14 Monday Mar 2016
Friday 11th March 2016 ko 19.00
Lowland League
GRETNA FC 2008 0 Rea sent off 89 (2nd Booking)
DALBEATTIE STAR 0
Att 366
Entry £5
Programme £1
If last year’s Lowland League hop broke new ground in that it was the first hop organised north of the border, it did create one issue for us at GroundhopUK and that was the format. Last year we went for 1 game on the Friday, 3 on the Saturday and 2 on the Sunday, but for a few reasons that couldn’t happen this time round.
29 Monday Feb 2016
Posted in A
Tags
Auchinleck Talbot, Beachwood Park, Juniors, Kirkintilloch, Rob Roy, Scotland, Scottish Juniors, West Region
Saturday 27th February 2016 ko 13.00
Scottish Junior FA, West Region Superleague Premier Division
AUCHINLECK TALBOT 2 (Hyslop 17 53)
KIRKINTILLOCH ROB ROY 0
Att c350
Entry £6
Programme £1.50
The day after this I paid a visit to the Scottish Football Museum, in the Main Stand at Hampden Park. It’s a fascinating place, well worth the £8 entry, but its coverage of the Juniors is disappointing. All there is a corner with a video on loop and the display explains the SJFA as being “Junior” in standard to the “Seniors” rather than in terms of age. I wondered if whoever put that display together had ever seen the likes of Auchinleck, or Kirkintilloch play? Continue reading
21 Thursday Jan 2016
Posted in L
Tags
3G, Barrfields, Euromillions, Juniors, Largs Thistle, Scotland, sjfa, stadium, Superleague, Weir, West Region
Saturday 16th January 2016 ko 13.45
Scottish Junior FA West Region Superleague First Division
LARGS THISTLE 0
MAYBOLE JUNIORS 1 (Riley 7)
Att c200
Entry £6
Programme £1.50
I’m fortunate that I have friends dotted all over the place, but the downside is the gargantuan driving stints to visit them all! Regular readers will recognise Iain’s name from us visiting a steady succession of Scots football grounds such as Irvine Meadow and Falkirk. It’s fair to say that whilst the 6 hour drives between our two towns mean we don’t spend as much time as we’d like together, but we’re fortunate that it’s the kind of friendship that we can pick up where we left off. Continue reading
31 Sunday May 2015
Posted in H
Tags
Blair Park, C Robertson, Hurlford United, Junior Cup, Premier Division, Scotland, Scottish Junior, Scottish League, Shotts Bon Accord, Superleague Premier Division, West of Scotland Superleague, West Region
Saturday 30th May 2015 ko 14.00
Scottish Junior FA, West Region Superleague Premier Division
HURLFORD UNTED 2 (C Robertson 59 Donnelly 77)
SHOTTS BON ACCORD 1 (McCrum 90)
Att 144
Entry £5
Programme (reissue from 6/12/14) £1 (original price £1.50)
In Scotland below the professional ranks there’s two visions of how non-league could look. On one hand there’s the new Scottish pyramid with the Lowland and Highland league champions playing off for the right to play off against the Scottish League’s bottom side for the final place in the league. On the other there’s the Juniors, not aged-based, more an alternative FA, with the North, East and West Regions ploughing their separate furrows, save for the Junior Cup. Continue reading
29 Sunday Mar 2015
Posted in T
Tags
Castle Douglas, Chris Berezai, Edinburgh, Edinburgh University, GroundhopUK, Lowland League, Meadow Park, Scotland, Threave Castle, Threave Rovers
Sunday 22nd March 2015 ko 15.00
Lowland League
THREAVE ROVERS 2 (Struthers 7 Donley 43) Miller sent of 87 (violent conduct)
EDINBURGH UNIVERSITY 3 (Daniels-Yeoman 12 Aitken 61 Ward 81)
Att 462
Entry £5
Programme £1.50
Here’s a first for you, has a groundhop every visited a club named after a tea rooms? The club is named after the café in Castle Douglas where it was formed in 1953. The tea rooms in turn were named after Threave Castle, and Threave is derived from the Welsh term “Tref,” meaning homestead. Perhaps that’s why we used two Welsh coaches for the weekend! Continue reading
26 Thursday Mar 2015
Posted in G
Tags
Chris Geddes, Gala Fairydean, Graeme McIver, GroundhopUK, Lowland, Lowland League, Netherdale, Rovers, Scotland, Stirling University, University of Stirling
Saturday 21st March 2015 ko 19.00
Lowland League
GALA FAIRYDEAN ROVERS 1 (Bonnar 49)
UNIVERSITY OF STIRLING 2 (Bonar 43 Geddes 90)
Att 323
Entry £5
Programme £2
The sun began to set and as the coach reached Galashiels I relaxed for the first time since we’d left Hilingdon 36 hours earlier. I knew everyone wanted to visit the iconic club of Gala, and in Graeme McIver I had a club contact who was competent to the point where Chris and I knew all we needed to do is let him get on with staging the game. That doesn’t happen very often, clubs at the level GroundhopUK organise hops for aren’t used to having 300-plus crowds so guidance is essential, to do otherwise is at best unfair, and at worst folly. Graeme simply needed to know how many tickets we’d sold and a rough idea of the likely attendance, and he was more than capable of doing the rest. Continue reading
25 Wednesday Mar 2015
Saturday 21st March 2015 ko 15.30
Lowland League
SELKIRK 1 (See 58)
THE SPARTANS 1 (Brown 84)
Att 281
Entry £5
Programme £2
With so much riding on this hop I was nervous as the coach left Innerleithen for our middle game of the day. It’s that word “middle” that’s key, on any organised groundhop you tend to see, “Drift” where hoppers find an alternative games for the middle game on a Saturday when the competition for them is at its greatest. The solution is to schedule 4 games so that the hopper has to miss 2 hop games to go elsewhere but the geography and the lack of floodlights at Selkirk’s Yarrow Park made that impossible. Continue reading
25 Wednesday Mar 2015
Posted in V
Tags
Frank Campbell, Innerleithen, Lowland League, Preston Athletic, Scotland, Vale of Leithen, Victoria Park
Saturday 21st March 2015 ko 12.00
Lowland League
VALE OF LEITHEN 0
PRESTON ATHLETIC 2 (Bruce 41 Roy 57)
Att 312
Entry £5
Programme £1.50
Badge £3
I suspect we all needed a good night’s sleep after Friday’s long journey, certainly the faces at breakfast looked refreshed, maybe the hotel bar hadn’t done as well from GroundhopUK as is usually the case! We left East Kilbride heading south down the M74 before striking out east along the beautiful Tweed valley.
We passed through Peebles, right past Peebles Rovers’ ground (isn’t it handy that the Lowland and East of Scotland Leagues share a fixture secretary?) before reaching the small town of Innerleithen. Continue reading
23 Monday Mar 2015
Posted in E
Tags
Chris Berezai, East Kilbride, GroundhopUK, Hop, K-Park, Lowland League, Scotland, Whitehill Welfare
Friday 20th March 2015 ko 19.45
Lowland League
EAST KILBRIDE 1 (McLeish 64)
WHITEHILL WELFARE 0
Att 491
Entry £5
Programme £2
Badge £3
In 1992 the Northern League’s Mike Amos invented the organised groundhop, a series of staggered kick-offs with transport between the fixtures. Phil Hiscox took the concept to the South-West and GroundhopUK’s Chris Berezai to Wales, but Scotland had never seen a groundhop. That wasn’t through lack of trying, we at GroundhopUK tried for the Highland League who told us variously that they didn’t need any extra crowds, and that we’ve never bring them, “More than 30 hoppers.” A region of the Juniors even told us we could hold a hop in their leagues but all the games would have to kick-off at 2.30 on a Saturday….
To be honest, we’d given up and when hoppers mentioned the idea we’d trot out one of the stories and shrug our shoulders. A shame, but that was life.
10 Tuesday Jun 2014
Posted in P
Tags
Glasgow, Iain, Juniors, Lanark United, Newlandsfield Park, Pollok, Scotland, Scottish Junior FA, Scottish Junior FA Cup, SFA, Superleague, West Region
Scottish Junior FA West Region Superleague, Premier Division
POLLOK FC 2 (Hunter 41 Diack 89) Aitchison sent off (denying clear goalscoring opportunity) 6
LANARK UNITED 1 (McCluskey 71) McLaughlin missed penalty 6
Att 415
Entry £5
Programme £1 (they issue for every game)
Badge £3.50 but charged £3 due to lack of change
Meat Pie £1.20
Bovril 80p
In early 2011 I wasn’t in a good place. My marriage had ended, and I was sat alone in a house I knew I was destined to leave. Fortunately I am blessed to have a friend in Dumfries in Iain and I was both fortunate and grateful to get a phone call to say,
“Come up (to Dumfries) and visit, and since its you, I’ll let you pick the game.!
Well you shouldn’t ever turn down an opportunity like that, so I travelled up, collected Iain, and at lunch time we parked in the Morrison’s car park adjacent to the ground. Iain extracted a large wedge of cash from the supermarket ATM, and one of my memories of the day was that he found it pretty much impossible to spend it at Newlandsfield Park. Iain, my friend, this is the wonderful world of the Juniors, no rip-off prices here! Continue reading
Football: Wherever it may be 