Category Archives: V

Wooden Heart

18 Wednesday Jun 2014

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Saturday 14th June 2014 ko 13.00

Division 3 Sydvästra Götaland

VÄSTRA FRÖLUNDA 2 (De Sousa 8 Hermansson 72)

LAHOLMS FK 2 (Sulejmani 83 Morad 85)

Att 95

Entry, & Teamsheet 60sek

Badge- Comp

NB On the Swedish hop, the £270 cost covered entry to all games, programmes, coach travel and two nights Bed and Breakfast.

The morning saw the hop party continue to turn heads in the IFK Gothenburg team coach as we went on a sightseeing guide of Gothenburg. Its times like these having a local driver, Ebbe, was invaluable as he negotiated the traffic restrictions and tram lines to the Masthuggskyrkan, or High Hill Church for a truly spectacular view of the city and Göta älv, or Göta river, with the huge container and cruise ships setting sail for distant locations.

From there, we headed into the centre and enjoyed a coffee and cake at Eva’s Paley, a famous Swedish cake shop started by Hungarian émigrés in 1945 and it was the perfect place to watch the Gothenburg tradition of running heritage trams on a Saturday. Continue reading →

Whimper

23 Wednesday Apr 2014

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Saturday 19th April 2014 ko 15.00

Conference North

VAUXHALL MOTORS 2 (Tames 32 Clair 60)

WORKINGTON 1 (May 42)

Att 166

Entry £10

Programme £2

Badge £3.50

It’s a quirk of Rivacre Park that you use a different exit from the M53 to reach it than you do for the car plant. Nominally at least you’re in Ellesmere Port, the Cheshire town lying on the south side of the Manchester Ship Canal from the Wirral. It’s a town built on industry generally, and the efforts of the likes of Thomas Telford and William Jessop specifically. If you’ve not been here, but you own a Vauxhall Astra car, then do drive here, your car will be returning home! Continue reading →

Hope

25 Saturday Jan 2014

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Saturday 18th January 2014

14.00 Malta Premier League

RABAT AJAX 2 (Allopardi 61 Micallef 72)

TARXIEN RAINBOWS 6 (Barbosa 10 Pulo 29 77 82 Santos Silva 36 71)

Att c350

16.00 Malta Premier League

VITTORIOSA STARS 0

VALLETTA 4 (Nafti 26 Agius 28 Dos Santos 78 Nyang 84)

Att c350

At Hibernians Stadium, Paola

Entry €6 (both games)

No Programme

Teamsheet FREE

If you want to find out about what makes a country tick, give its public transport a try. With Andy headed to tick a ground on Gozo I decided to tick one of Malta’s most famous grounds Hibernians, very much in the hinterlands of the country’s capital Valletta.

The bus wended its way along the northern coast of the island, passing past the salt pans at the edge of St Paul’s Bay, then through the small villages due east. Hearing the Maltese language fascinated me. The structure is Semetic, or Arabic and its the only language of its type to have a western alphabet albeit with some adapted letters, there’s an H with an extra horizontal bar for example. However with Sicily only 50 miles north, the Italian influence is clear with large chunks of the language thrown into the linguistic melting pot, Grazie and Ciao being perhaps the most obvious. Continue reading →

Faith

24 Friday Jan 2014

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Friday 18th January 2014 ko 20.15

Malta Youth League Section B

ST VEMERA LIGHTENINGS 0

SABBAR ST PATRICKS 8 (J C Cesare 2p 19 20 Fava 39 41 50 Diacono 43 Vello 60)

Att 13

At Sirens Stadium (Sirens FC), St Paul’s Bay

Entry €2.50

No Programme

So dear reader, if you’re the kind of person who absolutely has to have a programme with every game you attend, or hates artificial pitches, or won’t watch a game unless the home side is the ground’s owner or anchor tenant, then I have a feeling that much of the next 6 articles are going to make you wince. But this is Malta, and they do things very differently here, and for the most logical of reasons. Continue reading →

The Iron

14 Thursday Nov 2013

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Saturday 9th November 2013 ko 16.00

NB-II

VASAS BUDAPEST 1 (Gál 26)

SZIGENTSZENTMIKLÓS 1 (Takács 51)

Att 800

Entry 2000 HUF (approx. £5.62)

No Programme

Team Sheet FREE

From Elóre it was simple enough to get to the Stadion Rudolf Illovszky, just take the “1” tram still further away from Népliget passing the Puskás Ferenc Stadion before taking the “14” tram a few stops north-east in Budapest’s 13th district. If you’re travelling here by Metro the nearest stop is Forgach on the M3 line.

The club dates from 1911 and was set up by members of the Hungarian Union of Iron Workers,  as the Vas-és Fémmunkások Sport Clubja, the “Sport Club of Iron and Steel Workers.” Continue reading →

Rewritten by machine on new technology

12 Tuesday Nov 2013

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Friday 8th November 2013 ko 19.00

Hungarian NB-1 Liga

VIDEOTON 1 (Kleinheisier 87)
MEZŐKÖVESD ZSÓRY 0

Att 2,300

Entry 2,200 HUF (approx. £6.20)

No Programme

Videoton play in the town of Székesfehérvár, about 65km south-west of Budapest. The distance is significant if you’re taking the train from Budapest-Déli pályaudvar, or Budapest South station, as return tickets aren’t available for journeys of less than 100km. Its easy enough to buy a single ticket costing 1300 HUF, around £3.67, as ticket machines have an English button!

Simply getting to Déli pályaudvar is interesting though if you travel from the south on the metro, you’ll use the Russian-built M3 line then change to the more modern, western-style M2 line. That theme of old and new cheek by jowl was a constant wherever Andy and I travelled.

Szekesfehervar, or to translate Continue reading →

The Deer Park

03 Monday Jun 2013

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Thursday 30th May 2013 ko 19.30

Division 4 Mellersta Stockholm

VÄRTANS IK 3 (Morales 13 Sjöde 77 Isimeme 84)

BAGARMOSSEN/KÄRTORPS BK 1 (Sheriff 34)

Att 46

Entry FREE

No Programme

Recent events looked like making my attendance at the 7th Annual Swedish Groundhop impossible, but I was able to catch my plane to Arlanda, then the Pendeltåg, or suburban train in to Stockholm central.

I’d wanted to be in Sweden a day earlier than the rest of the other hoppers, as with there being a collection from two flights the next day, an extra pair of eyes and hands are useful. These groundhops are organised by Joachim “Kim” Hedwall, and specialise in the games of football that are a little off the beaten track, in short the games that I, and many others watch during the rest of the season in the UK! I act as his deputy, dealing with the UK end of things and offering help and advice when Kim requires it.

It gave me the chance of a bonus game too. If you take the Red T-Bana line to Ropsten you get to visit Continue reading →

Water…everywhere

24 Saturday Nov 2012

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Saturday 24th November 2012 12.00pm

We’ve had a lot of rain in the south of England these last few days, so when I went for a drive to one of my stomping grounds in north Oxford, I decided to bring by camera for the ride.

I didn’t actually reach my destination, but sometimes the journey is more interesting isn’t it? The area around the River Cherwell is notorious for flooding, it’s why during normal weather its something of a green oasis just off the centre of the city. But when there’s significant rain, well the whole look of the place changes….

The Victoria Arms sits in the middle of it all, on top of a peninsula jutting out from Old Marston. That settlement has a split personality, the old village retaining the “Olde Worlde” feel in contrast to suburban New Marston. The pub describes itself as “The Pub by the river,” but today is was more like “The Pub by the lake.” Normally you can punt from the city to here, but not today!

The pub holds a few memories, my mate Dave used to be chef here, and I took Peter and Mao from Osaka here when they visited last February. It really is a lovely quiet spot, and a darned good pub. Yes, it is still open and the road down to it from Old Marston is on high ground!

Sweet Surrender on the Quayside

26 Monday Mar 2012

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Saturday 24th March 2012 ko 3.00pm

South West Peninsula League Division One West

VOSPERS OAK VILLA 10 (Edwards 4 Fort 6 16 69 Almond 10p Jasper 34 38 83 Honeywill 50 Scholes 90)

PERRANPORTH 0

Att 34

Entry & Programme £3

Tea 50p

Pasty £1.20

This was a bit of a crazy day for me. Perhaps it was because I’d spent Friday evening in Witney catching up with some old workmates over a chicken madras and a beer or 10, but in the morning I set out towards Dorset to visit another old mate, a full week early! By the time I realised, I was in Dorset, so I needed a Plan B, and quickly!

There really was only one bloke to call given where I was, Sammo, or to use his proper title, Mike Sampson, press officer for the South West Peninsula League. He confirmed that Vospers Oak Villa in Plymouth were kicking off at 3, and that another mate, League Football Secretary & Web Master Phil Hiscox would be there too. From a groundhopping perspective Phil’s the chap that organises the popular groundhop the League hosts. It was good to speak to a fellow organiser, and look forward to when the League will have sufficient new grounds to host another Easter extravaganza.

Plymouth holds mixed feelings for me. I’ve always enjoyed my visits to the dockyard town for both football and for tourism. I attended Mike Sampson’s 60th birthday bash at Plymouth Argyle around 18 months ago which was a great night out. Sadly it was the last public appearance I made with my wife, before we separated 2 months later. So, yes, mixed feelings.

Vospers Oak Villa started their existence as Oak Villa in 1912 in what was known as the United Churches League and the club operated from St Phillips Church in Bridwell Road, in Plymouth. To play you had to be a member of the church, and the club’s name was taken from an old cottage at Camel’s Head where the first meeting took place. The team moved to Weston Mill, so adopted the name Weston Mill Oak Villa and rose up through local leagues, through to the Devon County League, and became founder members of the SW Peninsula League league in 2007.  The club is now known as Vospers Oak Villa, thanks to the sponsorship of Peter Vospers, of Vospers Motorhouse.

The Weston Mill ground is on the western edge of Plymouth close to the Devonport Docks, and the Tamar bridge linking Devon to Cornwall. It’s the Tamar Bridge that gives the league its logo. It has to be said that the ground will win no awards for beauty, or facilities, but the welcome was as warm as the weather. There’s a railed off pitch but no cover, and the only hard standing is via a disused 5-a-side pitch, itself a victim of vandalism. The gateman was exactly that, a man by a gate, with a bag of a programmes.

I’d seen a league table and thought this looked a home banker. Perranporth had only 7 points to show for a disastrous season, but the home officials didn’t seem confident, citing the departure of the management team looming at the end of the season, and a poor run of form. They could not have been more wrong, as the visitors played the vast majority of the game with ten men. Worse still their regular goalkeeper was unavailable (their officials said he was watching Arsenal, but then he is the recently departed manger’s son!), and the backup goalkeeper Ryan Barnes was sporting a broken thumb, so he was pressed into service in midfield, and midfielder Jack Bradshaw was pressed into service between the sticks. It didn’t work to put it mildly!

3 goals in 10 minutes set the tone, and at that point I honestly thought I may have been heading towards my highest aggregate score of 20. That I only got halfway was down to Bradshaw’s efforts, despite obviously not being a goalkeeper he threw himself at everything, and the fact that Villa eased off for periods playing an ineffective brand of champagne football. Joe Jasper and Stuart Fort will no doubt argue over who gets the match ball (is there a procedure for that?) but for me the man of the match was the unfortunate Jack Bradshaw who like his team-mates was there when it mattered. It would have been so easy for Perranporth to have simply not turned up. For that they deserve credit.

I should also thank Sammo for putting me up for the night and feeding me a huge breakfast Sunday morning. Thanks mate, and see you in Sweden!

Buster Gut

08 Thursday Mar 2012

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Wednesday 7th March 2012 ko 7.45pm

Wessex League Division One

VERWOOD TOWN 2 (Satterley 52 Lloyd 84og)

BROCKENHURST 1 (Lloyd 72)

Att 118

Entry £5

Programme £1

Verwood is the first town you reach after crossing west from Hampshire into Dorset. The name derives from Fair wood, and the arboral feel still exists today, both in the town, and Potterne Park where its football team plays. The town seems to be very good at producing actors, as Lionel Jeffries, Jessie Matthews and more latterly Buster Merryfield (Uncle Albert in “Only Fools and Horses”) all hailed from here. Former King Crimson vocalist Gordon Haskell is also from here. The Monmouth Ash pub is reputed to mark the spot at which the Duke of Monmouth hid from his pursuers in a tree after his ill-fated rebellion in 1683. It didn’t work well, as he was beheaded in 1685!

Potterne Park is a country park on the southern edge of the town, and since other than the walking areas, there’s also space for cricket and a BMX/Skateboard track, the place can be difficult to find. It didn’t help that I was running late due to hold-ups leaving Banbury, and it is on the outer limits of what I can get to from a 5pm start. I reached the ground about 10 minutes before kickoff after pushing myself and the car a little too much!  I was fortunate that Mike Woodward was there to buy me a programme and confirm that the club had posted the lineups on a whiteboard. Many thanks Mike!

With the club top of the league frantic efforts are being made to get the ground up to Premier Division standards. The footings for a Paybox are in place and a new fence will go up behind the far goal, the only inaccessible side of the pitch. The 4 “Arena” stands are in place, two with seats, two without. For the football ground purist that’s what’s wrong with the place. The club has only been in the Wessex League since 2004, when the league absorbed the Hampshire League, and so the ground has had to keep pace with grading requirements since then, and from being little more than a pitch and a set of changing rooms. There’s simply been no time to create “Character.”

What is beyond reproach is the team. A point clear of Team Solent and with two games in hand before this, they looked a fine outfit against another good team as Brockenhurst are fourth. The best description of the match I can give is that for a large percentage of it I thought I was watching an Premier Division game, as the teams maintained a breakneck pace, while maintaining a decent passing game.

It took time for the first goal, Jack Satterley being put clean through to fire home. There was an element of controversy about the equaliser. A corner was played in from the left, and headed back from the far post for centre-half Ross Lloyd to nod home at the near. The Verwood players thought the ball had been headed back from beyond the goal-line, but from where I was stood behind the goal, it looked fairly clearly in. In the final analysis it didn’t matter as Lloyd was to score against rising beautifully again, but this time to inexplicably to head past his own keeper following a cross from the right. He will no doubt blame his defensive colleagues for not shouting that he was under no pressure, and it was notable that no-one commiserated with him afterwards.

Rough on him and rough on Brockenhurst whose performance looked worthy of at least a point. I drove home considerably slower than I did a couple of hours earlier!