Jen was heading off to a retreat with some of her writing friends and so I dropped her off at Hartshead Moor Services and then continued on to the Leigh Sports Village stadium. It was the venue for a women’s FA Cup fixture between Manchester United and Burnley. If I remember rightly, the stadium was used as a venue in the 2022 Women’s Euros.
It’s also a rugby league ground and there was a statue of former Leigh player John Woods outside. I’m not very knowledgeable about League but was surprised that I hadn’t heard of someone famous enough to get a statue.
Leigh Sports Village doesn’t have much of a capacity, but it didn’t need it for this fixture. I had a ticket in the main stand. Two of the stands were closed and occupied only by flags. I got a burger before kick-off and took my seat among a crowd of mainly families. A large proportion of the women were wearing those dry robes. Maybe they had just been for a wild swim.
It was a fourth-round tie with a couple of divisions separating the sides. Burnley put out a full-strength team but Man Utd took the opportunity to field a few fringe players. The gulf in ability was clear though and after the hosts took the lead in the opening minutes the outcome was never in doubt.
Burnley defended well to go in just the three goals down at the break and the eventual scoreline of five-nil was a fair reflection of the afternoon. As I felt no real need to applaud the winners at the end, I was able to get quickly out of the car park and then head back to the North-East.
Trail of the Lion King 