Fleetwood Town 3 Jarrow Roofing BCA 0

16sep06
FA Cup 1st Qualifying Round
Highbury Stadium, Fleetwood
att. 377

The Northern League, not to be confused with the Northern Premier – or Unibond – League that it feeds into, is often criticised for the lack of ambition amongst their member clubs. However with concerns over the increased travelling time and cost involved in applying for and accepting promotion to the Unibond’s second tier, Northern league chairman Mike Amos forthrightly retorted to such suggestions in 2004, asking “what’s ambitious about suicide?” During last season too, the Northern League steadfastly stuck in the craw of the FA’s attempts to restructure, with a second geographically divided Unibond Division One unviable for the start of this season due to a lack of clubs both willing and able to make the leap from the far north east.

By the end of this season, the situation may well be resolved, with Durham City, Consett and Newcastle Blue Star intimating that they are ready to move onwards and upwards from the second oldest league in the world, despite the prospect of regular journeys all the way to the lower parts of Merseyside and Yorkshire. For those clubs in the extremities, like Northumberland, Devon, Cornwall and to a certain extent Norfolk, this is always going to be a sticking point, and even for the relatively wealthy and motivated, however much restructuring goes on, the problem will remain.

You can understand why the Northern League would be keen to keep hold of their clubs though, and I don’t just mean their ever-decreasing status in the pyramid. I’m talking about the names. No other league can match the Northern for a rich variety of club monikers that pit (no pun intended) the resolutely working class against the downright poetic. I give you Horden Colliery Welfare; Norton & Stockton Ancients; Dunston Federation Brewery; Bedlington Terriers; West Allotment Celtic; Seaham Red Star and Billingham Synthonia. Nice. Team Northumbria stick out a bit, I grant you, but still...

Today, I’m in Fleetwood watching their rapid social climbers take on one of the Northern League’s very many star names. Jarrow Roofing Bolden Community Association FC. -- Just breathe that in for a while -- Jarrow Roofing Boldon Community Association FC. Hhhhhmmmmhhhh. Oh yeah!

Them Roofers have a tough task on their hands today, having to dispatch with a Fleetwood Town side currently sitting on top of the Unibond’s Premier Division, having raced from reformation in 1997 through the capture of league titles at both levels of the North West Counties League in 1999 and 2005, to which they added a promotion as runners-up from Unibond Div. One last year. Ambition? Fleetwood show them how it’s done, crashing through the leagues like a short-changed ape through a mingy newsagent’s confectionary display.

Coming up to Fleetwood today also allows me to visit a chum recently arrived in Blackpool as well as to briefly investigate the unsung parts of the Fylde coast sat in between the two, such as Cleveleys, which is like Eastbourne, only with boredom more vividly etched onto the aging faces. On sidling through Fleetwood itself, past the Fisherman’s Friend factory (a bigger concern than I’d imagined – not that I thought it was just some old, tobacco-addled trawlerman bringing up his grey phlegm and allowing it to harden, but still not as expansive as this) and into a town that feels refreshingly real when compared to the make-up caked ageing showgirl that is its near neighbour.

In Highbury, Fleetwood have a ground with a name to make enthusiasts purr, while on the inside, its very bits and bobs, with two stacked terrapins for hospitality, a gleaming clubhouse, a wee stocking filler of a main stand and one end blocked off to allow the building of a new terrace to keep with their water-colour vision [see picture below]. On a mound outside the ground gather a number of young lads either as official ball-retrievers, or entrance fee dodgers (very much the latter as it turns out). “C’mon Fleetwood” shouts one early on as the home side establish their two-tiers-higher credentials, his mate adding “Smack their fookin’ arses” before turning his attention to the lesser officials “Linesman, you’re a wanker. Get a decent job. Be a ref! Or a football player!” This from an eleven year old. Ouch.

As early as the tenth minute, Fleetwood make their class count to lead, Richie Allen taking one touch from a beautiful cross-field ball before letting fly with his left foot, the ball travelling at medium pace over the keeper’s palm and into the far corner. It is largely all Fleetwood in the first half, although [inhales] Jarrow Roofing Boldon Community Association see the start of some very good stuff from Keith Hutchinson and Paul Chow down the left flank. By this stage though, Fleetwood keeper Andy Banks is looking like such a pond-side bank-holiday stroller, his glove bag may well contain several slices of stale Hovis Best of Both.

In the second half, matters are a lot more even, Jarrow’s Stephen Kennedy making a great save early on, but not long after, at the other end, Hutchinson tests Banks’ crumb-flecked hands. A minute later, he gets to the touch-line again, but his team-mates are left well behind and as such, his pass trickles harmlessly along the unguarded goal-line.

One minute before the hour the home support are finally put at ease, Lee Pryers showing great vision to cross the ball from inside his own half, over the defence and straight into the path of ex-Everton man Stuart Barlow, making it simple for him to lash the ball past Kennedy and into the centre of the net. Eleven minutes later, Allen completes his brace and the scoring as a whole, as Fleetwood once more exploit the massive hole being continually left for them on the right wing. Barlow dances through and levels a pass to Allen who first-times a shot between Kennedy and Ibrahim Hassan, the ball striking a desperate, flailing arm on them both as though they are branches only briefly impeding a descent between two trees.

As for that hole, well, Jarrow’s defence are keeping their shape but are tucked so tightly together, they appear to all be joined at the hips by a single tube and worked with a handle from the behind the hoardings. Thankfully I can report: there no windmilling. P’raps football ain’t so rotten after all.

As Fleetwood step down from 5th gear seemingly to allow Jarrow a consolation, the Roofers use the final few minutes merely to showcase Mark Johnson taking on the role of a 50-year-old-in-someone-elses-testimonial in front of goal, bellowing a number of gilt-edge chances high, wide and hopeless, and that ends up being Jarrow’s lot in this year’s Cup. It’s been an odd kind of cup tie really, I can’t remember the last time I was at a game where a scoreline flattered both sides. No doubt though that Fleetwood have dealt with the Roofers in a swift and brisk manner, as though having haggled down their fairly honest quote for tiling repair like a retired Army major trying to reignite the fire in his glottis.

So game over and thus, of course, I have to head back to the north-west’s iridescent blot on the coastal and cultural landscape. My antipathy towards Blackpool has been documented here before but to be fair, at least the illuminations, which I pass on the blistered-heel dawdle back on the tram, kinda make sense of the place. It may be tiresome town for one like me with all the gaudy an’ that but at this time of year, with levels turned up to an Aphex-Twin-Come-To-Daddy-screaming-in-a-granny’s-face kinda gaudy, the extremities maketh the town.

Actually, I forgot to mention, before I made my way back to Blackpool, I did spend a little time in a fairly deserted Fleetwood boozer watching some of the evening’s Prem Plus game and listening in to a conversation amongst a group of late middle-aged folks as they discussed their life experience. “You’ve not lived if you’ve not ‘ad crabs” says one, before his colleague adds “I’ve not ‘ad ‘um. Had thrush though.” The lover of lazy stereotyping in me just wishes I’d found them in Blackpool itself.

Links
Fleetwood Town website
Jarrow Roofing Boldon Community Association website
The Smid visits Jarrow Roofing BCA

Road to Wembley
F: Manchester United 0 Chelsea 1 aet (att. 89,826)
SF: Blackburn Rovers 1 Chelsea 2 aet (att. 50,559)
QFr: Tottenham Hotspur 1 Chelsea 2 (att. 35,519)
QF: Chelsea 3 Tottenham Hotspur 3 (att. 41,517)
5R: Chelsea 4 Norwich City 0 (att. 41,537)
4R: Chelsea 3 Nottingham Forest 0 (att. 41,516)
3R: Nottingham Forest 2 Charlton Athletic 0 (att. 19,017)
2Rr: Nottingham Forest 2 Salisbury City 0 (att. 6,177)
2R: Salisbury City 1 Nottingham Forest 1 (att. 3,100)
1R: Salisbury City 3 Fleetwood Town 0 (att. 2,684)
4QR: Fleetwood Town 3 Wisbech Town 0 (att. 1,005)
3QR: Fleetwood Town 2 Warrington Town 0 (att. 567)
2QR: Fleetwood Town 4 Goole 2 (att. 427)
1QR: Fleetwood Town 3 Jarrow Roofing Boldon CA 0
PR: Jarrow Roofing Boldon CA 5 Thackley 4 (att. 57)
EPRr: Ramsbottom United 0 Thackley 1 (att. 94)
EPR: Jarrow Roofing Boldon CA 5 Billingham Synthonia 2 (at. 67)
EPR: Thackley 1 Ramsbottom United 1 (att. 77)

Bedford Town 2 Havant & Waterlooville 1

09sep06
Conference South
The New Eyrie, Bedford
att. 507

Since becoming an exile in 2003, I have greeted each season with a certain amount of optimism. That is in my nature. I should perhaps thank the Havant & Waterlooville players each season for selflessly preventing my expectations from raising too high, because from the moment I left, my first H&W game of each season spells certain defeat. 2003, lost 2-1 at Stafford. 2004, a 3-2 defeat at Basingstoke. 2005, Yeading away, 0-2.

Has this made me pragmatic? Have I become cynical? No, and never shall I lose my ability to slap a gauntlet in the face of empirical evidence. Particularly after our most exciting pre-season in years. A lucrative 3 year sponsorship deal with Carlsberg; several solid, quality signings with experience at the top level of semi-professional football; and a very good showing in front of 3,700 fans, beating a very high-class Portsmouth side 3-1.

So, all pretty tasty then. Well, the first week or two of the season saw a couple of defeats but since then the victories have been coming, and with Bedford hardly pulling up trees in their first season in Conference South, I made my way early from St Pancras with a spring in my step, the kind of spring that after a very relaxing stop beside on the embankment beside the river, saw me easily through the three miles to the New Eyrie, built after the reformation of the club in 1989, having been defunct for seven years.

Not that all lazing in the sun was all that Bedford had to offer. Being a kind of smaller sibling to the relatively nearby Cambridge, it’s a pleasant enough town, if possibly a little cramped. Today being market day, there is a gentle bustle. A few people shyly canvas for signatures to prevent a pole-dancing club coming to the high street, while next to them, a group in 16th century get-up should the kind of hot moves Bedford appears to prefer. Together they lock arms and do-se-do to a piccolo’s unobtrusive peep and a hurdy-gurdy that appears to mimic a wet duckling’s first, satisfying, postnatal fart.

Despite the protests against the titty-bar, Bedford do appear fond of a bust. There’s a wee little effigy of anti-apartheid campaigner Archbishop Trevor Huddleston at the top of the precinct that makes him look oddly shrunken, like a retired jockey several hours after falling asleep in the bath, but the inscribed eulogic quote from Mandela make his memory stand taller than even a full statue could capture. Round the corner, on an alcove within the outer walls of the Corn Exchange is Glenn Miller’s little ‘ead, placed there apparently on the 50th anniversary of his disappearance, to commemorate the concerts he gave to the people of Bedford during the war, while stationed nearby.

Try as I might though, I can’t forever put off talking about the game. On joining the travellers from the south coast behind the goal, all seemed well. The atmosphere behind the goal remained good throughout, perhaps because those involved in the supporters club bus trip had not only a sweep on the first goal-scorer, but also a pass-the-bag-of-pound-coins-parcel thing going on, with each corner seeing the bag handed along. Furthermore, H&W were looking by far the better side, Rocky Baptiste holding the ball up marvellously, while a Brett Poate header on the half hour went over when, from 6 yards out, he really should have done better. Try as we might, the Bedford defence were proving a tough nut to crack, even though they didn’t appear to have anything up front to cause us too much concern.

In the second half things largely remained the same; another glaring miss came, this time from Tom Jordan’s head. A couple of minutes after that, Bedford scored their first in a two-in-five-minute suckerpunch, both coming from recently introduced substitute Ian Draycott and both from defensive errors.

After that, Havant & Waterlooville looked to have no answers and appeared to have given up the ghost when, just as the game entered injury time our sub, barrel-chested (and barrel-arsed) Richard Pacquette, dug out the ball from between many a Bedford leg, flicked to Brett Poate who edged past Bedford keeper Steven Graham, to slot into the bottom corner.

Reasons to be cheerful then? Well, one of our supporters won Bedford’s half-time draw. The same person then having to hand on the corner game wedge just before the final whistle was probably another reason, comically speaking. Indeed, despite the defeat, the behind the goal spirit remained pretty upbeat, possibly because it was fairly late on that we let our dominance slip. It is frustrating though, after a first half that we largely bossed, it looked odds on that there would be one winner, but two sharp uppercuts knocked the desire out of us, the second wind that did arrive coming much too late.

So, that spring in my step went on a typically early vacation, and the walk back to town felt a lot more than the three I thought it was on the way in. Such is the way when we’re partisan, and prone to disappointment, I guess.

Links
Bedford Town
Havant & Waterlooville

Buxton 4 Atherstone Town 1

02sep06
FA Cup Preliminary Round
Silverlands, Buxton
att. 418

Not sure what it is about my relationship with the FA Cup but combine it, wiv me, and I appear to become a rainmaker the envy of many an Apache tribe. There was H&W’s exit at the hands of Cirencester in last year’s competition, which was wet on so very many levels. Then there was two weeks ago at Garforth, where pretty much everyone in the ground tried to fit on the back row of the stand as that was the only area beneath the ‘cover’ that afforded any shelter. I would have thought I might have been due a drying off period, but…

If anything the angle of the rain today in the Peaks was even more horizontal. Thankfully, the combination of a mighty wind in tandem with the fine, but incessant, drizzle along with the fact that the Silverlands ground is placed on a steep hill that winds up from the town centre means the game will go ahead. However, having held off to the last minute to make sure it wouldn’t be a wasted journey, there is not enough time to explore what is, I imagine, quite a handsome part of central England. Apparently I came here briefly whilst on holiday with my olds when I was on the cusp of my greasy teens, but I remember absolutely nuffin’ of it, although I believe I was in the midst of a faze of listening long and often to Ozzy Osbourne’s ‘Randy Rhoads Tribute’ live LP (on white, err…, cassette).

One trip I do remember is my only, thus far, visit to Atherstone in the West Midlands. The 1999/2000 season, my first season as an H&W supporter, finished with an away fixture at Atherstone United. I wasn’t, at that stage, a regular away-tripper, and indeed travelled up with two old chums and my girlfriend of the time, rather than in the company of the Hawk crew, whom I have come to know a lot better since.

Plan had been for a long time that the last day away trip would be a fancy dress effort, ‘the 70’s’ being mooted as a theme. Keen to fit in, I pulled my mint green crushed velvet jacket out of the wardrobe. Not strictly 70’s, but with Showaddywaddy’s ‘Under The Moon Of Love’ having been adopted as our victory anthem during the course of that season, I thought it’d pass. I had been warned in the week prior to the game though that, despite the hype, not many would be going for it come the Saturday. Undeterred, I turned up in my garb, only to discover that ‘not any’ would have been a more accurate description of the general uptake. Still, I could have gone the whole Bootsy Collins/afro-wig hog, and as it happened H&W’s away shirts that season were a cheap, but vaguely shimmering, mint green, so not a complete disaster. A maverick then, albeit slightly awkward with it.

Not that many Atherstone fans were there to see it though, their team having already been relegated (and we’d have joined them but for two scrapping victories in the week prior). I wonder if any of the respectable gaggle of Atherstone fans here today might have borne witness to that, but then again a lot of water has floated under their bridge since then. I imagine the Southern League Premier days, punching above their weight really considering the size of the town itself, seem an awful long time ago. You may well have spotted by now that I am talking of an Atherstone United there, while Buxton’s opponents today are a ‘Town’, and therein, of course, lies a tale. Strictly speaking we are talking about two different clubs, United having gone into liquidation 3 years after my over-eager and over-dressed outing. However, a group of supporters managed to kick-start a new club to play at the Sheepy Road ground and laid claim to United’s history, United themselves having taken the baton from a previous, and again liquidated, ‘Town’ in 1979.

This Atherstone Town started in the Midland Combination Division One in 2004, earning promotion in both of their first two seasons to the Midland Alliance. Today’s game represented a chance for this successful Adders side to test themselves against Buxton, newly promoted from the Northern Counties East league and currently sitting atop the Unibond Division One, one level above them. This season has been Buxton’s return to the Northern Premier League set-up after two successive bottom-place relegations in 1997 and 98 pushed them out after 25 years of service, and results thus far this season appear to show they are keen to leap back up as quickly as they faded away. Their crowds and their Silverlands home give them a good base for their ambitions, particularly with a pitch that is not easily saturated.

Despite that, with the rain slanting across courtesy the hectic breeze, the players take a good long while to be sure of their footing, an early Buxton corner slipping and blowing out before it even reaches the near post. At the other end Atherstone’s Danny Gaunt is asking plenty of questions of the right back Sean Hutchinson on the flank, or at least he would be if his regular experiments with gravity didn’t suggest that he’s playing in tap shoes, on a glacier. [see photo]

In the middle of the pitch, a stray Kwik Save carry-bag perfects its own graceful American Beauty homage, curbing its understandable natural urge to grip onto a passing face like a frightened cat. Outside of its unpredictable flow, the slipping and sliding has made it less of a football match and more a happy hour rebirth of ‘Double Dare’ (one for the 80’s kids there, and incidentally, whatever happened to Peter Simon?)

It takes about quarter of an hour for Atherstone to rid themselves of their Teflon soles and keep up with the home side, and the first great chance of the game goes to the Adders; Junior Hewitt threads the ball across the box and, amongst a load of bodies, Chris Partridge swipes his shot all around the ball as it trickles embarrassingly out beyond him. Hewitt tries to do better a couple of minutes later, a cool cushion header that appears about to drop into the far corner before Tommy Agus’ intervention.

It is Buxton though, in the 37th minute, that take the lead. Shaun Doxey benefits from the ball bitch-slapping off of Leigh Everitt’s startled right cheek, to plant an exquisite shot into the top corner from 20 yards out. Proper slo-mo stuff too. Atherstone then up their tempo, breaking into the box twice in the following couple of minutes with, firstly, captain Craig Civzelis’ header grabbed a yard out by Buxton keeper Scott Hartley. Then Gaunt attempts a deft chip, but it settles in Hartley’s untroubled arms. “Keep the buggers out boy” gargles one curmudgeonly local, adding “load of bloody animals” like a sulky Alf Ramsey on a trip to the zoo.

Atherstone, as you might imagine, are keen to start the second period with gusto as the winner takes all here. ‘All’ being a grand and the opportunity to visit Tipton Town or Rushall Olympic. Indeed, Scott Hartley has to remain alert as they break inside the box twice in the opening minute of the half. Not long after, though, Buxton regain their sea legs and a lack-of-space-defying one-two between Aaron Brady and Adam Lee leaves the former free against keeper Richard Williams. The eventual shot though only requires Williams to tip the ball in the air as though celebrating a regulation slip-catch, and to gather it again on its way down.

As it becomes end to end, Atherstone force a corner, Stefan Beale’s in swinger catching on the air, allowing the gaggle of players in the 6 yard box to synchronise their watches before rising together, Hartley leaping above the lot to slap the ball against his own bar, and feel mightily relieved that it then goes behind.

After 65 minutes, Buxton are tired of hanging around, Michael Tovey taking the ball into the far-left corner before delivering a great cross to the 6 yard line where sub Rob Ward has readied himself like a trigonometrically-aware catalogue model to guide the ball past the keeper with an expert skid off his balding pate. Five minutes later it may this time be Aaron Brady in that same corner, but it is nonetheless the exact same cross for the exact same result, Ward nodding in again, this time with more of a heavy pat off his lofty forehead.

A further five minutes later, Danny Gaunt collects on the left, and with the Buxton approach to goalscoring now almost a cliché, Atherstone try to emulate it themselves, successfully too, Chris Partridge side-footing in at the far post before grabbing the ball and escorting it back to the centre-circle in the attempt to redress the now two-goal deficit.

However Buxton respond in the most adequate manner, killing off any hope of an Atherstone revival, passing it around arrogantly before Tovey dances through challenges in the box to belt an effort into the far corner. 4-1. Job done. Next stop? Tipton Town, currently leading the Midland Combination. Buxton will certainly be wary of their threat based on Atherstone’s commendable efforts, but very confident of further progression.

Needless to say, barring more, and this time too much, rain, your Hobo will report from the first qualifying round in a fortnight’s time.

Links
Buxton website
Atherstone Town website

Road to Wembley
F: Manchester United 0 Chelsea 1 aet (att. 89,826)
SF: Blackburn Rovers 1 Chelsea 2 aet (att. 50,559)
QF: Blackburn Rovers 2 Manchester City 0 (att. 27,743)
5R: Preston North End 1 Manchester City 3 (att. 18,890)
4R: Manchester City 3 Southampton 1 (att. 26,496)
3R: Torquay United 0 Southampton 2 (att. 5,396)
2Rr: Leyton Orient 1 Torquay United 2 (att. 2,384)
2R: Torquay United 1 Leyton Orient 1 (att. 2,392)
1R: Torquay United 2 Leatherhead 1 (att. 2,218)
4QR: AFC Sudbury 1 Leatherhead 2 (att. 613)
3QR: Woodford United 1 AFC Sudbury 3 (att. 309)
2QR: Buxton 0 Woodford United 1 (att. 542)
1QRr: Buxton 2 Tipton Town 1 (att. 491)
1QR: Tipton Town 1 Buxton 1 (att. 193)
PR: Buxton 4 Atherstone Town 1
EPR: Atherstone Town 3 Carlton Town 2 (att. 222)