Tag Archives: North Berkshire League

Worthiness

18 Monday Apr 2016

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Saturday 9th April 2016 ko 14.30

North Berkshire League Division Two

TURNPIKE SPORTS 1 (Brookes 90)

STANFORD-IN-THE-VALE 1 (McCarthy 8)

Att 24 at Pitch 5, Henwick Worthy Recreation Ground, Thatcham

Entry FREE

No Programme

I remember when Thatcham-based Turnpike Sports applied succcessfully to join the North Berkshire League. It was 2012 and I’m sure one or two others at the AGM like me raised an eyebrow and wondered where on earth they were from! They were formed in 2007, formerly Thatcham Town’s reserves, but splitting away to form their own club. They transferred out from the Reading, now the Thames Valley Premier League to the NBFL and were placed in Division 4 but won two championships in the last two seasons to get where they are now. Continue reading →

Straight Outta Compton

06 Sunday Dec 2015

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Saturday 5th December 2015 ko 14.00

North Berkshire League Division 3

COMPTON 2 (Butler 25 Sosnowy 82)

HARWELL VILLAGE 5 (Robins 16 Fisher 79 Fenton 31 73 89)

Att 19

Entry FREE

No Programme

For the avoidance of any doubt this Compton is a village near Newbury in Berkshire and not south-central Los Angeles! As far as I know no gangsta rappers hail from here either! Until recently the firm Pirbright had an animal health testing facility here, that’s gradually being turned into houses, but every time I saw the signpost for Compton on the A34 I always had the same thought, that the club would be perfect for the North Berkshire League. Continue reading →

Where It All Started

09 Monday Nov 2015

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Saturday 7th November 2015 ko 13.30

Oxfordshire FA “John Fathers” Junior Shield 2nd Round

MASONS ARMS 1 (Long 22) 

BENSON LIONS 2 (Swales 14 Willis 55)

Att 16 at Margaret Road Recreation Ground, Headington Quarry, Oxford

Entry FREE

No Programme

In so many ways if any game had my name on it, it was this one. I’m from this part of Oxford, my local is the Masons Arms, and I serve on the committee of the North Berkshire League, the league where Benson Lions ply their trade. But that’s only a superficial look at why this game was a must see for me. Continue reading →

Real Ales, Real Owls, Real Football

21 Monday Sep 2015

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Saturday 19th September 2015 ko 16.30

North Berkshire League Division One/ James Rennie Memorial Trophy

EAST HENDRED AFC 1 (Rowe 48)

LONG WITTENHAM ATHLETIC 1 (Cheong 24)

Att 204

Entry & Programme £4

Badge £3

“They dined on mince, and slices of quince,
    Which they ate with a runcible spoon;
And hand in hand, on the edge of the sand,
    They danced by the light of the moon,
          The moon,
          The moon,
They danced by the light of the moon.”

Except from “The Owl and the Pussycat” by Edward Lear

For someone who had only ever seen one game previously at Mill Lane, I seem to have visited this place a lot! The most abiding memory is the the series of meetings I attended in 2010 to get the North Berkshire Hop up and running. I met a third of the clubs across three meetings, and one of those was here. I remember one comment especially,  Continue reading →

Aim For The Plane

21 Monday Sep 2015

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Saturday 19th September 2015 ko 13.30

North Berkshire League Division 3

GROVE RANGERS 4 (Pickering 2 Vaux 18 Cramp 21 22)

BENSON LIONS 1 (Radcliffe 88)

Att 154

Entry & Programme £4

Badge £3

The first clubs on my wish list for this hop were Grove and the Lions. They’d kept us royally entertained at the Defence Academy last time round, so it seemed entirely logical that we’d simply reverse the fixture this time. What I entirely forgot about was the full sized model of the De Havilland Venom nearby, marking the site of RAF Grove which closed in 1974, but also I felt also marking the visitors’ links to the RAF. Continue reading →

Can I Call You?

20 Sunday Sep 2015

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Saturday 19th September 2015 ko 10.30

North Berkshire League Division Two

HANNEY UNITED 4 (Bishop 16p 41 Woodside 75 Woodside 88)

MARCHAM 2 (Larman 7 Dobbs 24)

Att 171

Entry & Programme £4

Badge £3

You have to be an enthusiast to organise a groundhop. I mean you wouldn’t subject themselves to the kind of day I had unless you enjoy it. Its not often that you find yourself at Radio Oxford at 7.40 in the morning to publicise the hop one last time, then get a lift to the other side of town to collect the last of our 3 minibuses before pick-ups at Steventon and Didcot Parkway station. Continue reading →

All Aboard

20 Sunday Sep 2015

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Friday 18th September 2015 ko 19.45

North Berkshire League Division One

WALLINGFORD TOWN 0

ABINGDON TOWN 1 (Pitson 59)

Att 125

Entry & Programme £4

There are so many tales I could tell of the North Berkshire League. The most important one for me personally is that they invited me on to their/our management committee a few weeks ago. It’s a massive honour, and validation for what Media Officer Phil Annets, GroundhopUK’s Chris Berezai and I have done together for the last 4 years’ worth of hops. What it did do too was imply more pressure on this year’s event, and true to form we ended up having to work far harder for our success than in previous years. Continue reading →

Rounding It All Off

11 Monday May 2015

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Saturday 9th May 2015 ko 19.00

North Berkshire Cup Final

BERINSFIELD 5 (Saunders 21 D Murphy 26 37 90 Holdsworth 60)

SAXTON ROVERS 0

Att c450 at Northcourt Road, Abingdon (Abingdon United FC)

Entry & Programme £3

If there’s one game at the end of each season I hate to miss its this one, and please don’t confuse it with the North Berkshire League Cup Final, this one is open to all first XI’s in the league, and you get a far better class of guest of honour, the trophy was presented by Angela Lawrence, Mayor of Abingdon. She was rewarded for her efforts with a champagne soaking! It’s the traditional closing of the NBFL season, a celebration, but this year there was more than usual to consider.

Continue reading →

Heaven & Hell

01 Friday May 2015

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Tuesday 28th April 2015 ko 18.45

North Berkshire League Division One

CROWMARSH GIFFORD 3 (Woods 10 Sandiford 27 Joe Nathanielz 73)

BERINSFIELD 4 (Ingram 41 Osbourne 53 D Murphy 57 62)

Att 76

Entry FREE

Nothing for sale

I’m sure some of you wonder how I pick my fixtures, well this one did rather leap out of the page. Firstly I hadn’t been back to Crowmarsh since they staged their hop game in August. They’d got the biggest attendance of any hop game that weekend, and staged the game quite beautifully, including producing a programme that would put professional clubs’ issues to shame. Sadly their success on that day hasn’t been replicated on the pitch and sadly they’d been relegated the previous Saturday. So I did want to catch up with the Nathanielz family and both thank them and commiserate in equal measure. Continue reading →

Shoot Out

16 Thursday Apr 2015

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Saturday 11th April 2015 ko 14.30

North Berkshire League Division One

KINTBURY RANGERS 4 (Allsop 8 11 30 Thorp 30)

BERINSFIELD 5 (Ingram 18p 65p Palmer 41 D Murphy 59 Rawlings 84)

Att 85

Entry FREE

No Programme

With my presence requested at the North Berkshire League Cup Final at Milton United later, my choice of afternoon games was rather limited. But serendipity can be wonderful thing, as I received word from Berinsfield assistant manager Nathan Frost that this game was going to be a shoot-out for the title. Yes I’d visited the ground as part of the Hellenic Hop in 2005 but this game had the potential to be a cracker. But great games on paper seldom turn to be classics do they? Continue reading →