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Football: Wherever it may be

~ Laurence's football travels

Football: Wherever it may be

Tag Archives: welsh premier league

The Dead Rubber

30 Thursday Apr 2020

Posted by laurencereade in C

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6 sent off, Caernarfon Town, Football, League of Wales, Llangefni Town, Loosemore's Cup, Non League, Red Card, The Oval, welsh premier league

With the football season over prematurely due to the Coronavirus Pandemic I’m in the unusual position of actually having this blog up to date! So to keep the content coming, and for something to do, I’ll do some old grounds and games where there’s a story to tell.

And believe me there’s a story to tell here….

Wednesday October 31st 2007 ko 19.30
Welsh Premier League Cup Group A

CAERNARFON TOWN 2 (Addo 48p Glendenning 82)

Sampson sent off 76 (violent conduct) 76

Maxwell sent off 76 (violent conduct 76)

McGarry sent off 87 (2nd booking)

B Jones sent off 89 (2nd booking)

LLANGEFNI TOWN 3 (A Jones 3 Lloyd 15 C Jones 69)

C Evans sent off (violent conduct) 76

Lloyd sent off (violent conduct) 76

Att 170

Entry £6

Programme £1.50

I remember the day well, or should I say the day before as well! I was working in Milton Keynes at the time, and the best I say for that part of my life is that at least it gave quick access to the M1! The previous day I’d headed to the North Wales coast to to watch Colwyn Bay, returned home, then back to work the next day. I sat in an uninspiring office, in a uninspiring job, in an uninspiring town and pondered should I head back up to North Wales after work? Silly question really…

Continue reading →

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Sea Salt

09 Friday Mar 2018

Posted by laurencereade in P

≈ 1 Comment

Tags

Bastion Gardens, Football, groundhopping, GroundhopUK, Newtown, Prestatyn Town, Wales, welsh premier league

Sunday 25th February 2018 ko 14.30

Welsh Premier League

PRESTATYN TOWN 0

NEWTOWN 1 (Goodwin 4)

Att 201

Entry £7

Programme £2

We’d had a bit of an adventure after returning back to our hotel after the Bala game. We were walking in the main entrance when an ambulance on blues and twos screamed into the car park. There’d been a wedding at the hotel and a guest had thought it would be a jolly jape to drop a Viagra pill into someone’s champagne… In the end no harm was done, I hope the victim wasn’t the groom (he spent the night in hospital) and it did serve to empty the bar for the hop party!

Continue reading →

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Sunset Over Snowdonia

05 Monday Mar 2018

Posted by laurencereade in B

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Bala Town, Cardiff Met, Cardiff Metropolitan University, Football, groundhopping, Maes Tegid, Wales, welsh premier league

Saturday 24th February 2018 ko 17.30

Welsh Premier League

BALA TOWN 1 (Davies 15)

CARDIFF METROPOLITAN UNIVERSITY 0

Att 303

Entry £6

Programme £1

Teamsheet FREE

We headed south-west through the foothills over Snowdonia, and although the journey was only 40 or so miles it took us over a hour, such is the realities of travel in rural North Wales. We arrived at Maes Tegid and it became clear that the late kick off had attracted hoppers that we hadn’t seen for the rest of the day. It was a pleasure to grab a tea and catch up, well apart from the one hopper that went through the turnstiles with his hood pulled up then scuttled off to the far end without such as an acknowledgment to anyone else. Different strokes for different folks I suppose… Continue reading →

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Life On The Periphery

05 Monday Mar 2018

Posted by laurencereade in C

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Connah's Quay Nomads, Football, groundhopping, GroundhopUK, Non League, The New Saints, TNS, welsh premier league

Saturday 24th February 2018 ko 14.00

Welsh Premier League

CONNAH’S QUAY NOMADS 0

THE NEW SAINTS 1 (Routledge 45) Harrison sent off (offensive/insulting language and/or gestures)

Att 222

Entry £7

Programme £2

Teamsheet FREE

You’d think the Flintshire Suspension Bridge marks the border between Wales and England; it doesn’t but it comes pretty close! It’s Britain’s only assymetrical suspension bridge, but suffers by being nicknamed, “The bridge to nowhere,” that’s rather disparaging to the good people of Connah’s Quay and Shotton but the feeling of being on the periphery persisted. Continue reading →

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Rock Climbing

28 Wednesday Feb 2018

Posted by laurencereade in C

≈ 1 Comment

Tags

Bangor City, Cefn Druids, Football, groundhopping, GroundhopUK, pel droed, S4C, Sgorio, The Rock, Wales, welsh premier league

Friday 23rd February 2018 ko 19.45

Welsh Premier League

CEFN DRUIDS 0

BANGOR CITY 2 (Hewitt 44 45p)

Att 426

Entry £7

Programme  & Teamsheet £2

There’s no question that it was highly flattering for GroundhopUK to to be approached to run a Welsh Premier League Hop. But when Chris Berezai mentioned it to me I found myself questioning whether the idea could be made to work? I looked back to the set of compromises that is a successful hop and wondered how we could adapt them for the needs of the Wales’ top domestic league? Continue reading →

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Added Value

26 Monday Jun 2017

Posted by laurencereade in B

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Bala Town, Europa League, Friendly, Linfield, Maes Tegid, Wales, welsh premier league

Saturday 17th June 2017 ko 14.00

Pre-season Friendly

BALA TOWN 1 (Connolly 72)

LINFIELD 3 (Waterworth 22 Burns 39p C Stewart 86)

Att c400

and

Bala Lake Steam Railway 

return ticket from Llanuwchllyn to Bala £11

Entry £6

Programme 50p

If there was one thought that I took home from the Swedish Hop it was the idea of adding value. Event organiser Kim Hedwall managed to do that with every single game we attended and that principle certainly influenced my approach to this game. It was a confluence of ideas, my girlfriend Robyn fancied a trip to a steam railway, and needless to say I fancied a football match! I looked at Bala, remembered my visit around 10 years previously, and quickly put “Steam railways Bala” into Google. Continue reading →

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Death of a 1000 passes

14 Monday Jul 2014

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Bangor City, Europa League, Farrar Road, Iceland, Les Davies, Nantporth Stadium, Stjarnan, UEFA, Wales, welsh premier league

Thursday 10th July 2014 ko 18.45

Europa League 1st Qualifying Round

BANGOR CITY 0

STJARNAN FC 4 (Rauschenberg 53 Bjorgvinsson 61 81 A Johannsson 85)

Agg 0-8

Att 805

Entry £14

Programme £3

Let’s be honest here, I’d waited far too long to visit the Welsh club’s new home on the banks of the Menai straits. But the decision to wait proved to be a good one, as a competitive game this time of year is not to be sniffed at, and I’d never watched a side from Iceland either!

Continue reading →

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Skewen

11 Wednesday Jun 2014

Posted by laurencereade in N

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Aberystwyth, BP, Football, Lee Trundle, Llandarcy Park, National Oil Refineries, Neath, Skewen, The Gnoll, Town, Wales, Welsh League, welsh premier league

Friday 23rd November 2007 ko 19.30

Welsh Premier League

NEATH ATHLETIC 2 (Price 78 Bevan 90)

ABERYSTWYTH TOWN 2 (S Roberts 18 Sherbon 32p)

Att 218 at Llandarcy Park

Entry £5

Programme £1.50

Today’s “Greatest Hit,” is a little unusual. Not only does the ground not exist (for football) but neither does the team either! The roots of the club lie in BP, British Petroleum and their predecessor National Oil Refineries. The club was founded in 1922 as National Oil Refineries F.C as the works team for the new refinery, and played at Llandarcy Park, now to the south-west of the M4 as it passes by Junction 43. Continue reading →

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Far to go

08 Saturday Sep 2012

Posted by laurencereade in A

≈ 2 Comments

Tags

Abergavenny, Govilon, groundhopping, Gwent County League, Kevin Wallace, Lee Hopkins, Leigh Ford, Pen y pound, Pontypool, soccer, Thursdays, Town, Wales, Welsh League, welsh premier league

Saturday 1st September 2012 ko 3.00pm

Gwent County League Division 3

ABERGAVENNY THURSDAYS 7 (Davies 19 36 Purvis 22 Wallace 43 Hopkins 51 Surtees 75 86) Ford sent off 89 (dangerous play)

PONTYPOOL 1 (Hatherall 87)

Att 28 (h/c)

Entry FREE

No Programme

So, when you’ve finished a gruelling 11 game tour of Welsh lower league football what do you do next? That’s right, do more of the same thing! There was also the bonus of the game being at the other end of my street! Yes, you have read that correctly, I live in Oxford, and at the end of my street is the A40. If you follow it for the small matter of 90 or so miles, you reach Abergavenny in Monmouthshire, just 6 miles over the border with England. Continue reading →

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The Boost

05 Wednesday Sep 2012

Posted by laurencereade in W

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Chris Berezai, Chris Kamara, free kick, George Mitten, Ian Jones, Iwan Matthews, James Longford, Llansantffraid Village FC, Maesydre, Mid Wales Hop, Mid Wales League, Olver Clarke, Town, Wayne Austin, welsh premier league, Welshpool

Monday 22nd August 2012 ko 11.00am

Mid-Wales League Division One

WELSHPOOL TOWN 3 (Longford 9 I Jones 31 Mitten 39)

LLANSANTFFRAID VILLAGE 5 (Austin 11secs 25 72 Clarke 2 Matthews 40)

Att 211

Entry/Programme Hop Ticket

Badge £3

So, the final day of the Welsh hop, and the club whose game was the most difficult to schedule. With Welshpool having played in the Welsh Premier League comparatively recently, a lot of hoppers would have already visited. As organisers we knew that if the game was scheduled either at 3pm on any day, or as the last fixture many hoppers would either go elsewhere or head for home. Revisits aren’t popular, but Welshpool are members of the league, and as such deserve a decent turnout as much as anyone else.

Those who saw Welshpool struggle to take a point off Llansantffraid in the reversed fixture on last year’s hop, saw just how badly they’ve fallen from grace. Ten days before that season they’d had no players and were close to folding. It was hardly surprising that they finished rock bottom of Division One and were spared relegation only because of there was no relegation from the Cymru Alliance, the league above. That season also saw Sky TV’s Chris Kamara guesting for the club when his tv commitments allowed. It provided some much needed publicity, and Chris and I were told by the club that Kamara was “..a joy to deal with.”

Of course a town the size of Welshpool should be able to sustain a club in a far higher league. The town is situated on the River Severn, and its propensity to flood gives it its the Welsh language name Y Trallwng, meaning ‘the marshy or sinking land.’ In fact until 1835 the English name was simply “Pool,” the “Welsh-” prefix being added to avoid confusion with Poole in Dorset.

Whilst Maes Y Dre was never really up to Welsh Premier ground standards, the ground being shared with cricket, there’s a lot to like here. The most obvious is the large pitched-roof stand, although you do have to be careful how you pick your seat, some are broken, others have little leg-room, it offered plenty of cover on a wet day. The cricket pavilion balcony on an opposite corner also served useful purpose. Behind and to the left The Long Mountain (Cefn Digoll) provided a spectacular backdrop.

The club worked hard at their morning. There were bacon rolls, together with Barra Brith and Welsh cakes (The Mid Wales League took Chris’ comment that he loves Welsh cakes totally at face value – barely a club failed to have them on sale!). I enjoyed a cup of tea, before helping out with the line-ups board. Unusually I was able to grab a seat just before kick-off.

That proved to be no bad thing as Llansantffraid scored after a mere 11 seconds, Wayne Austin gliding through a space where a right back should have been to open the scoring. He set up Oliver Clarke a minute later for the second, but after that a shell-shocked Welshpool began to find their feet. James Longford reduced the arrears before Austin restored the 2 goal lead. Clearly defending was not a priority as Ian Jones scored following a corner, then George Mitten’s superb strike almost unbelievably saw Welshpool draw level. It didn’t last, as the sieve-like home defence opened up once again a minute later,  to allow Iwan Matthews a free shot to make it 3-4 at half-time.

Much as the travellers would have liked it to have been the case, a 7-goal half was never likely to be repeated, and the teams noticeably tightened things up, as the rain fell. There remained the formality of Wayne Austin completing his hat-trick which he did without a fuss, to make it clear what those present had long since known. That is had Welshpool concentrated for the first 10 minutes they may well have got something from this game. Still, unlike the evidence of their hop fixture last year, this time they do at least have something to work with. I wish them well.

Fred Flood



Welshpool’s equaliser


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