Reds & Blues

07 Friday Nov 2014

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Wednesday 5th November 2014 k0 19.30

Welsh League Division 3

CARDIFF GRANGE HARLEQUINS 2 (Cawley 15 Dabusso 52)

BRIDGEND STREET 3 (Penekett 37 Kane 55 Dunfold 75)

Att c33

Entry £3

Programme- None. The club puts a downloadable version on the results section of their website, but the website hasn’t been updated for a while.

It’s a long time since I first encountered the Grangetown-based team, taking a 7-0 drubbing away at Plas Kynaston Lane, then home to Cefn Druids in January 2006. That was during Quins one season in the Welsh Premier League, an unhappy experience for them, their chances of survival stymied by a major sponsor pulling out just before the start of the season. A year or two later I went to see them at their home at Leckwith Stadium, and even now there are still echoes from that time. Continue reading →

Stiff Little Fingers

06 Thursday Nov 2014

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Tuesday 4th November 2014 ko 19.30

Western League Division One

RADSTOCK TOWN 4 (Carter 6 Harvey 26 Hardiman 89 Metcalf 90)

WINCANTON TOWN 2 (Jordan 68 Chant 90)

Att 61

Entry £6

Programme £1

Perhaps its just my ignorance, but until I visited nearby Welton Rovers, you can see their lights as you travel south from Bath, I didn’t associate Somerset with coal mining. That was genuinely my error, the pits were started in the late 18th century and at one point were owned by the Waldegrave family, you may remember MP William Waldegrave, but the last pit finally closed in 1973. The clues are still there, be it the “Miners” nickname of the football club, or the rows of terraces miners’ cottagers as you climb the hill towards the Southfields Recreation Ground. Continue reading →

Blood swept Lands and Seas of Red

31 Friday Oct 2014

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Let’s start with the facts, this is the moat of the Tower of London, gradually filled with 888,246 ceramic poppies each representing one British military fatality during the First World War.

The Poppies were designed by Paul Cummins, with setting by stage designer Tom Piper, and over the last few months the moat has gradually filled with a sea of red. In time the poppies will be sold, with 6 charities benefitting, but what is it like to visit? What does it look like, and more importantly how does it make you feel? Continue reading →

Malted Milk

29 Wednesday Oct 2014

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Tuesday 28th October 2014 ko 19.45

Midland League Division One

UTTOXETER TOWN 3 (Curley 15 85 Redshaw 80)

ATHERSTONE TOWN 1 (Storey 49)

Att 227

Entry £3

Programme £1

The Staffordshire town is reckoned to have had 79 different spellings of its name since its mention in the Domesday Book as “Wotocheshede” Perhaps now you know Uttoxeter now for its racecourse, or for Fox’s Malted Milk biscuits, or even Samuel Johnson’s penance. Dr Johnson’s father ran a bookstall on Uttoxeter market, and young Samuel once refused to help out on the stall. When Johnson was older, he stood in the rain (without a hat) as a penance for his failure to assist. Now Uttoxeter has another reason to be famous, its football team. Continue reading →

Moonlight Mile

26 Sunday Oct 2014

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Saturday 25th October 2014 ko 14.00

South Devon League “Herald” Cup 2nd Round

BEESANDS ROVERS 4 (Burt 23 Bailey 28 J Tucker 48 D Tucker 81)

KINGSKERSWELL & CHELSTON 0

Att 18

Entry FREE

Programme NO

Let’s answer a question I get asked a lot, how do I pick my games? The answer is that it varies. Sometimes they pick me- I get invited, sometimes I’m there because I’ve organised it, or sometimes there’s a touch of whimsy in my choice. In this case, I decided to dip into my list of quirky “off-piste” grounds I wanted to visit. Continue reading →

Avoidance of Doubt

26 Sunday Oct 2014

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Tuesday 21st October 2014 ko 19.45

West Midlands (Regional) League Premier Division

WELLINGTON FC 0 Fisher missed penalty 41

MALVERN TOWN 1 (Hooper 82)

Att c50

Entry £4

Programme £1

I suppose the league gives the game away that this is the Wellington that’s around 5 miles north of Hereford, not the version just a few miles from the M5 in Somerset. The Herefordshire team are Wellington FC, the Somerset club are Wellington AFC!

Or in my terms this club are the team close to the junction where I very nearly drove the wrong way up a dual carriageway! The turn-off for the village is at a point where the A49 goes from dual to single-carriageway, and I misread the white lines briefly, and was fortunate to spot an arrow pointing towards me a yard or two later. A quick volte-face saved face, so be warned! Continue reading →

Common Decency

24 Friday Oct 2014

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Monday 20th October 2014 ko 19.45

Southern League Premier Division

HITCHIN TOWN 2 (Webb 50 Burns 68)

BANBURY UNITED 0 Jervis sent off 41 (dangerous play)

At 288

Entry £10

Programme £2

As a groundhopper I don’t revisit many grounds, but Hitchin’s Top Field is definitely one to provide an exception to that rule. Perhaps its the wooden terracing, or the low slung stand, full of nooks and crannies, or the clubshop that you never quite know what delights will be on sale there. Last time I visited I bought a book on FC Start that toured with me in Sweden! Increasingly architecture on all buildings, not just football grounds is becoming more bland, so the potential loss of the Top Field is particularly hard to stomach.

Continue reading →

Rogues Gallery

23 Thursday Oct 2014

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Tuesday 14th October 2014 ko 19.30

Leicestershire Senior League Premier Division

COTTESMORE AMATEURS 1 (Mackie 21)

SILEBY TOWN 3 (Coggan 5 Jelly 11 34)

Att c30

Entry £2

No Programme, Old Copy £1

It is odd that England’s smallest county Rutland has clubs at two different leagues at the same level. Uppingham, Oakham and others play in the Step 7 Peterborough & District League but the anomaly is that Cottesmore play in the parallel Leicestershire Senior League. With my GroundhopUK hat on another set of floodlights in the PDFL with a Rutland hop scheduled for next season would have been handy! Such is life, and with plans for next July’s event well progressed the weekend should be a hugely enjoyable one.

Continue reading →

Glasshouse

22 Wednesday Oct 2014

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Sunday 12th October 2014 ko 15.00

4de Nationale A

K STANDAARD WETTEREN 1 (Droessaert 90)

SPORTING WEST HARELBEKE 0

Att c270

Entry €10 (all areas)

One advantage of the Sobemai game finishing sooner than we’d planned was that we reached the East Flanders town of Wetteren earlier than we expected. The town is most famous for the explorer Émile Pierre Joseph Storms who was born here and did much to open up what is now the Congo to western influence, and expand the Belgian empire in the late 19th century. Continue reading →

Coffee Football

17 Friday Oct 2014

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Sunday 12th October 2014 ko 10.00

Voetball Cafeploeg

FC SOBEMAI 1 (Dabart 60og)

WEST EIND & BOOGARDE KERMIS 3 (G-J Savat 39 44 van Waryenberge 60)

Att 42 at Stadion Edelharte de Lille, Maldegem

Entry FREE

Programme NO

I could tell you about how we got up at 5.30am to do this one, or about the fog on the motorway from Luxembourg, and even the guilt that three of us felt when we all fell asleep just after crossing into Belgium leaving an exhausted Lee to drive for 3 hours plus listening to us snoring!

We reached the East Flanders town of Maldegem, diverted to avoid a Sunday Flea Market, crossed the narrow gauge tracks then turned left into the Stadion Edelharte de Lille, just 7km south of the Dutch border. Our collective jaws dropped, leaving any other tale I could tell utterly redundant.

Continue reading →