Tag Archives: Chris Berezai

Loads Here Already

18 Thursday Aug 2016

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Sunday 31st July 2016 ko 14.00

Peterborough & District League Premier Division

SAWTRY 0

STILTON UNITED 2 (West 77 Denning 81)

Att 534

Entry £4

Programme £1

I remember last time “The Itinerant Football Watcher” Peter Miles sent me the “There’s loads here already” message. That was at the final game of the 2015 Welsh hop at Penmaenmawr Phoenix and the gate turned out to be a Welsh hop record! Our coach pulled off the A1, that message arrived again, and I hoped for something similar. Continue reading →

Motivation

08 Monday Aug 2016

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Saturday 30th July 2016 ko 16.30

Peterborough & District League Premier Division

THORNEY 3 (Gallacher 71 Lodzian 80 Rayner 87)

LEVERINGTON SPORTS 4 (Reed 19 Kudaba 54 64 90)

Att 203

Entry £4

Programme £1

There are many reasons why a club would want to host a hop game. For some it’s purely a fundraiser, for others it’s the chance to bring the community together. I remember for Berinsfield it was a charm offensive, and for the likes of Films SK in Sweden it was to show off their beautiful country. For Thorney though, the motivation was a first, and completely different. Continue reading →

Incroyable

03 Wednesday Aug 2016

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Saturday 30th July 2016 ko 10.30

Peterborough & District League Premier Division

CROWLAND TOWN 2 (Hunt 2 Ellis 29)

AFC STANGROUND 7 (West 51 62 Mahoney 60 J Staggs 83 87 Rankin 85 Brown 89)

Att 240

Entry £4

Programme £1

Badge £3

One of the things I love about this hop is the variety of grounds we get to visit, as as organiser the challenge is understanding those clubs’ highly varied needs. You saw it in a nutshell between our first game at Long Buckby and at Snowdon Fields in Crowland. In terms of facilities they are chalk and cheese. Continue reading →

The Gap

02 Tuesday Aug 2016

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Friday 29th July 2016 ko 19.45

United Counties League Division One

LONG BUCKBY 4 (Salumu 40 Kostiuk 53 67 Hinton 72)

WHITTLESEY ATHLETIC 1 (Butterworth 78)

Att 201

Entry £6

Programme £1

The third United Counties/ Peterborough & District Leagues hop felt different from its predecessors. The first was very much a trial run, the second based on a theme, the county of Rutland, but this felt like the continuation of a well-established event. That said, the issues running a dual league hop at the start of the season produces issues, and those issues haven’t changed. Continue reading →

Bullseye

26 Monday Oct 2015

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Sunday 18th October 2015 KO 14.30

Western League Premier Division

MELKSHAM TOWN 2 (Higdon 15 82)

GILLINGHAM TOWN 1 (Smith 88)

Att 357

Entry £5

Programme £1

So all too soon it was over, our 7 game Western League jaunt that months earlier Chris Berezai and I wouldn’t have thought possible, and certainly not taking in the Melksham’s iconic Conigre Ground, staging football for a final unexpected year, due to would you believe a colony of newts. While Chris and I knew that the hoppers would love the ground, we were far less certain about how the club would enjoy their day. Continue reading →

Jules/Jewels

25 Sunday Oct 2015

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Saturday 17th October 2015 ko 19.45

Western League First Division

KEYNSHAM TOWN 2 (Abang 74 Harris 86)

WESTBURY UNITED 2 (Matthews 7 Adams 90og)

Att 224

Entry £5

Programme £1

The coach pulled into the Crown Field’s car park, and Chris Berezai, Dave the driver, and I strained our eyes trying to find where we were to park. Nothing usual about that, and we quickly spotted club secretary Julian “Jules” French pointing out a coned off area for us. I was beginning to flag a little, and I’m sure I wasn’t only one, so it was good to know that with Jules in charge I could mentally slow down a little. I had after all, had a preview… Continue reading →

Clues

24 Saturday Oct 2015

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Saturday 17th October 2015 ko 16.30

Western League Premier Division

CADBURY HEATH 0

CRIBBS 0

Att 185

Entry £5

Programme £1

Once again another lean forward to check the coach driver’s sat-nav revealed another mile’s journey between games. And just like between the first two games we spotted someone who was walking between the games, so we offered him a lift to Keynsham after this one but he declined, perhaps he foresaw the score here!

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The Format

20 Tuesday Oct 2015

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Saturday 17th October 2015 ko 11.00

Western League Premier Division

BITTON AFC 3 (Bryan 15 47 Tong 71)

STREET 3 (Murray 10 21 Hunt 22)

Att 217

Entry £5

Programme £1

Even with the amount of events GroundhopUK now runs, the chance to run a hop in a completely new league is still relatively unusual. So the chance to approach the project with a blank sheet of paper was no bad thing. We have a tried and tested way of doing things for Step 5 and 6 leagues but there is always both room for improvement, and a sense of new light through old windows was a thought worth pursuing. Continue reading →

Listening

19 Monday Oct 2015

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Friday 16th October 2015 ko 19.45

Western League Division One

CORSHAM TOWN 1 (Lardner 82)

CALNE TOWN 2 (Windsor 12 Beasley 54)

Att 293

Entry £5

Programme £1

If you metaphorically scratch the surface of the Western League Hop, you get League General Secretary Mark Edmonds. It was him who put the idea in as part of his successful application to the role, and it was him who first put the idea to his clubs. From GroundhopUK’s perspective we’d had an abortive attempt at the project a decade or so earlier, so we hadn’t even considered the idea. But all kinds of coincidences happened to make this happen. Continue reading →

The Pressure Cooker

13 Sunday Sep 2015

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Monday 31st August 2015 ko 18.15

Welsh Alliance Divsion Two

PENMAENMAWR PHOENIX 3 (S Williams 21 Z Davies 44 Paddock 90)

GREENFIELD 4 (Pritchard 38 Beck 56 Henley 58 80)

Att 431 (Welsh Hop record)

Entry £3

Programme £1

Badge £3

Recently I attended a funeral of a mutual friend of my ex-wife and I. Since we split up 5 years ago we’ve only spoken a handful of times and never met. We both knew the other would be present, so the nervous tension built up in the days before. Fortunately we found time for a brief chat before the service, and whilst we’ll never be friends I stood at the back of the chapel and felt the tension slowly dissipate, rather like the valve on a pressure cooker. It wasn’t the first time I’d felt like that in the last few weeks. Continue reading →