Tag Archives: GroundhopUK

The Wire

08 Monday Apr 2019

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Sunday 10th March 2019 ko 11.00

North West Counties League Division One South

RYLANDS 3 (Boothman 5 45 White 86)

CHEADLE HEATH NOMADS 5 (Green 10 27p Herbert 36 Harrison 68 Simpson 71)

Att 319

Entry £4

Programme £2

The final day of the hop was defined by the weather from start to finish. From the moment I glanced through the curtains at the Holiday Inn in Warrington to the moment I did the final drop-offs at Crewe station I wondered whether I’d be rained, sleeted or hailed on. At times it felt like all three simultaneously! It was one of those days where on arrival at the ground, the coach party takes it’s time to get off… why be in a rush to get cold and wet? Continue reading →

Bert

04 Thursday Apr 2019

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Saturday 9th March 2019 ko 19.45

North-West Counties League Division One North

ST HELENS TOWN 1 (Diggle 49)

GARSTANG 3 (Coar 12 Sailor 60 Hothersall 75)

Att 292

Entry £5

Programme £2

One of the advantages of the day’s first 3 games all being so close together was that I still felt reasonably fresh as the coach pulled into the wide expanse of the Ruskin Drive Sports Ground. As with Lower Breck and Litherland Remyca earlier we’d be visiting a ground new to the league, but here was a club with a long history of membership. Continue reading →

The Magician

27 Wednesday Mar 2019

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Saturday 9th March 2019 ko 16.30

North-West Counties League Division One North

LOWER BRECK 6 (Milne 18 60 90 Moore 31 Colbeck 45 Henders 55)

ASHTON TOWN 1 (Johnson 84)

Att 339

Entry £3

Programme £2

From Litherland the coach picked its way through surprisingly quiet Saturday afternoon traffic. We knew we were close to Goodison Park by the blue banners on every lamp-post until we actually passed by Everton’s famous ground. Then we skirted by Stanley Park until the huge new 20,500 Main Stand at Anfield dominated the view. From there those lamp-post banners changed to red as we travelled a few more hundred yards to the rather more humble Anfield Sports & Community Centre in Lower Breck Road. Liverpool FC may operate on altogether more rarified plane than our hosts, but they did have a massive influence on this hop! Continue reading →

Sefton

24 Sunday Mar 2019

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Saturday 9th March 2019 ko 13.30

North West Counties League Premier Division

LITHERLAND REMYCA 1 (Foy 44p)

CITY OF LIVERPOOL 2 (Dalton 61 Clair 70)

Att 574

Entry £5

Programme £2

It really didn’t take long for the coach to pick its way through the Sefton district of Liverpool to Litherland Sports Park. The district has the distinction of appearing in the Domesday Book while Liverpool didn’t! I was pleased it looked busy at the Litherland Sports Park, even if we did have to exit the bus rather quickly to let others in! Continue reading →

Maritimes

18 Monday Mar 2019

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Saturday 9th March 2019 ko 11.00

North-West Counties League Premier Division

BOOTLE 4 (Peers 10 19 Cox 72 Jones 90)

ASHTON ATHLETIC 2 (Gilchrist 22 Munro 50)

Att 391

Entry £5

Programme £1

I’m not sure why but on organised hops I like my breakfast quietly. Perhaps it’s because I know that for the rest of the day Chris Berezai and I will be in the centre of the maelstrom of everything that’s going on across the 4 games. That and the knowledge that experience without reflection is worthless. We’d had real problems getting this hop at a point where we felt comfortable organising it, but we’d got the event to a point that the day’s four host clubs had everything they needed to do well. I found myself thinking about the four grounds we were visiting. Continue reading →

The Disconnect

14 Thursday Mar 2019

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Friday 8th March 2019 ko 19.45

North West Counties League- Division One South

BARNTON 0 Cobley sent off FT (foul/abusive)

VAUXHALL MOTORS 2 (Webb 35p Hassall 70)

Att 272

Entry £5

Programme £1

I’d met the coach we at GroundhopUK were using at Ellesmere, in Shropshire, and from there we headed north to pick up a cohort of groundhoppers at Crewe station. It gave me rare time to think as Paul picked his way through a series of leafy Cheshire villages. The first North-West Counties League Hop was 6 games over the last 2 days of the 2017 Easter Hop but its roots lie in a phone conversation I’d had with then Atherton Collieries’ programme editor Joe Gibbons in 2013 that lead to the hop party diverting there when a game at AFC Emley on the Northern Counties East Hop had been postponed due to drifting snow. Continue reading →

The One We All Wanted

08 Friday Feb 2019

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Saturday 26th January 2019 ko 13.30

Norfolk Senior Cup Quarter Final

U.E.A. 0

SWAFFHAM TOWN 3 (Pearson 5 Castellan 65 75)

Att c60 at University of East Anglia Playing Fields, Colney Lane, Norwich

Free Entry

It’s probably common knowledge that GroundhopUK and the Anglian Combination have agreed to work together to stage an Anglian Hop in 2020. If you’d have told me even at the start of this season I’d get to write that, I’d have laughed at you. We’d tried, and tried again but each time received a firm, but polite “No” from the league. I’d mentally filed the idea along with the Highland League Hop in that folder marked “Nice idea but it’ll never happen” but then Twitter intervened! Continue reading →

Is Vic There?

18 Sunday Nov 2018

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Sunday 9th October 2018 ko 14.00

Western League Division One

BRISTOL TELEPHONES 1 (Goulding 60)

KEYNSHAM TOWN 2 (Shorney 27 38)

Att 310

Entry £6

Programme £1

There was no secret as to why the final game of the 2018 Western Hop was always going to be the most popular amongst the groundhoppers. Bristol Telephones are only in their second season in the Western League having won the Gloucestershire County League in 2017 so many would target this game, and this game alone in order to re-complete the league. By means of an example, the BTRA Ground, Stockwood Lane was to be my only new ground of the weekend! Continue reading →

Fairfax

15 Thursday Nov 2018

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Sunday 7th October 2018 ko 11.00

Western League Premier Division

BRIDGWATER TOWN 1 (Ellis 74)

BRIDPORT 0 Martin sent off 70 (Serious Foul Play)

Att 371

Entry £6

Programme £1

 

Sunday dawned and with it the longest drive of the hop, from our base in Almondsbury to Bridgwater. It was odd driving one of our 3 minibuses, full of hoppers but utterly incapable of going more than 60 mph! The extra time on the M5 did give me time to consider what we’d be likely to find at Fairfax Park. Continue reading →

Planning Gain

08 Thursday Nov 2018

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Saturday 6th October 2018 ko 17.00

Western League Premier Division

HALLEN 0

SHEPTON MALLET 3 (Willmott 45 Pollard 59 Morgan 77)

Att 218

Entry £6

Programme £1

Given one or two groundhoppers’ predisposition for getting their geography in a twist I ought to make it clear that this in the Hallen, which is the other side of the M5 from Bristol and not the club playing at the World’s oldest football ground- that’s Hallam! And while we were never ever going to visit the Hallen Centre on the Northern Counties East Hop, we could have easily have visited back in the day on the Hellenic Hop, the club are based in, and affiliated to the Gloucestershire FA, and it took until 2000 to prise themselves away and into the more logical Western League. That isn’t the limit of the club’s adventures though! Continue reading →