFC 2 (Doyle 46 Cummins 88)

Att 181

Entry £10

Programme £2

In groundhopper parlance a “Vulture Job” is heading to a ground that is possibly not going to be there for much longer. Normally it’s because the club is moving to a new ground, and you could argue that this is the case with North Ferriby. However it isn’t certain that North Ferriby are on the move, and if they do move it will certainly be without the agreement of their supporters. Continue reading →

The Surprise

02 Wednesday Jan 2019

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Tuesday 4th December 2018 ko 19.30

Leicestershire Senior Cup 2nd Round

NORTH KILWORTH SPORTS 2 (D Laywood 51 90)

KIRBY MUXLOE RESERVES 0

Att 23

Free Entry

These days, I tend to get the most satisfaction from those “Ticks” that are unexpected. Once you push past four figures of grounds visited, your opportunities for easily reached floodlit new grounds rapidly diminish. I’d been keeping an on Cosby-based Saffron Dynamo for a while, the Leicestershire Senior League doesn’t schedule that many midweek fixtures, but when I checked their fixture for this date, I was disappointed to see the game postponed due to a floodlight fault. But I scanned down, and… “Who are North Kilworth?”  Continue reading →