Tranmere Rovers 2 Hartlepool United 0

League One Play-Off Semi Final 2nd leg
2-2 agg. a.e.t., Hartlepool win 6-5 on penalties
att. 13,356

There was me thinking my football season was over, but following an aborted trip halfway to Prenton Park back in March, the play-offs throw up a further opportunity. Second leg against Hartlepool, who hold a 2-0 lead from the first leg. Their Victoria Park is quite a small ground, and would be dwarfed in the Championship, but a sizeable proportion of their home gate appears to have made the trip to see if their team can get to a Cardiff showdown with Sheffield Wednesday to determine next year’s Championship newbies.

Have had a soft spot for Hartlepool since working with a Pools fan for several years down in Havant, and visited their ground last year. It’s small, for sure, but nicely appointed, a favourite stop on the ol’ hobo tread. I also like that rather than be embarrassed about their town’s apparent history, they actually embrace the term ‘Monkey hangers’, and elected their giant primate mascot as mayor. A very special people.

However, what’s not to like about Tranmere as well? Constantly in the shadow of Liverpool and Everton across the water, recent cup runs (including that amazing 4-3 win, from 3-0 down, against Southampton a few years back) have shown they can offer up quite a few surprises. With that Saints tie still living large in the memory, a huge banner on their giant Kop proclaiming ‘Bouncebackability’ suggests they fancy their team to get back the deficit, and they appear positive at half time despite the lack of goals, and the fact that their talisman, Jason McAteer, has to be replaced after 20 minutes, injured and weeping because he could take no further part. Can’t knock that sort of passion.

The other sort of passion is going on in front of me as a Tranmere youth has a running verbal battle with a member of the Hartlepool young team. However the noise of the crowd and the distance between them actually makes it more like a particular aggressive edition of ‘See Hear!’. This goes on all game, but it is a sideshow to an excellent tie.

Certainly the atmosphere is hot all round and Prenton Park is pretty packed compared to their usual expectations. It is only the atmos that’s hot though and having not done a midweeker for a while, I forget how much the temperature drops even in May. As it is, I’m nithered stiff (as they say in Leeds) by half time.

Tranmere, particularly in the second half, make all the running, battering the opposition down the flanks and the Pools goal appears to live a charmed life until finally a Taylor free-kick lifts over the wall and out of the grasp of Konstantopoulos on 70. Again the pressure is kept up and David Beresford’s sweet curled shot past defence and keeper to get the tie level with 3 minutes to go sees Prenton rocking. Our friend in front (seen clapping and chanting to his own tune below) gestures at his new friend in the away end shouting hoarsely, “2-0 down, 2-2 up”.

So extra time and tired legs means the tempo changes and Hartlepool finally get some chances of their own, but ultimately it always looks like it’s going to penalties and so it goes. After a save each side, it enters sudden death and an eerie kind of calm descends on my section of the crowd. Discarded remnants of fingernails litter the floor. Sharps penalty, the 7th for Tranmere, is saved and Richie Humphries makes relatively easy work of the winner.

Cruel on Tranmere who have put 2 games worth of effort into this second leg, but Pools have been resolute and dogged.

So that’s it for this season. 52 games not a bad return.

Got a few ideas of where I want to get to next season, certainly I will be making use of my time at the Edinburgh festival to check out some Scottish League action.

Any suggestions of Scottish clubs to visit or clubs (best to be northern) for next season are welcome in the comments. If anyone has a burning desire to see pictures of Atherton Laburnum Rovers taking on Abbey Hey, or some such, then do let me know.

Altrincham 2 Eastbourne Borough 1

Conference Promotion Final – North vs. South
Brittania Stadium, Stoke
att. 2,835

Stoke is, without doubt, a football town. After all, how many places situate a statue of their legend (Sir Stan, born Hanley 1915) in their main shopping centre rather than in the car park at the ground? Add the 3 further likenesses outside the Britannia and you see my point. There is a fine history behind Stoke City, although the great days seem to be disappearing further into the distant past.

However the usual effort of talking up (and down) the ambience and club of the place I happen to be is misplaced today as today isn’t really about either, other than the fact that the Conference have booked the relatively brand new Britannia Stadium to host their play-off finals. Last night Carlisle beat Stevenage to make a swift return to a division that has changed it’s name in their absence. Possibly in the hope that Carlisle wouldn’t be able to find it again. Curses, foiled, and such.

Today though is a new thing, a first play-off final for the North and South feeders to distinguish the 3rd promotion spot split between the 2 divisions. Certainly these end of season wheat-sorters keep the interest up (1 up only from each of 3 feeder leagues, as was until last year, is certainly not conducive to keeping several seasons alive) as the 2 finalists are the teams that finished 5th (and therefore at the base of the play-off cut) in each division.

Talking of Stoke’s history, the two clubs involved today could not really be much more different in terms of background and tradition. Altrincham formed in 1911 and have fine records in the Conference, the FA Trophy and the FA Cup (14 league scalps with Blackburn, Everton, Liverpool and Spurs, twice, also run very close).

Eastbourne Borough on the other hand have only had their handle since 2001 (much to the annoyance of Eastbourne Town and Eastbourne United), having previously competed as Langney Sports in the Sussex League. They too took FA Cup scalps during their time as an awkward County League banana-skin, but their giant-killings came in the form of Harrow Borough, Leatherhead and, ahem, Havant & Waterlooville. Comparatively excellent achievements nonetheless, and their rise through the Sussex League, Dr Martens Eastern and Premier to the Conference South has been meteoric. A win today and elevation to the top non-league rung would make it magnificent.

The great geographical divide also adds spice with a metaphoric Hadrian’s Wall running between, roughly, Swansea and Norwich. A variety of flat-capped pigeon fanciers and Mockney Chavs (as each other would not doubt have it) have been manning the turrets all season claiming their league to be the best of the two. Indeed, in the run up to this fixture, the web fora for each league were filled with ‘Do the Conf North/South* proud (*delete as applicable)’ type messages.

For Altrincham, a 33 mile trip, for Eastbourne a 235 mile haul, so in a stadium built for 28,218, a final for 2 leagues the majority of football fans are not yet aware of, it is perhaps unsurprising that the Conference marketing suits were putting the call out for neutrals in the Stoke area to come out for it. We neutrals even got our own window at the ticket office. Certainly there would be a smattering of interest from the more rabid followers of teams at level 6 to turn out to see what might have been for their team.

As it is less than 1 side of the Britannia is required and we scattering of fence sitters, sociopaths and saddoes are positioned on the lower tier next to the Alty army and beneath the drums, bells and trumpets of Eastbourne in the upper level. Scoff at the crowd size and the swathes of empty Stokeite seating if you will, but the atmosphere is excellent (despite the drums).

Of course, it is a game of cat and mouse as to who will be the first to sing ‘you dirty (north/south)-ern bastards’ but after 17 minutes and a particularly rough challenge from Eddie Hussin, Eastbourne break for the line.

Chances come at either end in the first half, but the singing banter is of most interest. Boro: “4 of you singing, there’s only…”. Alty: “Who are ya?” It’s 0-0 at half-time, but Eastbourne have edged the North/South vocal battle.

However it is to be Alty’s day on the pitch as they knock up a couple of goals not too far apart at the start of the second half, first Rod Thornley planting it unpretentiously away after some box pinball, then Val Owens swooping like a kestrel to push the ball in with his shiny pate.

Alty could relax after that, and so other incidentals could grab the attention, such as the solitary blue balloon, a remnant from the previous evening’s festivities, wafting around in the empty Boothen End like a boozy Cumbrian uncle at Eastbourne’s increasingly unhappy sleepover. Certainly, you’d hope the inflater of said protuberation was still asleep upside down in a toilet cubicle somewhere in the ground

In the 90th minute, Eastbourne finally get somewhere and convert a penalty kick, to give Altrincham something to think about but not long after it’s finished and the Alty get the opportunity to mount the podium with the box-fires growling flame and pyro cracking away. Nice the Conference should go to that effort.

As the celebrations go on, the blue balloon has someone made it round to the Alty section and despite it being wrinkled from it’s prior frenzy, it takes on a dove like quality, as though welcoming Altrincham to the national Conference, giving them a hand up to take Carlisle’s recently vacated spot.

Perhaps that’s a bit too ‘American Beauty’ for yer average South Manc non-league hanger on though.

Wigan Athletic 3 Reading 1

Championship
Att. 19,662

Glory hunter? Where?

Been trying to time my visit to the JJB Stadium just right, and with a final day that could see promotion or a heartbreaking fall at the last hurdle into the play-off lottery, this seemed like the ideal. Especially so when you consider that Wigan almost had to play their final home fixtures behind closed doors due to a financial spat with the Greater Manc plod. The atmosphere for this game would certainly have been a touch different as the JJB was, understandably, much fuller than usual. Twice as many here as had been for their clash with Brighton back in August, for example. However there are still wide open spaces either side of the Reading following, despite it being advertised as sold out (safety issues with the fuzz again, it turns out) forcing urchins to hold up signs pleading for spare tickets outside.

Wigan are well known for not doing great business with regards the football team. The Warriors rugby league side with whom they share their home put more bums on the JJB seats. Today though the town seems to be at a standstill in preparation for the biggest game in their history. Perhaps Wigan needs to be shutdown for the JJB to see an attendance their on-field successes have merited this season. The centre is deserted, aside from just two open shops: GAME and Gamestation. Perhaps then the people of Wigan are not missing in football-related action, rather they are all at home hunched over arched, addicted thumbs worn of their opposability. Or maybe Sunday trading just hasn’t arrived here yet. Time for some excitement then, and Wiganers know exactly where that can be found at today.

Certainly the football club are pulling out all the stops to whip up their punters (some old, some new, some borrowed, some probably red) into a frenzy. As I walk in, it becomes apparent that they have dug up the Drifters, the combination of a swirling wind and instinct keeping their legs swaying in unison down on the pitch. It may well have been a tribute act, but either way they cause a notable crowd reaction, which seems to highlight the newness of the football experience to some in the Wigan stands. Rather than launching Styrofoam tea-cups, rather uselessly, in their direction, or drowning out their croons with boos, a version of ‘Saturday Night At The Movies’ (albeit in scuzzy lo-fi form thanks to the farty PA) causes that kind of regimented in-time clapping usually only seen in those holding studio audience tickets for the Generation Game.

As the Drifters drift, the announcer, rather presumptuously, screams “90 minutes from the Premiership”. Before that payday, though, they are keen to borrow a tenor, as Lawrence Robinson booms out ‘Nessun Dorma’ for which the PA seems better suited than 4-part harmony. Thankfully normal footballing order is relatively restored as he is largely drowned out by both sets of fans in full chant. Sadly not “We all agree. Puccini is better than Wagner” though.

Nonetheless, everyone quietens down to allow him his moment of vocal glory on its Sturm und Drang creschendo, and give him warm applause. All well and good to get a bit of class and culture into these situations but if he’d come out in suit and boot and launched straight into leading the crowd in operatic style through the “dee do do dee do”’s of ‘Tom Hark’, THAT would have been really impressive.

Still, it’s just another distraction when both sets of fans want the game to start. It’s not just about Wigan getting an easy win to get them promotion (as the announcer would seem to have it), but Reading needing to win to stop West Ham taking the last play-off place from them.

The news soon comes through that Ipswich, Wigan’s rivals for the second promotion spot, have taken a lead. This is relayed to the crowd through a helpful Reading chant of ‘1-0 to the Ipswich Town’ in a fine example of ‘let’s try and motivate the opposition’ crass thickery. That Brighton equalise not long after is less apparent, but it soon becomes immaterial as Wigan score 2 in 2 electrifying minutes deflating Reading and essentially killing the game as a spectacle, certainly for the remainder of the first half.

The second half didn’t see Reading do anything that warranted anything other than second tier football next year and eventually Nathan Ellington finished it off in the 85th, the cross for his header seeming like TV movie slo-mo. A thousand 80’s soft-rock incidentals are composed in those stretched out seconds and, although Reading knock in a consolation in injury time, the Wigan celebrations were given license to begin. Over and over again as the match approaches climax the tannoy announcer implores the crowd that they should not come on the pitch. A sizeable amount of Wigan’s over-excited support take that as a wager and stream onward once the ref sounds his three promotion party parps.

It is perhaps understandable that Wigan’s more senior support will not quite believe all this, after all it is only 27 years since Wigan were elected to the Football League despite finishing second to Boston United in the Northern Premier. A chap behind me says to his companion that he had watched Wigan in their non-league days. He might well have also seen the Sex Pistols at the 100 Club, and a vision of Jesus in his bath towel, but no doubt there are a good many that have experienced the whole journey, and he may well be one. It is to them that this promotion should be dedicated, the heart and soul of the club from when they were semi-professional minnows, not just their sugar daddy Dave Whelan, although his contribution cannot be understated.

Indeed, some may say that Wigan is not a footballing town, that they don’t have the support to justify the step up, that they are not ‘big’ enough for the Premier League, but attendance figures don’t win you promotions and why shouldn’t a team with a smaller hardcore taste success? It seems as though sometimes that the attitude is that the bigger teams must have a better and more passionate support when in fact they will, by the very nature of their successes and excesses, have more fair-weather limpets than most.

Indeed, it is great when teams like Portsmouth, Birmingham, Charlton and Bolton come up and hang around despite not being particularly fashionable and yet, certainly in the case of Bolton, really making a fist of it and cementing their place amongst the old money.

Fact is, Wigan have been an attacking force to be admired, as the Roberts/Ellington partnership bearing 45 combined fruits has proven. They will no doubt find life tough with the big spenders but their positive play will be a welcome addition to the top division, a breath of fresh air in the face of increasing Premiership predictability (see the latest When Saturday Comes for an excellent editorial on this subject). Furthermore, in Paul Jewell they have a canny young manager who has had to do all this scrappy underdog business in the big league before with Bradford.

One of the great moments in the last 10 years in the Premiership has to be Bradford beating Liverpool on the final day in 1999/2000 to claw onto top-flight status. Okay so they went into financial meltdown in the process and only got one more year for their trouble (and it may be significant that Jewell had left after keeping them up due to a rift with the chairman), but lessons can be learnt from it, and no doubt Dave Whelan will be looking to use his money effectively but wisely in a bid to compete.

The word 'survive' is not in their lexicon. At this stage.

Shropshire CCC v Hampshire CCC

C&G Trophy Round 1
Whitchurch CC

Salop 132 all out (Whitney 39, Warne 3-20, Logan 3-37)
Hants 133 for 3 (Pietersen 76)

Hampshire won by 7 wickets

That scent of smouldering flesh, as sure as eggs is eggs, means my summer has started in the usual way. My first cricket of the season always runs parallel with my forgetting what the sun can do when you're sitting about underneath it for a few hours. Ah well, I can handle a bit of melanoma when given the chance to check out my county cricket club relatively near to my North West exilia.

Sadly I missed Hants C&G jaunt to Cheshire CCC last year, but luckily the draw threw up another nearby county, and good job it did, as this will be the final year that minor 'counties' (aside from Scotland and Ireland) will play in the C&G Trophy.

Like with football's FA Cup, most of the romance dies once the minnows are all knocked out, and now cricket's sole opportunity for the semi-professional/amateur counties to lock horns with the big boys as the ECB have changed the format for next year. Considering how many cricket lovers in this country don't live in the 18 main counties, this does seem like short-sightedness.

We have come to expect that of the ECB though.

This match, while easily won by a Hampshire boasting twin startlets Shane Warne and Kevin Pietersen (who both shone brightly, Pietersen's 76 coming fro only 49 and included 6 sixes, such was his dominance of the Shropshire attack), highlighted the joy that can be had from coming to these modest grounds to watch some of the worlds best face a potential banana-skin.

Giant killings don't happen as often in cricket as they do in football, but to remove the opporunity completely (and it is a great money-spinner for the minors) makes for a very dull competition.

As I say, this was a great occassion, many turning out to plonk themselves in hastily procurred and arranged patio chairs, plus heaving hospitality tents for those willing to wear a tie on a day that saw plenty of cloud but when the sun made itself visible, it beat down hard.

Many in attendance seemed to bemoan Shane Warne's decision to field first, hoping to see a full Hampshire innings rather than the 21.1 overs it took for them to knock off Salop's 132. However, with the potential of rain within the smattering of cloud made it the right decision.

Indeed there was plenty to admire anyhow. Pietersen won the man of the match award for his attempt to play the game like a Twenty20 tie, but kudos should also go to Shropshire's Jono Whitney for keeping the score respectable for his side with a dogged 39 low down the order, gamely taking on Warne's leg-spin genius. That he was stumped off Warne's bowling (a wide, as it goes) highlights how willing he was to take him on.

Good stuff and the early finish meant I didn't have to panic in getting back to Manchester to see Arcade Fire who were, as it goes, simply gorgeous.

Grays Athletic 3 Havant & Waterlooville 0

Conference South
att. 1016

So, to typify my H&W supporting season, another defeat (that'll be 6 in 8 for Jonah Skiffoid then). In the face of a rampant Grays Athletic high on crushing all-comers in the Conference South (a 23 point gap between them and second place Cambridge City tells all) and the FA Trophy (7-0 semi-final aggregates against a team from a higher level tell even more, with only Hucknall standing in their way in the final), it is perhaps hardly surprising. Grays were the only full-time professional team in Conference South, and it showed.

Added professionalism, of course, runs hand in hand with trumped-up arrogance. Today was their party, the Connie South mug due for presentation after the game, and as such my fellow H&W fans were prevented from putting up our usual array of flags. "It's our day" was apparently the whine of a Grays official who threatened to throw out all of our support for arguing the point.

On hearing this, our midfielder Robbie Pethick was apparently heard to say, 'if you lot get thrown out, we ain't playing', and seemed to mean it. Although anyone who saw Robbie's cameos on BBC2's 'Football Diaries' when playing for Weymouth will know that in brightness terms, he's not been attracting any moths lately. Can't fault the sentiment though.

The over-officious Grays directorate did not get their hands on our shed-load of Colgate, brought and proferred in tribute to Dean Holdsworth's snow-white ivories. Check out the H&W zine site IGT Squawk for pictures of the terrace action.

Grays were better than us and deserved their victory and the title, but they did take the piss somewhat. For example, when awarded a penalty, they sent up their goalkeeper. The picture below shows our custodian Gareth Howells saving his spot, but sadly, he followed it in.

The first half was a pretty hot and bothered affair, the humidity playing its part. The Grays fans spent ages reminding Dean Holdsworth about his early 90's sex scandal. It was noted by our support that when calling for crosses, his raised arm was topped off with a raised finger. Guess which one.

Indeed, when Dean curled home a quality finish, his celebration in front of the Grays support was, rather understandably, less than gentlemanly. An offside flag never makes for ideal viewing after such emphatic gusto. That's gotta hoit.

Grays' Recreation Ground is an odd box, as the balconies of adjoining flats lean over the ground, and it seems Grays fans reside in several of them. Blue wasn't the only colour fastened to the mast though, as you'll note, which caused rabid drunken heckling from the Tory in our number. 'Shut up about fuckin' politics' was our man Malc's succinct and spot on request.

The Rec is perhaps not the ideal setting for Conference National action next season, but the Grays squad look poised to acquit themselves well on the field.

Hopefully, after two seasons requiring a late spurt to raise us from gloom, we can get a good start off the blocks next season and, not just for selfish reasons, I'll get to see us win a bit more often. A Trophy run and the FA Cup 1st round away to Nottingham Forest will do me n'all.

Don't ask for much do I?