I’ve been making reasonably progress at ticking off the grounds in the East Division of the Northern Premier League, mainly due to the efforts of Northern League clubs in gaining promotion to it. As I had a Friday night with nothing planned, I thought I’d head down to Emley for their opening game of the season against Silsden.
In an update of other stuff, Jen and I had been to the Old Courtroom at Middlesbrough Town Hall the night before to see local band Weathership. They were ok, but I preferred one of the livelier support bands.
The drive down to Emley was more complicated than it needed to be with multiple road closures. Nevertheless, I made it on time to the Fantastic Media Welfare Ground and handed over my tenner admission just as the teams were walking out. There was a decent programme for a couple of quid.
Emley were favourites for the win having just missed out on promotion last year whilst Silsden were playing their first ever fixture as high as the eighth tier. I watched for a while from behind the goal, then found myself a seat in the main stand where I ended up in conversation with a fellow groundhopper about some of the other grounds in the division.
Next to the main stand was a cabin with a rooftop viewing area. This was where the people who had opted for the thirty pounds hospitality package watched the game from. The stands behind the goal looked as if they had all been erected at different times with little regard to an overall design. I liked the look of it though, it was a sort of shanty town.
The game went as expected, with Emley two up inside twenty-five minutes and then adding a third midway through the second half. A fair few of the near five-hundred crowd were from Silsden and their team showed enough to suggest that, despite the result, they will do ok this season.
One of the things that I thought I’d try and do this season is get around a few more of the ninety-two league stadiums. Whilst I’ve been to more than two hundred grounds in England, I’ve not completed any of the top four divisions and among them there are still thirty-five grounds I’ve yet to visit.
I made a start by driving across country to Accrington. It was a pleasant enough journey via Skipton, a route that I rarely seem to take when heading West.
The fixture was a preliminary tie in the Carabao Cup between Accrington Stanley and Oldham Athletic. I’d bought my ticket online in advance and parked up with at least half an hour to spare before kick-off.
I followed the crowd towards the Wham Stadium but found myself in the section of the ground reserved for the away fans. Oldham had been given the open terracing behind one goal and most of the covered seating along one side. My ticket was for the main stand opposite and when I pointed this out to a steward, she very kindly escorted me most of the way to my seat.
Once in position I was able to listen in to a Geordie bloke a couple of seats along from me. He was explaining that a visit to the Wham Stadium had been on his bucket list for years. However, he had been thwarted by fixtures being cancelled for reasons including a waterlogged pitch, snow and international call-ups.
His previous attempt at the weekend just gone had failed when his wife insisted upon them going shopping instead. With luck like that I fully expected a locust plague to rock up as the teams walked out.
It was an action packed first half, with Accrington taking a three-goal lead. The third goal resulted in an injury to the Oldham keeper when he punched the crossbar rather than the ball. The fella to my left thought that he was feigning injury out of embarrassment at being beaten three times in half an hour, but when the lad removed his glove, his pinky finger stuck out to the side at a forty-five-degree angle. Ouch.
At the break I tried to buy a butter pie, for no other reason than I’d never heard of them before, never mind had one, but they were sold out. Next time in Lancashire, perhaps.
In the second half I watched from behind the goal. Oldham pegged a goal back, but it turned out to be no more than a consolation. The cross-country drive was less enjoyable in the dark and it was knocking on for midnight by the time I arrived home, albeit with just thirty-four of the ninety-two remaining.
There’s just a week to go until the proper season starts for the Boro. That means it’s time for the traditional ‘big name’ friendly at home. Good as that is though, the fixture against Deportivo de La Coruna wasn’t the highlight of my weekend. Not at all.
Twelve years after logging our first section of the Cleveland Way, Jen and I finally finished it off. We walked a total of eleven miles from Filey Brigg to Cayton Bay and back, which meant that we fully completed the trail in both directions on the same hike.
It’s nice to do these walks with a dog and as Henry is still recovering from his knee surgery, we borrowed Soph’s other dog, Millie. She’s an seven-month-old Labrador and whilst Jen and I covered just the minimum distance necessary, she ran back and forward for at least twice the mileage.
The second-best weekend activity was the match. Tom had mentioned that he and his mate Jones were going in hospitality for forty-eight quid. That seemed like a good deal to me and so Harry and I joined them.
We were in the Host and Stay Lounge, which is usually close to two hundred and fifty pounds a pop, although I think for regular games you get a lot more than the burger and chips that we were given.
It made for an interesting change though. There was table service, and we had one of the booth tables that allowed us to look out towards the fan zone and see other fans arriving.
Having a big table also made it easy to spread out the fold-out poster in the programme and identify ourselves in the photograph of the Boro end at Ibrox a week earlier.
Our padded seats were just to the right of the Director’s Box. The Boro were pretty much full strength from those available, with the exception of Rav van den Berg and Hayden Hackney. The dutchman was nowhere to be seen as he tries for a move back home, but Hackney was on the bench after deciding to gamble on securing a Premier League move by turning down Championship Ipswich.
I think he has made the right call, but if his transfer doesn’t happen until late on deadline day, we might find it too late to replace him in this window.
We did ok with Tommy Conway scoring twice, the second after a good run from wing-back Sammy Silvera. In between those efforts, Deportivo scored twice themselves and the resulting draw meant that we were still awaiting our first win under Rob Edwards. Hopefully we are saving that for Swansea on Saturday.
It’s not often that I get to Hartlepool, but this was my second visit within a month. The previous time Jen and I had taken a walk along the England Coastal Path. We started at St Hilda’s church, quickly passing a pub with outdoor karaoke next to the Andy Capp statue. We continued northwards as far as Steetly Pier before retracing our steps.
We paused at the cemetery that has the graves of those killed in the World War One naval shelling, with the highlight of the six-mile walk being a seagull flying past us with a mouse firmly clasped in its beak.
This visit was to watch the Boro at the Victoria Ground, or as it is now known, the Suit Direct Stadium. It’s thirty-nine years since I last saw a game there, back in ’86 for the Boro’s first game after coming out of liquidation. Ayresome Park didn’t have the safety certificate and so Hartlepool very kindly lent us their ground.
My memories of that game are sketchy. I remember turning my ankle on the wasteland going in and I’m fairly sure I watched from the terracing along one side of the pitch. Probably the side facing the tunnel. We went two up and could have clinched the win when someone, possibly Archie Stephens, maybe Gary Hamilton, rattled the crossbar from distance. Port Vale hit back though, and we had to settle for a two all draw.
There was no wasteland to negotiate this time as we parked near to the stadium and followed the road around to the entrance for the Victoria Park Lounge. I’d opted for a hospitality ticket mainly so that I could watch the match sitting down. For thirty-eight quid a pop, Jen and I got padded seats behind the dugouts, curry and rice before the game and a welcome drink. Not bad at all.
There were around two thousand Boro fans attending. We had the standing section behind the goal to our left and the seated stand to my right. There was a small group of vocal Hartlepool fans in the corner of the stand opposite, but otherwise the home crowd were fairly quiet.
Boro had picked a young, inexperienced side, so much so that there were players I’d never heard of. Fringe players Forss, Barlaser, Hamilton and Gilbert were given a run out, but none of them made a pressing case for a first team starting spot.
It was goalless at half-time when we returned to the lounge for a coffee. Hartlepool scored first after the restart, but Boro equalized through Sonny Finch running at the Hartlepool defence and finishing well. A draw was a fair reflection of the evening’s action.
This was a bonus game that I spotted as I returned to the car after the Rangers v Boro women’s game at Broadwood Stadium. It was on the 4G pitch next to the main ground. There were a couple of blokes watching and they very kindly filled me in on the teams. The game had just resumed after half-time and the visitors, Ashfield, were a goal up.
They told me that it was a pre-season friendly and that Ashfield, who were from Glasgow, were probably one step up from the local side, Chapelhall. From the appearance of the players, I’d say it was probably an under-twenty game.
The two fellas had been at the Boro game yesterday, so we chatted for a while about our respective line ups and Tommy Conway’s international prospects. I hung around for ten minutes or so to take some photos before clearing off and heading south.
As we were staying over in Scotland after the Rangers v Boro game, it gave me the opportunity to go along to the women’s fixture between the same teams the following day.
We had planned to walk some more of the West Highland Way beforehand, but the weather was a bit ropey and we didn’t see much point in heading out in the rain when we could always return at a later date with some more enjoyable conditions.
The game was at the Broadwood Stadium in Cumbernauld. It’s a ground that Rangers Women share with Lowland League side Cumbernauld Colts and League One’s Hamilton Academicals. Hamilton have only just taken residence at Broadwood after being booted out of their previous home at New Douglas Park.
We arrived about half an hour before kick-off, meaning that there was sufficient space in the car park. We could have bought scarves and bucket hats, but did nae bother as they say up there.
Only the main stand was open and there were quite a few spectators wearing Boro colours. The queue for food and drink was too long to join which meant that we missed out on a choice of scotch, macaroni or kebab pies. I sometimes wonder if Scotland is trolling the rest of the world with their culinary inventions, but if they are, a lot of their own population aren’t in on the joke.
Rangers are in the top division in Scotland with the Boro having just been promoted to the third tier in England. The gulf in talent was apparent from the off and Rangers were three up at the break, before extending their lead to six by home time.
It’s difficult in pre-season friendlies to gauge the respective merits of clubs as you don’t always know whether you are watching a weakened team or players who are at different stages of fitness. On this showing though, the Boro have a bit to do if they want back-to-back promotions.
The Boro’s pre-season friendly with Rangers certainly caught the attention of the Boro fanbase with around seven thousand tickets sold for the trip to Ibrox. I looked at accommodation in the city but it seemed so expensive that I initially assumed that it must have been a weekend when both Oasis and Taylor Swift were in town.
My Plan B was to stay north of Glasgow and combine the trip with walking a little further along the West Highland Way. The hotel that we booked in Drymen was having a Murder Mystery Night and so we joined in. I doubt I’d make a detective as I strongly suspected a couple who were there as punters, just like us. It’s lucky I didn’t rugby tackle them to the ground to make a citizen’s arrest. Jen identified the murderer easily enough, reasoning that ‘it’s usually the wife’.
We only had time on the Saturday for a short pre-match walk, but we covered the section between Dumdoyne and Arlehaven in both directions. It was just six miles in total, but it’s enough to keep the progress of the trail ticking over and it’s good to spend a morning out in the countryside.
We passed a distillery that I may visit on a future trip but didn’t see much wildlife. I’d been hoping for deer but had to settle for a robin.
In the afternoon I drove to Ibrox. It’s a stadium that I’d last visited in the summer of ’85. On that occasion my friend Craig and I had travelled up to Edinburgh to see some lads that we had recently met on holiday in France. They were Hearts fans and we went with them to Glasgow to see their team get beat 3-1.
It looks as if there have been some renovations in the past forty years as the few memories that I have of the inside of the ground bear little semblance to what I could see from the lower section of the Broomloan Stand.
Tom and Harry had made the journey north too, but I missed them before the game. As they were in the upper tier I couldn’t meet up with them during the game either.
I was pleased to see Sol Brynn in goal for us. If he is going to be our first team keeper this season, he needs to establish himself as soon as possible. Possible departures Hayden Hackney and Rav van der Berg were missing, supposedly with minor injuries, or perhaps after a phone call from an agent.
The game was more physical than a lot of our players were used to and we struggled to ‘win’ free kicks by going to ground after minimal contact. I’m ok with that. Law McCabe adjusted quite quickly and seemed to relish the opportunity to get stuck in. I’m hoping that when Hackney does go, that he’ll get a decent run alongside Morris.
We went one up from a corner early on and added a second just after half-time. Rangers then made ten subs at once and with a much stronger team brought it back to two each. We were happy to take the draw by the end.
I finally caught up with Harry and Tom for a chat outside before heading back to Drymen with the intention of a further chunk of the West Highland Way the next day.
I had some university stuff going on in Colchester, so Jen and I stayed down there for three nights. I don’t really know much about the place other than the Romans rocked up there a while ago. Football-wise, they’ve got a team in the lower reaches of the Football League and I’ve a vague recollection that they once beat Leeds in the Cup. Probably not long after the Romans had gone home.
We stayed on a boat, which was enjoyable. It looked to be permanently moored, which meant that the shower and power worked better than the boat we’d stayed on recently in London. It was interesting to watch the ducks extracting whatever they dig for in the mud as the tides went out.
We went for a wander around a nature reserve, Fingringhoe Wick. Apparently, the name originates from the geography of the area and the protruding pieces of land rather than it being a place where Romans would engage with sex workers.
There were multiple bird hides, some of which were occupied by blokes with cameras big enough to photograph birds before they’d even migrated to the UK. I was hoping for some seals, but didn’t see any.
We’d been told that there were adders at the reserve, but we didn’t see any of them either. We did spot a deer but it quickly legged it. The highlight was probably two squirrels fighting. They grappled in trees until one fell out and the other would jump down to continue the punch up. All it needed for the full bar room brawl experience was for one of them to smash a chair over the other’s head.
Insects were easier to photograph and we got some snaps of butterflies and something that looked like a dragonfly.
On the Thursday evening I drove to the nearby Hawthorns ground, home of Stanway Rovers. They’ve just been promoted to the eighth-tier Isthmian League North. Their opponents were Walsham-le-Willows, a ninth-tier Sussex team that plays in the Premier Division of the Eastern Counties League.
I hadn’t really had much interest in pre-season friendlies in the past, but this year I’ve come to appreciate the way in which it helps gauge the respective strengths of leagues. Providing, of course, that teams take it seriously. So far, that seems to have been the case.
It was a fiver to get in and I wandered around to one of the three four-row shipping container stands on the far side. It looked as if more containers had been used to form the outer wall behind one of the goals and by retaining a section of the container roof it provided cover that was somewhere between a stand and a walkway. As long as the rain came down absolutely vertically, it would probably do its job.
Dog of the day was in the stand next to me. I overheard its owner explaining that it was a cross between a Jack Russell and an American Rat Terrier. Apparently rat terriers can be quite muscular, but this dog just looked like a taller Jack Russell. Ideal, I suppose, for catching rats that are a little above ground level.
The pitch was in poor condition for this time of year, although the lack of rain won’t have helped. It wasn’t level either, with a hump in the centre of the pitch and a corner with an incline up to the corner flag. It looked like something that a bloke with an excavator and a few tonnes of topsoil could have fixed within a week.
The game was tight early on, before Stanway scored two goals in the run up to half-time. The second one was a gem, with the striker flicking it over the advancing keeper’s head with a prolonged contact between ball and foot that would have graced a freestyling competition. I celebrated with a burger that had received extensive online praise, but in reality, was just a burger.
I’d been expecting the floodlights to come on at half-time, but we were an hour or so into the game before anyone turned them on. By that time, it was pretty dark, the sort of gloom that you’d happily play in as a kid, but in the knowledge that it was rapidly approaching ‘next goal the winner’ territory.
Both sides had their chances in what had been a competitive game but there was no further score until we reached the ninety-minute mark. Some slack marking from the visitors allowed Stanway to add a third from a tap in after the keeper had made a decent stop from the initial effort.
With just a month to go until most leagues commence, there are plenty of pre-season games to pick from. I’d initially identified a low-key fixture between Westmoreland League teams on the basis that they generally involve sitting in a camping chair in a field. That meant that Jen and Henry would have been able to come along. However, Henry wasn’t keen to get in the car and so I left them both in the garden instead. They were fine with that.
My delayed departure called for a change of plan to a closer ground. I’d been saving Knaresborough to combine it with a visit to somewhere like Mother Shipton’s Cave, but it was the best fit for that afternoon and we can always pop along to the cave on another occasion.
The Manse Lane ground is on the outskirts of the town. That’s just as well as Knaresborough is a busy place on a sunny Saturday afternoon.
Knaresborough Town are in the ninth-tier Premier Division of the Northern Counties East League. Opponents Blyth Town were promoted last season from the Northern League via the play-offs and will play in the eighth tier Northern Premier League Division One East this season.
It was six quid admission and the bloke on the gate also sold me raffle tickets for a meat draw. I’m not sure what the meat was, but there was a large lump of flesh in a small glass-fronted fridge. I think he assumed I’d travelled ninety-odd miles from Blyth as he told me that if I was worried about taking the meat home in the thirty-degree heat I was welcome to take twenty quid as an alternative prize.
The ground worked well at this level. There was a covered stand with five rows of seats along one side and a small raised covered standing area behind one of the goals. Blyth had brought some fans on a coach and one of them, a young lad, had taken up residence in the standing area with his flag and drum.
There was also a clubhouse with a bar and a raised beer garden outside. If anyone wanted to sit closer to the pitch there were a handful of picnic tables as well.
I watched the first half from the covered seated stand where the benefit of shade was cancelled out by the lack of a breeze. I shared the area with a couple of old blokes, a family with a baby that looked no more than a few weeks old and some lads out on the beer who soon left to get another pint each. The highlight though was a small dog inside of a handbag.
Both sides kept it tight for the first half-hour before Blyth scored twice in quick succession. They added a third on the stroke of half-time.
I wandered around to the food hut and bought a hot pork pie before watching the second half from different vantage points on the rail. Knaresborough pulled a goal back before a well-taken finish to a one on one with the keeper restored Blyth’s three goal advantage. That’s how it ended up.
The pre-season rounds of fixtures are well underway, and I’d picked a match just on the other side of the Tyne-Tunnel at Killingworth. Again, I’d not been up to very much before the game as the dog is still recovering from his ACL op, but he’s happy enough in the garden, particularly if I’ve got him a bone from Blackwell’s. Hopefully the surgery will fix his knee, but I can’t help but think about the former Boro player, Matty Bates, who snapped his cruciate ligament five times. No doubt from jumping up on the settee when he wasn’t supposed to.
Killingworth, of the 12th tier Northern Alliance Division One, were hosting Bedlington Terriers who were one step above them in the 11th tier Premier Division of the same league. Bedlington were demoted last year from the Northern League for failing to meet ground requirements. I was at a game at their Dr Pit Welfare ground a couple of years ago and it seemed ok to me, but I understand that it might have been the floodlights that were the issue.
There wasn’t anyone collecting gate money, so I wandered into the clubhouse and spent it on a very good bacon sandwich instead. There were a lot of people in there watching the Lionesses on the telly and many of them moved outside as kick-off approached to see some live football.
It would have been a good game to have brough Henry along to if he had been fit. There were a couple of staffies, three labs, a greyhound and a scottie dog. Highlight though, was a dog that had the shape and curly hair of a Bedlington Terrier, but was around three times the size. It was as if it had been crossed with a polar bear.
Bedlington struggled in the first half. It’s not surprising really as they had only managed to retain three of their Northern League team from last year. Their keeper kept them in the game but they went in at the break three one behind.
The visitors gelled a bit more in the second half and had the best of the chances. They pulled a goal back at the death, but Killingworth hung on for a three-two win.
Trail of the Lion King 