I’d been hoping to watch a game at Earls Orchard for a while. It’s the pitch that’s alongside Richmond Castle and occasionally pops up in groundhopper threads about picturesque venues. Richmond Town played their games there until joining the Wearside League and then moved to the Dave Clark Arena, which sounds grand, but in reality is a school pitch.
Richmond Town Reserves play in the less demanding Wensleydale League and when I noticed that they had a pre-season friendly against Northallerton Town Reserves at Earls Orchard, I thought I’d go along.
Richmond is an ideal location to go for a walk and so Jen and I turned up a couple of hours prior to kick-off and took Henry for a stroll along the River Swale. The Coast to Coast National Trail runs alongside the river for a while and as we thought we’d be unlikely to get lost if we kept the river in sight this seemed like a simple option.
The path took us through some fields of sheep and kept returning to the river, which allowed Henry some drinking opportunities. Wildlife sighting were rare, with rabbits in a field being the highlight. There were lots of people around though with some family barbecues being held on the river banks and groups of teenagers dipping in and out of the water.
We were back at Earls Orchard in time for kick-off and, as suspected, the castle did provide a spectacular backdrop. Richmond were in blue with Northallerton dressed up as Newcastle. There weren’t many people watching, maybe twenty or so most of the time, and I suspect some of the lads in the crowd were either first teamers or squad members who hadn’t been selected.
Not a lot happened in the first half but the game came to life in the second half with Richmond scoring two penalties in quick succession. They added a third on the hour before Northallerton pulled one back from a spot kick of their own.
Richmond had the game well under control though and rattled home another three goals before the end for a comprehensive victory. If I lived in Richmond I’d probably pop along every week, set up a camping chair, and watch the football in front of a special backdrop.
Chester-le-Street Town have played at their Chester Moor ground for the past forty-two years. Initially in the Wearside League and then in the Northern League since 1983. It’s an easy drive from Norton, so I’m a little unsure as to why it’s taken me so long to get to a game.
Anyway, better late than never, Jen and I took the dog up the A1 for their Division Two fixture with Redcar Town.
It was five quid in and another two for the best programme at this level that I’ve seen for a while. I speculated another quid on the raffle which, as usual, came to nothing, before sitting on the concrete steps behind the far goal. If we’d wanted, we could have had proper seats in the main covered stand, but it was fairly crowded and I thought it would be better if the beagle had a bit more space.
There was another clash of colours on the pitch with both sides in blue and white. It’s something that seems more prevalent lately.
I learned from the programme that Chester-le-Street were on a losing streak of nine home games. Their chances of ending that streak were reduced midway through the first half when a long through-ball drew the keeper way out from his goal. The Redcar striker got there first, nicked it past him and tapped home into an empty net.
At half-time I went into the clubhouse and got a pasty and some chips. The friendly lady behind the counter told me that they had been cooked in a Ninja. It was wasted on me as I’ve no idea what a Ninja is, or whether it is likely to improve the taste of what were clearly bought-in oven chips. The tray came in handy though for giving the dog some water from a tap behind the goal.
Redcar had most of the territory in the second half and in hindsight we’d have been better off switching ends sooner than we did. The game was over as a contest when Redcar added a second goal fifteen minutes from time and they notched two more in the last ten minutes for a win that extended the home losing streak to ten games.
This game took place on the weekend of the Stone Valley North Festival and as it was only twenty minute’s drive from the Ushaw Moor festival site I was happy to nip out for a couple of hours despite it resulting in me missing Sleeper and Stone Foundation.
I did see plenty of decent bands though, including From The Jam, with the highlights probably being the headline sets from The Stranglers and The Boomtown Rats.
As you may have deduced from that glimpse of the line-up, it’s a festival for old people. A few people had brought their grandkids, which lowered the average age, but I’d say that even at fifty-seven, I was below the median.
At 2.30 I left Jen, Paul and Strach to get on with their drinking and drove to the New Ferens ground in Durham. It’s the temporary home of Boro Rangers who were promoted to Northern League Division Two this summer from the North Riding League and had to relocate as their previous ground was below the required standard.
The visitors were Prudhoe Youth Club Seniors who were also in their first Northern League season having been promoted from the Northern Alliance League.
It was only three quid in, which is cheaper than usual for the Northern League, although in hindsight I wonder if I was charged the pensioner rate. I asked the bloke on the gate if there were many in already and he went to the trouble of adding up his tally sheet. I was the thirty-fourth person through the turnstile although a few more came in after me including three WAGs who were clearly unimpressed at the distance that they had to travel from the Boro for a home game.
The visitors were in blue with Rangers turning out in Boro kits. Usually that would be enough to ensure my allegiance, but Boro Rangers weren’t a likeable team. They were very aggressive with tackles flying in from the start. That’s legitimate, but they combined their over-physical approach with excessive appealing for every decision and then furiously berated the officials from the pitch, dugout and stands when it didn’t go their way. And often when it did.
The first half passed without much goalmouth action and as the game went on, I found myself hoping for a Prudhoe goal, ideally a contentious one that would reduce the entire Boro Rangers contingent to apoplexy.
A goal did eventually come when a direct free kick was curled with pace into the top corner of the Prudhoe net. It was enough to deservedly take the three points for Boro Rangers and I was able to get back to Stone Valley in time for the closing songs of Peter Hook’s set and to join in with the evening’s drinking.
August is a time when there are plenty of games going on in the lower leagues as fixtures can be played mid-week without floodlights and with little chance of the weather intervening.
With that in mind, Jen, Isla, Henry and I went along to FC Hartlepool for their eleventh tier Wearside League Division One match against Durham City. We found the ground easily enough but, as I’ve often done in the past, I’d got the date wrong and we were twenty-four hours too early.
This is usually the point where I bring up standing outside of Freddy Natt aged seven trying to get into a padlocked school one day before it actually re-opened after Christmas, but I dare say you’ve heard that one. As we were already out and about, we drove to Seaton Carew for a walk along the seafront and some fish and chips.
Jen and I returned to the Grayfields Enclosure the next evening with the dog and paid our three quid admission. If we’d been a bit sharper, we could have nabbed the bench seat near to one of the corner flags, but instead ended up having to lean on the railings around the pitch. There was a decent turnout, with people watching from all four sides of the pitch and a few kids having kickabouts of their own.
I’d seen Durham a couple of times last season in their relegation from the Northern League. They’d been really hammered on a few occasions and didn’t win a game until the final day of the campaign. I was hoping that the drop down a level would make them more competitive, but a seven-nil defeat on the opening day of the season suggested that they may struggle this season too.
Hartlepool were in red and blue, with Durham in red and black. Theoretically there wasn’t a clash of colours, but in real life it was often difficult to tell the teams apart. How hard is it to make sure that the teams play in non-clashing kits?
Hartlepool took the lead in the first few minutes with a shot from outside the box that appeared to have left the keeper unsighted. The added another ten minutes later and a third from a penalty on the half-hour. The home goalie didn’t have a save to make in the first half and whilst it was still only three-nil at the break, Hartlepool genuinely could have been ten goals to the good with better finishing.
Durham kept their hosts at bay for the opening fifteen minutes of the second half, but two goals in quick succession around the hour mark opened the floodgates and Hartlepool added another six in the remaining half-hour to run out eleven-nil winners.
It’s hard to gauge how good unbeaten Hartlepool are two games into the season, but it looks like another tough year for Durham.
Harry and I went to watch the England Women’s team at the Riverside back in February. That must have got me on to a mailing list and a few months ago I was alerted to the Euro’s ticket sale. I picked up one for the England game at Southampton that took place on a day when I was already scheduled to be there anyway, and I also got a couple for the final for thirty quid a pop.
As the tournament went on, it looked very possible that England might make it all of the way. Harry never really doubted it, but he’s eleven and without a history of England and the Boro pissing on his chips. So, with train seats pre-booked at the same time as the match tickets, we set off for London.
It all went easily enough and we had time for a pre-match lunch at the pub we were staying in at Kilburn. We only stayed for the one night but it was sufficient time for us to visit the Millenium Dome, or the O2 Arena as it is now known, the next morning and walk across the roof.
I’d initially thought that the safety precautions were a bit over the top but, particularly after descending, I can see why we were required to do the walk clipped to a safety line and with suitable shoes.
We set off early for the game and even with two hours remaining to kick-off Wembley Way was packed. The atmosphere was completely different to that of a men’s game and the game could probably have gone ahead without any policing whatsoever. We were in the ground with ninety minutes to spare and watched some pre-match entertainment from singers who were more familiar to Harry than me.
I suspect that you might be aware of how it went. But, just in case you’ve been in a coma, England went a goal up after a pass and finish that graced the occasion. Germany equalized to take it to extra-time and then England scrambled a winner before indulging in ten minutes of top quality shithousery to keep the ball in the corner and run down the clock.
We stayed for the presentation, celebrations and the inevitable Sweet Caroline before heading out to a packed Wembley Way and then an overheated overground tube without air conditioning. After attending five Wembley finals with the Boro without a win, it was nice to be on the right end of a result once.
I’ve already been to a competitive game this season in the Women’s Euros at Southampton and a couple of pre-season friendlies, but this one felt like the proper opening fixture of the season. Alistair was away for the weekend, so it was just Harry and I that went along.
You never really know what you might see on the river outside the ground and there was a new structure there this week. I suspect that it was something to do with the oil and gas industry but that’s about the best I can do in pinning down its identity.
Pre-match talk was inevitably about the personnel changes, mainly the arrival of the American goalie and Tav’s move to Bournemouth. Zack Steffan’s loan signing looks a good move, both for him and us, but I was disappointed with Tav’s departure, particularly without a replacement having been brought in. I appreciate the pull of the Premier League though and hope he does well.
One of the biggest surprises has been the re-integration of Chuba Akpong after his banishment to Greece and then the U21s. He started this one and did well, combining well with Ryan Giles to set up an early goal for Isaiah Jones. We had a second one disallowed shortly after and at that stage it looked like an easy three points.
It rarely pans out in the way that you expect though and West Brom equalized soon after the restart for the second half. They could have won it too, as despite us having most of the possession the better chances fell to them. I reckon a draw was a fair result though and with another forty-five games and hopefully a few more signings to come, I’m happy enough with the point.
I’ve still got a handful of Northern League grounds to visit and with Carlisle City’s Gilford Park being the furthest away we made a day of it and went for a walk. Back in 2011, Jen and I spent four days walking alongside Hadrian’s Wall. We didn’t do the full route then, but focused on the central area which has most of the best bits. The furthest west we got at that time was Lanercost Priory and so what I thought we’d do was park up at Walton and then walk eastwards to the Priory and then back again.
It was an enjoyable walk despite some rerouting along a road. There wasn’t a lot of wildlife or a lot of wall, with most of the remains being buried rather than on display, but it was well signposted as the National Trails tend to be. Suitably inspired, we returned a few days later to walk the section between Walton and Crosby in both directions.
Carlisle City were taking on Nelson, a fellow tenth tier team that plays in Division One North of the North West Counties League. Nelson had played the previous day in Scotland and were accompanied by a handful of fans enthusiastically following the mini pre-season tour.
We gave our three quid admission to a girl at the gate. She was complaining to her friend that her fake tan was rubbing off on everything she touched. I remember when my daughter went through her fake tan phase and there was a terracotta stain around every light switch in the house.
There were two seated covered stands and a covered standing area down one side. I’d estimate that around forty people in total had turned up in cold and drizzly weather. We sat in the stand behind the goal.
Nelson’s conditioning seemed better than their hosts and they were two up after fifteen minutes and added a third on the half-hour. Carlisle pulled a goal back, but Nelson added a fourth before half-time. The constant stream of people returning from the burger van meant that the dog was far more alert to what was going on than the Carlisle defenders had been.
Nelson looked as if they would add to their lead after the break but ran out of steam as the game went on, perhaps as a consequence of playing on successive days. Carlisle took advantage of their opponent’s fatigue and scored a couple of late goals to make the game seem closer than it really was, but Nelson held on for a four-three victory that made the trip all the more enjoyable for their travelling fans.
I’d not been to the Mazuma stadium before and so I was pleased when the Boro announced a pre-season friendly at Morecambe. With nothing going on in the afternoon of the game I had plenty of time to drive across, taking a scenic route via Askrigg, Hawes, Ribblehead and Ingleton. I should have left even earlier and had a wander around at the viaduct as it looked magnificent in the early evening light.
My knowledge of Morecambe is limited. If I’ve given it any thought whatsoever, I suppose I’ve considered it a sort of Blackpool-lite. I arrived early enough to head for the seafront and have fish and chips for tea, near to the statue of Eric Morecambe. Whilst a lot of the country had been staying indoors to mitigate the impact of the forty degree heat, Morecambe residents were out on the beach.
I still tend to think of Morecambe FC as a non-league side, despite it being fifteen years since they reached the Football League. It turns out that they are actually in League One these days, just one step below the Boro.
I did a lap of the ground before finding the correct turnstile and took a seat towards the back of the Boro section. Around six hundred fans had made the trip and after a while the majority took the rare opportunity of sitting at an away game.
Boro had Ryan Giles at left-wing back, and he picked out a player in the box to gain an assist for each of our three first half goals. If we can attack effectively down both flanks this season, then it will hopefully deter teams from doubling up on Isaiah Jones.
There was some neat, quick passing through the midfield as we built from the back with Tav involved in most of the moves. He’ll be hard to replace if the rumoured Premier League does happen this summer.
At the interval I went downstairs for a drink. The queue was slow, probably on the basis that there was a big demand for their award-winning pies. They looked to have a decent beer selection too.
Morecambe had Conor Ripley in goal. He’s a player that I’ve kept an eye on since he left the Boro and it looks as if he should get some game time this season after his bench-warming at Preston. He took some stick from some Boro fans over his weight but reacted good-naturedly. He put in a good performance, pulling off some decent saves and wasn’t at fault for any of the goals.
The tempo slowed in the second half as the effect of playing in the heat and the impact of the substitutions took its toll. Overall though, we looked good and whilst the squad still needs to be added to I’m hopeful of a good start to the season proper.
I’m not sure if I’ve arrived at a game by way of a boat before. I probably have, although not after spending a week sailing across the Atlantic on the Queen Mary 2. I like the relaxing nature of a sea crossing and I managed to get more steps in by lapping the deck than I’d been able to do in the summer heat of the southern US. I still had plenty of opportunities for idling on a deck lounger watching the small birds that follow the boat and the porpoises that flit along the Gulf Stream. One morning there was a pod of whales and whilst most were content to briefly surface and exhale air, one very kindly put on a show of backflips as he passed us by.
On the way into Southampton Docks, we sailed past Marchwood Power Station. I’d worked there for around eighteen months back in 2008/9. It all looked very peaceful at five in the morning and it was interesting to see it all from a different viewpoint, despite me not being able to spot anything that I remembered.
One night after work at Marchwood a couple of mates and I fished at the inlet, despite signs telling us that we shouldn’t. We caught some fish, but they were too small to keep. Even if they had been bigger, I doubt we’d have taken them as there looked to be a fair amount of industrial discharge into the water. I’d like to think that those fish were still swimming around as we passed by this time.
Whilst working at Marchwood I lived a short drive away in the New Forest and enjoyed the sight of wild ponies lolloping around. As we had some spare time, Jen and I spent a few hours in Lyndhurst. There were as many horses around as I remembered, and I pointed out the places in the village that I knew from my stay.
I recalled taking in a game at Totton in the Wessex Premier Division and also an early FA Cup Qualifying fixture at Brockenhurst. For some reason though, I didn’t ever make it along to St Mary’s Stadium and it remained one of the Premier League stadiums that I’d still to tick off.
When I saw the schedule for the Women’s Euros and realized that we’d be arriving in town on a day with a fixture I booked a hotel and waited for the ticket sales. My ticket cost forty quid, which seemed expensive for a tournament that is hoping for full stadiums, but on the basis that the match sold out almost immediately, it looks as if whoever set the prices got it right.
Our hotel was a half hour walk away from the stadium and the route took me across a bridge where I got my first view of the ground. Even with an hour to go to kick-off there were lots of people making their way to the game.
There were sizeable queues at St Mary’s, with a lot of groups of kids, presumably school or sports club trips. There were also a lot more family groups than you generally see at men’s fixtures and far more women and girls. There were also a lot of same-sex couples attending, something that is still not really noticeable in the men’s game. All in all, a diverse attendance and without any undercurrent of violence. There wasn’t much drinking going on and if any of the schoolkids were doing coke they weren’t yet at the stage where they were fighting each other.
I had a seat in the east stand, perfect for a view of the sun going down. I got a good view of the play as well and an England performance that, whilst it didn’t quite reach the heights of the eight-nil Norway game, was far too good for Northern Ireland.
There’s a gulf between the full-time and the part-time players but Northern Ireland did their best to keep it tight, holding out until almost half-time before conceding but then quickly shipping a second before the break.
Two early goals in the second half suggested a rout might be on the cards but England didn’t take their chances and, in the end, ran out five-nil winners. Both teams took the applause at the end, with England topping the group and Northern Ireland heading home.
After the short stay in Lubbock Jen and I continued to head south, and we spent three nights in a cabin in the Davy Crockett National Forest in Texas. There weren’t any games going on nearby and at over a hundred degrees it was too hot to hike.
I saw some deer whilst driving into Crockett for supplies, but the only real wildlife we saw around the cabin were squirrels. Squirrels with white chests.
There were some large grasshoppers too, that appeared around the same time each evening and climbed a tree next to where we were sitting. I’d estimate that they were between three and four inches long. That’s Jen’s hand in the photo in an attempt to try and give a sense of perspective.
After the Davy Crockett National Forest we drove on to Mississippi for Jen’s Dad’s seventy-fifth birthday celebrations. With it being a large family gathering we stayed half an hour up the road at another cabin in the woods. Again, there were no nearby games and the nearest we got to any hiking was taking Roscoe for a walk in the woods.
With the party over it was time to head north to catch the boat back to England. Jen had been waiting for her passport back and it finally arrived a day later than expected. This meant a twelve hundred and thirty mile drive over a day and a half to reach our booked cabin in Quakertown, Pennsylvania.
Driving on the larger American highways isn’t too onerous but the nineteen hours or so at the wheel from Louisiana in such a short period of time wore me out. We arrived at Quakertown around five in the afternoon, giving me just enough time to empty the car before we got back in again and nipped down the road to the John Makuvek Field at Moravian College in Bethlehem.
The fixture we had driven seven hundred miles that day to get to was in the Mid-Atlantic Division of the fourth tier USL2 with Lehigh Valley Sonic United taking on West Chester United.
We left the car in a visitors parking spot outside the university offices and wandered over to where the players were warming up. The pitch wasn’t fully fenced and therefore there wasn’t really an opportunity for someone to charge for admission.
We stretched out on a grassy bank that ran the length of one side of the pitch. There were probably around another fifty spectators, most of whom appeared to be family members of the players on the home side. There was frequent and enthusiastic encouragement of the kind that I rarely hear at games in England. One wretched miscreant somehow missed an open goal and was consoled with “Alright Guys, good try, good try!” That’s something David Currie won’t have heard from the Holgate or the Chicken Run.
Both sides generally played decent football for this level, keeping the ball on the ground and trying to build patiently. West Chester, in black, were the better side though and they took the lead with a penalty after the keeper wiped out a forward whilst successfully collecting the ball. I doubt it would have been given in the UK, but, even as an ex-goalie, it seemed just to me.
By half-time, the visitors had added two more goals and could have been further ahead with better finishing and if the home keeper had not pulled off some decent saves. Surprisingly Lehigh swapped goalies at half-time, perhaps to share around the pitch-time, but the change had minimal impact and West Chester took the points with an eventual six-nil victory.
The game was the last of the American trip and two days later we were on the boat back to England. It had been another excellent holiday and whilst we didn’t have any close encounters with bears or snakes this time I enjoyed the hiking, particularly in the Colorado mountains, the wild camping and being out in the woods for most of our stay.
The driving was a necessary evil to attend two very enjoyable family celebrations and we ended up clocking nearly eight thousand miles as we did a four hundred and fifty degree circuit from New Orleans up to New York, across to Laramie and down to Colorado, then back to Louisiana again before re-visiting New York. Highlights of the driving hours were spotting a coyote trotting along in an adjacent field and unscheduled stops at places such as a Pony Express Station and the grave of Buffalo Bill.
We saw eight football matches, spread over five tiers and also five baseball games, including the Rockies at Coors Field and a variety of lower-level fixtures where the emphasis seemed as much on entertainment as a win. That’s not a bad return in seven weeks.
Trail of the Lion King 