17mar07
Campeonato Nacional De Primera División
Estadio Ricardo Saprissa, San José, Costa Rica
When thinking about great footballing rivals, we think of Real Madrid and Barcelona, Celtic and Rangers, Man Utd and Liverpool. Down in Costa Rica, they have their very own 'Classico Nacional': Deportivo Saprissa of San Jose and their local neighbours Alajuela.
With the game being one of the highlights of the Costa Rican league season, I was a little concerned about ticket availability. Dave and myself decided to head to the Estadio Saprissa the day before to see if we could get tickets. As our unmarked taxi pulled up outside the stadium my ticket fears were lifted. A few ticket touts saw our pasty white gringo skin and all of a sudden we were having reels of tickets waved in our faces through the taxi window. The man to left was offering tickets worth 2000 colones for 5000, the man to our right tickets of 4000 for 5000. With a mark up of just over a pound, our man to the right won our custom.
Arriving at the ground a good few hours before kick off, the streets were full of fans wearing Saprissa team colours- purple with white trim. Nothing says masculinity like a beefcake in a purple shirt with 'Bimbo' slapped across their chest. As with the games in El Salvador, the streets were full of people selling food and team merchandise, the most notable items being a mexican wrestling style mask and horns made from actual bull horns complete with hair.
As we made our way in the ground, I had the usual frisk from riot police which I'd become accustomed to back in El Salvador. Once again the gentle officer took away my rechargeable batteries just in case I decided to throw them at anyone. With almost an hour and a half before kick off the terrace behind the goal was brimming with Tikos awaiting the arrival of their heroes. As the 'Purple Monsters' came out of the tunnel, latin american football fever kicked in. With the stand smothered in banners, fans held huge Saprissa flags high whilst the air was filled with flares, fireworks and smoke billowing across the terraces. A guy with a drum and a megaphone lead the chanting and jumping. As the whole end leaped up and down the concrete terrace underneath me began to shake and move beneath my feet. I was genuinely quite concerned of the terrace collapsing, but I cast my doubts aside as I had a copy of my insurance certificate on me, safe in the knowledge that San Jose has one of the best hospitals in central america.
The game began slowly with Saprissa and Alajuela sharing possession. Towards the end of the first half 10 minutes of Saprissa pressure earnt our hosts a goal. With a diagonal cross finding the striker, he took control, paused unnecessarily and slotted the ball home through the defenders leg and the keepers arms. The stadium erupted. The second half continued in this fashion with Saprissa scoring another smart goal. A precise cross found the head of a diving forward whose pin point header found the bottom corner of the net. Once again the stadium was alive with passion as more fireworks were let off into the San Jose night. A third goal came with a smart flick over the Alajuela defence found a Saprissa player who scuffed a volley. The Alajuela keeper was caught off balance and the ball found its way to the back of the net. With the final score 3-0, the Purple Monsters had won the bragging rights in Costa Rican football.
Saturday, 31 March 2007
Monday, 26 March 2007
Cambridge City 3 Havant & Waterlooville 0
24mar07
Conference South
Milton Road, Cambridge
att. 436
first in a series of short despatches from the play-off push
In my last post I described how a 1-1 felt ‘a bit arse’ in a lengthy, anally-fixated piece. Probably not one of my finest, and now with hindsight, how I’d love a return to those halcyon days of, well, the first part of this month; of tight away draws; of the stout defending that made the first two thirds of this season a very different kind of watch for us Hawks used to spirited attacking, but naïve, haphazard stuff at the back. Like I acknowledged though, this raising of the expectations is what happens when you’ve been spoilt. Even last weekend, we turned a drab first half performance into a pretty impressive 3-1 over the eternally mercurial Newport County, consolidating third position in the table.
This enabled us to travel away once more this past Tuesday with confidence and this, well, this would probably be the point which determined what the remainder of our season would entail. Continuing to fight for automatic promotion, or merely to make sure of a play-off berth. The Glassworld Stadium, home of league leaders Histon was our destination, and although Histon would retain a game in hand afterward, their lead over us could, in those ninety minutes, be cut from five points to a very chase-able two. As it turned out, we rolled over easier than a set of Ghandi-inspired union skittles staging a pensions demo. 4-0. FOUR. NIL. The word on the street was of a shocking, deflating second half.
However, four days later, a chance for our guys to return to the scene of the crime to put things right. Well, almost the same scene, Cambridge City being only about four miles from Histon. Must we then blame the Cambridgeshire air – today featuring the cold, the wet and lashings of dank - for 3-0, a second successive heavy defeat with barely a shot on target. We might, as a set of supporters, be able to deal with getting stoved by a team who appear to have one hand on the league title, but Cambridge City are mid-table floaters this year, with more pressing off-field concerns such as the future of their club. This, after a couple of years of clinging on to the front-door like a baby onto their hippie uncle’s ponytail, looks as though it will be their final season at Milton Road, their lease having finally run out, rather cruelly, after 99 years. It is only that imminent threat of eviction that prevents “you’ll be back again next year” from entering the City Shed Choir’s repertoire.
So you could argue that that puts the concerns of not gaining promotion into perspective, but excuse me the occasional Veruca Salt-esque tantrum. I want promotion. I wan’ it, I wan’ it, I wan’ it!!! However, from being well set last weekend, only four points now separate us from Braintree in sixth, one place outside ‘the zone’ and precisely where we finished last year. We couldn’t let it slide at this stage after such a successful season. Could we? I’d like to think not but at the moment the worry is that our side could quickly become like a stricken milk-float teetering backwards over a ravine i.e. at the pivotal point, all the bottle will rapidly slip away.
Links
Cambridge City website
Havant & Waterlooville website
Conference South
Milton Road, Cambridge
att. 436
first in a series of short despatches from the play-off push
In my last post I described how a 1-1 felt ‘a bit arse’ in a lengthy, anally-fixated piece. Probably not one of my finest, and now with hindsight, how I’d love a return to those halcyon days of, well, the first part of this month; of tight away draws; of the stout defending that made the first two thirds of this season a very different kind of watch for us Hawks used to spirited attacking, but naïve, haphazard stuff at the back. Like I acknowledged though, this raising of the expectations is what happens when you’ve been spoilt. Even last weekend, we turned a drab first half performance into a pretty impressive 3-1 over the eternally mercurial Newport County, consolidating third position in the table.
This enabled us to travel away once more this past Tuesday with confidence and this, well, this would probably be the point which determined what the remainder of our season would entail. Continuing to fight for automatic promotion, or merely to make sure of a play-off berth. The Glassworld Stadium, home of league leaders Histon was our destination, and although Histon would retain a game in hand afterward, their lead over us could, in those ninety minutes, be cut from five points to a very chase-able two. As it turned out, we rolled over easier than a set of Ghandi-inspired union skittles staging a pensions demo. 4-0. FOUR. NIL. The word on the street was of a shocking, deflating second half.
However, four days later, a chance for our guys to return to the scene of the crime to put things right. Well, almost the same scene, Cambridge City being only about four miles from Histon. Must we then blame the Cambridgeshire air – today featuring the cold, the wet and lashings of dank - for 3-0, a second successive heavy defeat with barely a shot on target. We might, as a set of supporters, be able to deal with getting stoved by a team who appear to have one hand on the league title, but Cambridge City are mid-table floaters this year, with more pressing off-field concerns such as the future of their club. This, after a couple of years of clinging on to the front-door like a baby onto their hippie uncle’s ponytail, looks as though it will be their final season at Milton Road, their lease having finally run out, rather cruelly, after 99 years. It is only that imminent threat of eviction that prevents “you’ll be back again next year” from entering the City Shed Choir’s repertoire.
So you could argue that that puts the concerns of not gaining promotion into perspective, but excuse me the occasional Veruca Salt-esque tantrum. I want promotion. I wan’ it, I wan’ it, I wan’ it!!! However, from being well set last weekend, only four points now separate us from Braintree in sixth, one place outside ‘the zone’ and precisely where we finished last year. We couldn’t let it slide at this stage after such a successful season. Could we? I’d like to think not but at the moment the worry is that our side could quickly become like a stricken milk-float teetering backwards over a ravine i.e. at the pivotal point, all the bottle will rapidly slip away.
Links
Cambridge City website
Havant & Waterlooville website
Saturday, 17 March 2007
Welling United 1 Havant & Waterlooville 1
10mar07
Conference South
Park View Road, Welling
att. 703
So, it’s that time of the season again, folks. That time when your rump makes like an agitated music hall impressionist making a third attempt, in front of an increasingly restless crowd all harshly reddened by happy hour gin, at rendering the sound of a cellar door opening in a decaying, derelict châteaux. A top manager once put it more succinctly than that, but sadly it’s become the lazy sports writer’s go-to bum-etaphor ever since. I will wager my handsome legs that you’ll have heard it on your telly or read it over someone’s shoulder at least five times in the last month.
With it being that time, then, that time when Alex Ferguson’s apparently rusty rectum takes over the nation’s media with a Mao-ist ubiquity, you’ll be pleased to learn we will not countenance its usage on these pages. In later postings, should the need arise, we’ll be going with “Tony-the-turtle-stretching-his-long-old-neck-to-touch-cloth. Time”. Cumbersome, yes, and goes a little further than Fergie’s windy suggestiveness to something a touch more incontinent, but hopefully the anthropomorphism will be enough to appeal to the kids.
See, I’m just trying to open up the market for vaguely unpleasant anus-centred anxiety analogies, I’m not denying for one minute that Fergie had something. It is all about the arse at this stage of the season. Whether fighting for promotion or against relegation, team’s need backbone. Sure, but take a trip down one of those and where does it lead you, eh? That’s right, the same thing you need to pull your finger out of. Son. Before I take my boot to your backs… You get the picture.
Sometimes it is just arse. There are scales of that though. It will be fully arse for those who are already resigned to a dismal fate. It is a truth universally acknowledged that a man who’s been doused in petrol for three weeks, must be in want of a match (and a refund on their West Ham season ticket). For others, it will be arse in pockets (to paraphrase Chrissie Hynde), and that holds true for those at both ends of the table. Each week threatens to disappoint, drive you mad or even derail an entire season. I myself am quite lucky that my side currently occupy third place in the Conference South, but it’d only take a couple displays of arse to stun the play-off dream, and kill the one of automatic promotion.
When you’re playing away at the side occupying the final play-off spot in 5th, it becomes exactly what Sir Alex suggested. Who’s that knocking on the door? Well, if it isn’t Tony the turtle! Hello Tony the turtle! Earlier in the season, we took Welling apart 4-0 at home, but this being the time it is, every performance needs to be a big one, whether playing promotion rivals, the relegation haunted, or even those in middle table who are already casting one leg over the side of a hammock and tilting their straw-hat towards their chin.
We’ve been in good form lately though. Not only coming from 3-1 down at home to another potential play-offee, Bishop’s Stortford, to win 5-4, which was followed four days later by a 5-1 away win at Weston Super Mare, but further 4-0 and 6-0 successive home wins over Bedford Town and Hayes respectively, the latter equalling our record league win. The form, like I say, has been good, Rocky Baptiste finally getting a hat-trick whilst running away with the golden boot, and the defence remaining unusually solid (well, most of the time). So not much arse around our way of late, but a 1-1 draw today felt a bit like it, especially with an early lead squandered. And I know, I know, I’m saying all this knowing full well that I’ve been spoilt this season, promotion challenges and big cup ties and all that. Just don’t want the so near/so far thing to kick in, is all.
So, yeah, 10th minute. Jamie Collins with his back to goal, flicking the ball with his left foot past the keeper, a defender and his own right leg with the spontaneous, ramshackle invention of a teenage punk band let loose for the afternoon on a viola pock-marked by woodworm. 1-0. Sun is shining, weather is sweet, all is good with the world. “When we win promotion, this is what we sing…”. Except we didn’t sing that, I guess previous fairly close-run disappointments have tempered our chicken-counting a tad.
We had two further chances of note in the first half, Jefferson Louis with a gilt-edged chance to nod in a Shaun Wilkinson cross at the far post, while Wilko himself drove in a fierce shot that was tipped over by Welling keeper Jamie Turner. Admittedly this was probably going over anyway, and the ref certainly believed so, robbing Turner of his glory by awarding a goal kick. Turner had a decent game all told, but was certainly not kept as busy as Shane Gore in our goal who was punching out hard and often, like an angry tramp trying to establish an arc of territory in the corner of a past-its-prime shopping arcade.
In the end, we didn’t make the most of the breaks we did get, Jeff-Lou getting caught up in his own legs like a awkward, geeky, teenage crane-fly on several occasions, while Rocky clearly didn’t bring his Grade A shooting irons either. Perhaps it was the presence of his closest challenger for the Conference South golden boot, Welling’s Danny Kedwell, that was putting him off. However, Kedwell didn’t get on the scoresheet either. Sadly, his team-mate Ben Lewis did, nodding a cross back over Shane Gore just before half-time.
In the second half, with Welling barrelling down their slope and out of the sunshine, it was always going to be a tough task, and Gore had to be at his best, particularly with one point-blank shot that 99% of the time would have caused to net to billow like a line-drying bedsheet on a blustery hill-top. Our moment of note came when a ball going fairly innocuously across the Welling box, flicked up and appeared to strike a defender on the underside of his arm, causing fury behind the goal. I was stood, briefly, around the side at the time but, from what I came to gather when I got back around, there was something cast iron being nailed-on to a stone-wall, or something. Also, it was a definite penalty.
Being on the side however did allow me to watch the by-play involving our sub Fitzroy Simpson, who was following the linesman up and down the touchline, asking “Am I wrong then though? Is it netball now is it” with the scowling, repetitive incredulity of Jeremy Paxman querying the presence of a mini-bar Toblerone on his hotel bill.
In the end though, we were probably holding on a bit but if someone had offered us one apiece at 3pm, they’d have soon been left screaming at their blood-gushing stump, their hand having been snatched off by several eager Hawks at once. However, with another 1-1 draw following the next Tuesday away at Eastbourne Borough, there’s only so long we can rely on these kinda results with seven away games still to go.
Links
Welling United website
Havant & Waterlooville website
Conference South
Park View Road, Welling
att. 703
So, it’s that time of the season again, folks. That time when your rump makes like an agitated music hall impressionist making a third attempt, in front of an increasingly restless crowd all harshly reddened by happy hour gin, at rendering the sound of a cellar door opening in a decaying, derelict châteaux. A top manager once put it more succinctly than that, but sadly it’s become the lazy sports writer’s go-to bum-etaphor ever since. I will wager my handsome legs that you’ll have heard it on your telly or read it over someone’s shoulder at least five times in the last month.
With it being that time, then, that time when Alex Ferguson’s apparently rusty rectum takes over the nation’s media with a Mao-ist ubiquity, you’ll be pleased to learn we will not countenance its usage on these pages. In later postings, should the need arise, we’ll be going with “Tony-the-turtle-stretching-his-long-old-neck-to-touch-cloth. Time”. Cumbersome, yes, and goes a little further than Fergie’s windy suggestiveness to something a touch more incontinent, but hopefully the anthropomorphism will be enough to appeal to the kids.
See, I’m just trying to open up the market for vaguely unpleasant anus-centred anxiety analogies, I’m not denying for one minute that Fergie had something. It is all about the arse at this stage of the season. Whether fighting for promotion or against relegation, team’s need backbone. Sure, but take a trip down one of those and where does it lead you, eh? That’s right, the same thing you need to pull your finger out of. Son. Before I take my boot to your backs… You get the picture.
Sometimes it is just arse. There are scales of that though. It will be fully arse for those who are already resigned to a dismal fate. It is a truth universally acknowledged that a man who’s been doused in petrol for three weeks, must be in want of a match (and a refund on their West Ham season ticket). For others, it will be arse in pockets (to paraphrase Chrissie Hynde), and that holds true for those at both ends of the table. Each week threatens to disappoint, drive you mad or even derail an entire season. I myself am quite lucky that my side currently occupy third place in the Conference South, but it’d only take a couple displays of arse to stun the play-off dream, and kill the one of automatic promotion.
When you’re playing away at the side occupying the final play-off spot in 5th, it becomes exactly what Sir Alex suggested. Who’s that knocking on the door? Well, if it isn’t Tony the turtle! Hello Tony the turtle! Earlier in the season, we took Welling apart 4-0 at home, but this being the time it is, every performance needs to be a big one, whether playing promotion rivals, the relegation haunted, or even those in middle table who are already casting one leg over the side of a hammock and tilting their straw-hat towards their chin.
So, yeah, 10th minute. Jamie Collins with his back to goal, flicking the ball with his left foot past the keeper, a defender and his own right leg with the spontaneous, ramshackle invention of a teenage punk band let loose for the afternoon on a viola pock-marked by woodworm. 1-0. Sun is shining, weather is sweet, all is good with the world. “When we win promotion, this is what we sing…”. Except we didn’t sing that, I guess previous fairly close-run disappointments have tempered our chicken-counting a tad.
We had two further chances of note in the first half, Jefferson Louis with a gilt-edged chance to nod in a Shaun Wilkinson cross at the far post, while Wilko himself drove in a fierce shot that was tipped over by Welling keeper Jamie Turner. Admittedly this was probably going over anyway, and the ref certainly believed so, robbing Turner of his glory by awarding a goal kick. Turner had a decent game all told, but was certainly not kept as busy as Shane Gore in our goal who was punching out hard and often, like an angry tramp trying to establish an arc of territory in the corner of a past-its-prime shopping arcade.
In the end, we didn’t make the most of the breaks we did get, Jeff-Lou getting caught up in his own legs like a awkward, geeky, teenage crane-fly on several occasions, while Rocky clearly didn’t bring his Grade A shooting irons either. Perhaps it was the presence of his closest challenger for the Conference South golden boot, Welling’s Danny Kedwell, that was putting him off. However, Kedwell didn’t get on the scoresheet either. Sadly, his team-mate Ben Lewis did, nodding a cross back over Shane Gore just before half-time.
In the second half, with Welling barrelling down their slope and out of the sunshine, it was always going to be a tough task, and Gore had to be at his best, particularly with one point-blank shot that 99% of the time would have caused to net to billow like a line-drying bedsheet on a blustery hill-top. Our moment of note came when a ball going fairly innocuously across the Welling box, flicked up and appeared to strike a defender on the underside of his arm, causing fury behind the goal. I was stood, briefly, around the side at the time but, from what I came to gather when I got back around, there was something cast iron being nailed-on to a stone-wall, or something. Also, it was a definite penalty.
Being on the side however did allow me to watch the by-play involving our sub Fitzroy Simpson, who was following the linesman up and down the touchline, asking “Am I wrong then though? Is it netball now is it” with the scowling, repetitive incredulity of Jeremy Paxman querying the presence of a mini-bar Toblerone on his hotel bill.
In the end though, we were probably holding on a bit but if someone had offered us one apiece at 3pm, they’d have soon been left screaming at their blood-gushing stump, their hand having been snatched off by several eager Hawks at once. However, with another 1-1 draw following the next Tuesday away at Eastbourne Borough, there’s only so long we can rely on these kinda results with seven away games still to go.
Links
Welling United website
Havant & Waterlooville website
Friday, 9 March 2007
South Liverpool 5 Stoneycroft 2
03mar07
Liverpool County FA Premier League Roy Wade Cup Quarter Final
Jericho Lane, Otterspool, Liverpool
att. 25 (approx.)
The cliché foretells of a man, an unassuming man, and a single dog. He will be devastated if there’s not a programme, and may well carry with him a flask. Of course, this is almost never the actual case. Well, not in the sense that our tea-drinkin’, programme-collectin’, probably flat-capped gentleman will be there alone. Even today, a game between two teams that play at level 12 of English football (and Saturday senior football's rungs don’t get too much closer to the ground after that) can attract, not one man, but twenty-five. And no sign of a Jack Russell either. Although there is a small boy hovering around the away bench, clad fully in a red Liverpool strip.
Once upon a time, South appeared to be almost a handily placed feeder club for those Reds to the north, with the great Jimmy Case and John Aldridge passing through their ranks on their eventual way to Anfield. Mind you, South Liverpool were a very different club in those days. In all there have been three incarnations, the original outfit that played in the Lancashire Combination between the wars before morphing into New Brighton; a second which ran from 1935 to 1991, competing in the Northern Premier League from its inception in 1968 until financial problems forced them to fold; and then this third incarnation that initially merged with Cheshire Lines, de-merging two years later. South Liverpool have played in the Liverpool County Combination (now County FA Premier League after the Combination merged with the I Zingari League last year) ever since.
During the second incarnation, South played at Holly Park, Allerton (see picture above), which lay dormant for many years after the 1991 collapse. However, in 2006, the site was cleared and its place taken by the new Liverpool South Parkway airport link rail station. Traces of the terrace wall briefly remained, but since the photos below were taken, it has been removed. While they never seriously challenged at the top of the Northern Premier League, they nonetheless applied, more in hope than expectation I guess, for election to the Football League on ten occasions.
Still, 1939 Welsh Cup winners; eight runs to the rounds proper of the FA Cup (twice to the second stage); plus flirtation with the football league certainly suggests a club with a proud history, and the latest committee are keen to keep that alive. Today’s matchday programme reprints from a 1914 edition produced for a game against Tranmere Rovers. It appears commercialism was rife in football even then, the top of the team-sheet emblazoned with a good luck message. “W. G. Wicks, the South Liverpool hosier, wishes “the Babes” every good fortune for 1914-15.” Certainly, a footballer can play their game with a great deal more freedom; a great deal more passion and vigour even, when they’re safe in the knowledge that, when push comes to shove, they won’t be found wanting for tights.
Considering the free entry, the concrete prison of a changing block, the lack of neutral linesmen and the fact that the opposition are wearing four-year old Manchester City away shirts, you might be forgiven for thinking that we’ve dipped into the murky, beery world of parks football here. There is though a difference and, quite simply, it’s the history. Certainly, there appears to remain a loyalty, however small, to the South Liverpool brand that must be the envy of other sides in their league. The old boys dotted around the sidelines look as thought they may well have once stood on the steps at Holly Park, and at least one, who scampers with a charming eagerness when the ball flies off the pitch around where he is standing, that may just remember the Dingle Park days of the original team. There is certainly a charming archaism about the place. For example, a large amount of today's programme has been produced on a typewriter.
However time cannot stand still in all things and now, with Holly Park consumed by car-parking and bus-stops, the South support must be content with watching not from a terrace, but from behind a length of rope, this, like I’ve inferred, essentially being a recreation ground. If so, it speaks volumes for their loyalty, although clearly that was often split. One chap says of his previous evening; “Tranmere on the Friday, the South today...just like the old days”. Furthermore the fact that this two-thirty kick-off means an overlap with the final moments of Liverpool’s game with Manchester United means attention is divided, even on the benches.
Indeed, it is only about 30 seconds after South open the scoring, James Kelly side-footing calmly in after beating the eager charge of the Stoneycroft keeper, that their bench are informed “United have just scored.” “Who? United? Ahhhh!” spits the gaffer, exhibiting all the focus of a bus-tyre-crushed disposable camera. A further South supporter breaks away from his car radio long enough to chat with the one sub who isn’t part of the coaching team and remains sat on the bench, making the most of his proximity to the barrier rope to apply a little motivational asphyxia.
On the field, South are dominating, and making the most of the Stoneycroft keeper’s apparent allergy to his own goal-line. However, just as you start to think he’s the most hyperactive and unreliable keeper you’ve ever seen, he pulls off a terrific one-handed save. However he ruins the moment by then attempting to leap, cat-like, upon the ball, only to land five feet in front of it.
On 17 minutes, South double their lead, one of the bigger Stoneycroft players goes down heavy, but the ref ignores him, as the lively David Foy exploits the keeper’s eagerness, rounding him and slotting home. Within a minute though, Stoneycroft have a decent penalty shout turned down, the keeper appearing to pull at the leg of the number 8. Five minutes later they finally get their goal, the 9 breaking through the defence and firing beneath keeper Peter Webster.
Indeed the ball through the defence, whether on land or in the air, is causing consternation in both defences, the major thing separating the sides being the head-and-shoulders-above quality of South’s two scorers thus far, not to mention the better grasp of passing and rapid movement. Along with the history I spoke of, this clearly raises it some distance above pub level. In Kelly, they have a tough box-to-box striker, and in Foy, a pacey, creative, stick of dynamite. Two minutes before half-time, it is the latter who adds South’s third with a beautifully weighted, first-touch lob over the once-again illogically advanced keeper.
That’s not the lot for the half tough, as a fourth is added, Foy completing a hat-trick. A shot past the keeper from their number ten accurately pin-points the forehead of the a defender who has made it back to the line, but as it rebounds, the ball comes to Foy and after checking several times for the right angles send a shot which pinball’s off about four legs, a shin and a big silver bell, and into the net.
At half-time, Stoneycroft eschew the Gulag-like charms of the changing rooms for the comfort of the sidelines, while in the centre-circle, the ref plays keepies all by himself, in his head probably thinking “Yeah, that’s right, I’m better than all of these boozers. If only I had some assistants here to see this” With a mountain to climb, Stoneycroft burst out of the traps in the second half, pulling another goal back after two minutes, a cross being met by their 8 in front of desperate tackles by a defender and the keeper, the ball trickling into the far corner.
After this, the game’s pace becomes a little less frenetic, particularly as South lose two players two foot injuries, one apparently a broken toe, in quick succession. However, they finish off the scoring, thanks to some not altogether untypically calamitous stuff in the Stoneycroft defence. A ball is passed back to the keeper who clears, but only as far as a South midfielder, who make use of the keeper’s now semi-legendary positioning, to fire straight back into the net.
Five points clear in their league, and now in the semi-finals of their divisional cup, it’s shaping up to be a great season for South. If some of these 25 chaps here today have stuck by their side since prior to 1991 then, well, who would begrudge them a double?
*Holly Park picture taken from Groundtastic #47, December 2006.
Road to the final
F: Aigburth People's Hall 3 Mossley Hill Athletic 1 [aet]
SF: Mossley Hill Athletic 1 South Liverpool 1 [aet, 4-3 pens]
QF: South Liverpool 5 Stoneycroft 2
R1: Saint Ambrose 0 South Liverpool 4
Links
Liverpool FA County Premier League
Liverpool County FA Premier League Roy Wade Cup Quarter Final
Jericho Lane, Otterspool, Liverpool
att. 25 (approx.)
The cliché foretells of a man, an unassuming man, and a single dog. He will be devastated if there’s not a programme, and may well carry with him a flask. Of course, this is almost never the actual case. Well, not in the sense that our tea-drinkin’, programme-collectin’, probably flat-capped gentleman will be there alone. Even today, a game between two teams that play at level 12 of English football (and Saturday senior football's rungs don’t get too much closer to the ground after that) can attract, not one man, but twenty-five. And no sign of a Jack Russell either. Although there is a small boy hovering around the away bench, clad fully in a red Liverpool strip.
Once upon a time, South appeared to be almost a handily placed feeder club for those Reds to the north, with the great Jimmy Case and John Aldridge passing through their ranks on their eventual way to Anfield. Mind you, South Liverpool were a very different club in those days. In all there have been three incarnations, the original outfit that played in the Lancashire Combination between the wars before morphing into New Brighton; a second which ran from 1935 to 1991, competing in the Northern Premier League from its inception in 1968 until financial problems forced them to fold; and then this third incarnation that initially merged with Cheshire Lines, de-merging two years later. South Liverpool have played in the Liverpool County Combination (now County FA Premier League after the Combination merged with the I Zingari League last year) ever since.
During the second incarnation, South played at Holly Park, Allerton (see picture above), which lay dormant for many years after the 1991 collapse. However, in 2006, the site was cleared and its place taken by the new Liverpool South Parkway airport link rail station. Traces of the terrace wall briefly remained, but since the photos below were taken, it has been removed. While they never seriously challenged at the top of the Northern Premier League, they nonetheless applied, more in hope than expectation I guess, for election to the Football League on ten occasions.
Still, 1939 Welsh Cup winners; eight runs to the rounds proper of the FA Cup (twice to the second stage); plus flirtation with the football league certainly suggests a club with a proud history, and the latest committee are keen to keep that alive. Today’s matchday programme reprints from a 1914 edition produced for a game against Tranmere Rovers. It appears commercialism was rife in football even then, the top of the team-sheet emblazoned with a good luck message. “W. G. Wicks, the South Liverpool hosier, wishes “the Babes” every good fortune for 1914-15.” Certainly, a footballer can play their game with a great deal more freedom; a great deal more passion and vigour even, when they’re safe in the knowledge that, when push comes to shove, they won’t be found wanting for tights.
Considering the free entry, the concrete prison of a changing block, the lack of neutral linesmen and the fact that the opposition are wearing four-year old Manchester City away shirts, you might be forgiven for thinking that we’ve dipped into the murky, beery world of parks football here. There is though a difference and, quite simply, it’s the history. Certainly, there appears to remain a loyalty, however small, to the South Liverpool brand that must be the envy of other sides in their league. The old boys dotted around the sidelines look as thought they may well have once stood on the steps at Holly Park, and at least one, who scampers with a charming eagerness when the ball flies off the pitch around where he is standing, that may just remember the Dingle Park days of the original team. There is certainly a charming archaism about the place. For example, a large amount of today's programme has been produced on a typewriter.
Indeed, it is only about 30 seconds after South open the scoring, James Kelly side-footing calmly in after beating the eager charge of the Stoneycroft keeper, that their bench are informed “United have just scored.” “Who? United? Ahhhh!” spits the gaffer, exhibiting all the focus of a bus-tyre-crushed disposable camera. A further South supporter breaks away from his car radio long enough to chat with the one sub who isn’t part of the coaching team and remains sat on the bench, making the most of his proximity to the barrier rope to apply a little motivational asphyxia.
On the field, South are dominating, and making the most of the Stoneycroft keeper’s apparent allergy to his own goal-line. However, just as you start to think he’s the most hyperactive and unreliable keeper you’ve ever seen, he pulls off a terrific one-handed save. However he ruins the moment by then attempting to leap, cat-like, upon the ball, only to land five feet in front of it.
On 17 minutes, South double their lead, one of the bigger Stoneycroft players goes down heavy, but the ref ignores him, as the lively David Foy exploits the keeper’s eagerness, rounding him and slotting home. Within a minute though, Stoneycroft have a decent penalty shout turned down, the keeper appearing to pull at the leg of the number 8. Five minutes later they finally get their goal, the 9 breaking through the defence and firing beneath keeper Peter Webster.
Indeed the ball through the defence, whether on land or in the air, is causing consternation in both defences, the major thing separating the sides being the head-and-shoulders-above quality of South’s two scorers thus far, not to mention the better grasp of passing and rapid movement. Along with the history I spoke of, this clearly raises it some distance above pub level. In Kelly, they have a tough box-to-box striker, and in Foy, a pacey, creative, stick of dynamite. Two minutes before half-time, it is the latter who adds South’s third with a beautifully weighted, first-touch lob over the once-again illogically advanced keeper.
That’s not the lot for the half tough, as a fourth is added, Foy completing a hat-trick. A shot past the keeper from their number ten accurately pin-points the forehead of the a defender who has made it back to the line, but as it rebounds, the ball comes to Foy and after checking several times for the right angles send a shot which pinball’s off about four legs, a shin and a big silver bell, and into the net.
At half-time, Stoneycroft eschew the Gulag-like charms of the changing rooms for the comfort of the sidelines, while in the centre-circle, the ref plays keepies all by himself, in his head probably thinking “Yeah, that’s right, I’m better than all of these boozers. If only I had some assistants here to see this” With a mountain to climb, Stoneycroft burst out of the traps in the second half, pulling another goal back after two minutes, a cross being met by their 8 in front of desperate tackles by a defender and the keeper, the ball trickling into the far corner.
After this, the game’s pace becomes a little less frenetic, particularly as South lose two players two foot injuries, one apparently a broken toe, in quick succession. However, they finish off the scoring, thanks to some not altogether untypically calamitous stuff in the Stoneycroft defence. A ball is passed back to the keeper who clears, but only as far as a South midfielder, who make use of the keeper’s now semi-legendary positioning, to fire straight back into the net.
Five points clear in their league, and now in the semi-finals of their divisional cup, it’s shaping up to be a great season for South. If some of these 25 chaps here today have stuck by their side since prior to 1991 then, well, who would begrudge them a double?
*Holly Park picture taken from Groundtastic #47, December 2006.
Road to the final
F: Aigburth People's Hall 3 Mossley Hill Athletic 1 [aet]
SF: Mossley Hill Athletic 1 South Liverpool 1 [aet, 4-3 pens]
QF: South Liverpool 5 Stoneycroft 2
R1: Saint Ambrose 0 South Liverpool 4
Links
Liverpool FA County Premier League
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