Climate Change

Kibworth Town  8  Desford Development  0

Leicestershire Senior League – Division Two

“I never wanted to kill, I’m not naturally evil…..”

Not my words, the words of Morrissey, but right now it perhaps sums up how myself and many other football fans feel about the current weather situation and the impact it’s having on the ability to get games on.

Can anyone of a meteorological background please explain to me, does the weather have an understanding of the days of the week? The reason I ask is because it seems to know when it’s the weekend. It’s fine from Sunday through to around Friday tea time, and then it smashes it down all the way through to Saturday night, and right now, it’s like clockwork, every week.

If the weather were a living form, it would be a cockwomble, Jon Pigeon would shat on it, it would get the blame for the Brexit fiasco, it would have a contract out against it, and I would sign it, like I said, I’m not naturally evil………..

So, usual Saturday morning bollocks aside, I was left with a couple of local choices, those being at South Elmsall and Kibworth, and if they went by the wayside I was going to be M25 bound searching out the Isthmian League’s finest artificial surfaces in the vicinity of Heathrow Airport. A large part of me was praying to the God I don’t believe in, for a miracle.

I had a plan, bearing in mind South Elmsall called their game off when the pitch was re-assigned for a jet-ski competition, and that was to run with the initial good vibes I was getting from the Secretary of Kibworth Town. I sent him a text (James that is) and he told me that the manager had been up to the pitch and declared it playable.

I was a touch nervous about the difference between early inspections and referees turning up and playing the dick, plus I was also mindful of any forthcoming rain, so I decided to go down to Leicester Forest East Services, which is just fifteen minutes from Kibworth, and check again. If it was then called off, I was within a couple of changes of clothes from West London.

The good vibes from Kibworth were still good once at the services, so I decided to go for it, Kibworth Town, the last remaining ground of the plethora of newbies that were admitted at the start of the season. It was to be a champagne job, I could kiss goodbye to Everards Ales and Walkers Crisps until next season at least. That said, it’s been good fun, some really good clubs have come in and some nice set ups. Mass brawl at Newbold Verdon aside, it’s been like clockwork. Well done Rob and all of the guys at the LSL, credit where its due.

Kibworth is located South of Leicester, on the main A6 that goes from the ring road at the Racecourse, through Oadby, and down to Market Harborough. The ground is on the very edges of the village and unless you know precisely where it is, you’ve got no chance of finding it as it sits a good distance away from the road, and is shielded by hedgerows. It’s called Birds Barn and it’s on the road that leads to Fleckney, another newbie to the league, and I suspect when they play each other all Police leave is cancelled.

First port of call was the ground, and yes I did miss the entrance, but once I’d travelled along the track and found it, I was pleased to find two sets of players and a referee in place. All was good in the World, I had a chat with the Kibworth Manager, I had two important questions. Is the game definitely on, and where is the nearest pub.

Yes, and the Coach & Horses was the reply.

Kibworth is a very pleasant village, made up of two parts, Kibworth Beauchamp and Kibworth Harcourt, with the dividing line seemingly the railway line that runs through the middle. It’s also a busy place, but the car park at the boozer had spaces, I was a mostly very happy man.

With pint and peanuts in hand, I thought it prudent to have a look at the history and the fortunes of Kibworth Town. Currently, they play in Division Two and sat in fourth place before the game. Northfield Emerald are going to win it, they have won ten from ten and have a +62 goal difference, but a promotion place is definitely in the equation for them.

Last season they competed in the Leicester & District League, finishing mid-table, but their application to the LSL was duly accepted.

The ground at Birds Barn is a vast place. The car park is sizable, with the clubroom and dressing rooms located next to it. In front are a vast array of small sized pitches, with the railed off main pitch sat on something of a plateau at the far end of the complex. The pitch was in very good condition considering the recent weather, the manager was clearly spot on in his assessment!

The game was largely one sided, bar a spell of about fifteen minutes at the end of the first half when visiting Desford Development could have capitalised on their possession and breached the host’s defences. Otherwise, it was something of a procession.

It was 3-0 at half time thanks to goals from Ollie Watson, Aiden Smith and a penalty from Ollie Magee. It was the third goal that visibly killed Desford, as it came at the end of their best spell of the game.

After half time it was completely one way, Smith got his second and Kibworth’s fourth while Watson also got his second and the hosts fifth goal. Substitute Alex Hobart scored a fine sixth goal, while Tom Barton volleyed home a seventh. The eighth goal was the crispest finish for me when Ollie Biddle smashed the ball home from twenty five yards, giving the valiant Desford goalkeeper no chance.

Six wins out of six from Kibworth as they march on. The fact they have such a well draining surface at Birds Barn will probably help them because if this weather continues they will play more often than they get called off.

I’ve not even bothered looking at the weather forecast for next Saturday, because it’s already decided what it’s going to do. Climate change and Greta Thunberg, my arse……….

LYM

Llanrhaeadr Ym Mochnant  2  Ruthin Town 2

Cymru League - North

Some might say that heading to Mid-Wales on a day when matches were falling all over the place due to the weather, was not the most sensible of ideas!

Probably not, but, it was only thanks to the promptness and positivity of Llanrhaeadr Ym Mochnant (LYM hereafter) on their Twitter account that convinced me to take the journey with assurance and confidence.

I genuinely do believe that some clubs use social media very well indeed and reap the benefits of it, while others could learn a thing or two, and maybe, encourage a few more through the gate in the process.

So, to cut a long story short, I’d had LYM and the game against Ruthin Town in the newly formed Cymru North (it used to be the Cymru Alliance for all intents and purposes), on the radar for a while. And with not much else on in terms of my targets for this season, I thought I’d make enquiries on the Friday night, probably more in hope than expectation.

The response was positive with confirmation to follow in the morning, which duly arrived, no problems, get ones arse in the general direction of Mid-Wales young man!

I missed LYM first time around when they were in the Cymru Alliance, it fell during the “moving in with Mrs L” period when I was being a good little husband to be and only going to Belper Town games. They dropped back to the Mid-Wales League so I kind of forgot about them, until last season when they got promoted again. However, due to issues with the ground and the size of the pitch at Tanllan (Theatre of Trees), they opted to move in with Llansantfraid Village, the former home of TNS.

However, with pitch widened, new stand put in, and one or two other bits and pieces sorted, they were back in the village, and consequently back on my list.

Readers, you are probably wondering where LYM actually is? I’d better try and explain, by describing my journey. Heading West, I went to Stoke-on-Trent and then out through Baldwins Gate to Whitchurch, whereby I took the well trodden route to Wrexham, for a bit anyway.

A left turn then took me on the Ellesmere road, and then once out of Ellesmere it was on to Oswestry and out West again through the town centre. LYM is around nine miles beyond Oswestry, along some very scenic albeit narrow roads. The main road was actually closed so the sat nav kindly took me seven miles along a single file track that was flooded in places, thank you so very much!

So, what is LYM like? Well, it’s most famous for it’s waterfall, or the Pistyll Rhaeadr Waterfall to give it the full name. One of the Seven Wonders Of Wales, along with Max Boyce apparently? Just over 1000 people live in the village, and what I did discover is that it’s well served by drinking establishments, but more on that later.

Once at the ground and parked up, the first person I bumped into was Chairman Mel Roberts, who it turns out is the club Twitter chap. So we had a brief chinwag about the fact that under no circumstances should I go back via the route I came, and if I wanted a pint, head to the Wynnstay Arms in the village, which was a five minute walk away.

The walk to the Wynnstay gave me a chance to admire the prettiness of the place, and once inside, the homeliness struck you. I ended up chatting to a local who was a Black Country man originally, and a big Wolves fan, but due to marriage etc he now lived in the village. He told me just how popular and well thought of the club were in the village, and also, how well supported they were.

That support became apparent when I got back to the ground just before kick-off, I would estimate around 150 were present, but think about that as a percentage for a minute. That’s 10-15% of the population, and if that trend were to be typical we’d see some phenomenal crowds across the land. Belper Town for example would get 3000 a week!!

I really liked the ground. The ground is just off the main road and the car park is entered via a cul-de-sac. The car park sits behind the goal and the turnstiles are in one corner. Once in the ground on the North side is the clubhouse / dressing room building, which is up some steps, while next to it is a brand new seated stand that had to be installed to meet league requirements (very few people sat in it by the way despite it’s elevated viewing position).

Behind the opposite goal is a much smaller seated stand, while hard standing is on three sides, with the side along the road where the dugouts are, out of bound for spectators.

No floodlights, not a requirement of Level Two in Wales, yet, and the pitch was perfectly playable despite the recent bad weather.

LYM had a great start to the season and sat just above half way in the table while the visitors sat below them, but clear of the drop zone.

It was a really good game to watch. Ruthin took the lead in fifteenth minute when Garmon Hafal scored at the near post, but ten minutes before the break Tomos Geraint Evans bagged the equaliser. Right on the half time whistle, Iwan Matthews made it 2-1 to the hosts from the penalty spot, and on balance it was probably the right scoreline.

The second half saw Ruthin come back into the game and it did look as though the hosts would hold on as the game got somewhat more ragged and the yellow card started to get flashed around. 

However, as the game moved into the closing stages, LYM were denied what I thought was a penalty, only for the ball to go straight up the other end, for the visitors to be awarded a penalty!

Up stepped Owain Llyr Morris, 2-2, and that was it, on balance, a fair outcome, which upon leaving, Mel agreed with me as I said farewell.

I took advice around the journey back and went via Llansantfraid, which eventually bought me back out on the Shrewsbury ring road and then back up the A5 / A38 to blighty. What a cracking day out, at a cracking club, a day out that probably wouldn’t have happened had it been for LYM’s excellent communications.

A lesson for many I feel.

Grifters

Nuneaton Griff   1   Coventry Sphinx   1 (4-3 pens)

Midland Football League – League Cup

It seemed like a very good idea at the time.

It would have been February 2004, a Wednesday night, and the snow had been falling steadily in the parish of Dronfield throughout the afternoon.

I’d seen a game I quite fancied, it was Nuneaton Griff v Rugby Town in the Midland Combination, it was declared as on, despite the adverse weather conditions.

I set off from Dronfield, and within half a mile I’d found myself sliding sideways down the main road towards oncoming traffic. Thankfully, I ground to a halt before colliding with anything, but even so, it proved to be an un-nerving experience, so I chose to give Nuneaton a miss.

It subsequently got called off late in the day anyway!

By the time it got round to December 2004, I decided to head for Griff again, on a Wednesday night, but this time the weather was not an issue, I saw them draw 1-1 with Barnt Green Spartak.

That was fifteen years ago, almost, and since that point I can honestly say that I’ve never had any inclination whatsoever to head back to the Pingles Stadium to watch Griff again, not because they did anything to upset and annoy me, far from it. Simply they weren’t on my radar, and maybe also because every time I think of them I have flashbacks to my car heading uncontrollably down a snow covered road!

That all changed a bit though earlier this year, and it was down to a friendship I struck with a gentleman called Rod Grubb.

I’d set up a programme trading business, on a small scale, via mail order and via eBay, and Rod stumbled across me. We got talking, and kept in touch, and it turns out that Rod was indeed the programme editor at Nuneaton Griff. We’d never met before, so I made him a promise that at some point this season I’d head down to watch them, and at the same time, put a face to a name.

After a couple of aborted attempts, I finally got a date in the diary, a Wednesday night, and given the previous weeks torrential rain, it was declared as very much on.

I don’t know Nuneaton as a town very well, apart from the previous visit to Griff, I’ve been to the old and the new Nuneaton Borough grounds a couple of times each, and I went to watch a team called Stockingford Allotment Association one evening, which from memory was somewhere in the town, very close to a cabbage patch.

So to a certain extent, despite the relative closeness of Nuneaton to Belper, it was a bit of a journey into the unknown. But with my trusty sat nav taking me down the M69 and via the back way into the town, I found myself handily parked up in the pub car park at the bottom of the access road to the stadium, which gave me time to do a bit of research into the club I was about to visit.

It seems Griff were formed in 1972 as Nuneaton Amateurs, the year I was born in fact, maybe we could be twins? Anyway, Football Club History Database only picks them up from 1999 so presumably they played in some local leagues and of course the Coventry Alliance prior to that, I guess?

So, in 1999, they joined the Midland Combination and were somewhat controversially placed into the Premier Division, but that was fully justified as they won the Championship in their first campaign. The following year they did it again, but also won the League Challenge Cup at Villa Park and the Coventry Telegraph Cup at Highfield Road the night after, becoming the first team to win two cups on consecutive nights at different Premier League grounds!

Up until the end of the 2013-14 season the club had a mixed time, some successful seasons, some less so, and then when the Combination merged with the Midland Alliance they were placed in the First Division, where they remain today, despite having finished bottom last season, and sitting bottom this time around.

They reached the Fifth Round of the FA Vase in 2015-16, losing to Salisbury, but other than that, they’ve not registered much on the national scale. Although an 8-5 home defeat to Rocester in the Vase a couple of seasons back opened a few eyes.

I didn’t have much of a recollection of the Pingles Stadium, other than they had a tall stand, and it was an athletics stadium. So when I found the turnstiles, which isn’t that easy, what I found did bring back a few memories. Yes, it was still an athletics stadium, and yes it did still have a tall and smart stand, but also I recalled the nearby railway arches, and the tress that lined one side of the complex.

They have, according to Rod, extended the clubhouse and dressing rooms in recent years and are now trying to get an alcohol licence. To be honest though, I have no recollection whatsoever of that from my previous visit.

It’s a tidy venue, and with plans to refurbish the athletics track, and the floodlights, to go with the new electronic scoreboard and media block, it will be tidier still. For what Griff both want and need, it does just the job, and clearly it’s well cared for.

I finally got to meet the mighty fine gentleman that is Rod, and had the pleasure of spending the game in his company. He invited me in for coffee and cake at half time, which was very kind of him and of the Griff Chairman who I also had the pleasure of meeting. Griff might be struggling on the pitch due to being one of the clubs in the league that doesn’t have a  playing budget, but off the pitch they are first class.

So what about the game?

Considering visiting Coventry Sphinx were from the league above, albeit struggling, Griff made a very positive start and looked well organised. It came as no surprise either when Lewis Collins found the net in the 38^th minute to give them the lead.

Sphinx got an equaliser in the 77^th minute from a Lewis Noon free kick but to be fair, even up to that point Griff had not looked in any significant danger. That said, once the goal went in, it was all hands to the pump for the hosts as Sphinx had their most dominant spell of the game, without finding any further goals.

The game went straight to penalties, and Sphinx saved the first Griff penalty only for the liner (a former Griff player!), to quite rightly rule that the goalkeeper was two yards off his line when the kick was taken. The re-take found the net.

That kind of set the tone, and when Sphinx saw their last penalty saved, it was a 4-3 victory for Griff who progress to the next round. The Sphinx manager resigned after the game.

I gave Rod a lift home after the game, it was the least I could do in return for his hospitality. And for his and all of the volunteers who’ve worked so hard over the years at the club, I do hope they can retain their Step 6 status this season.

If you’ve never been, I urge you to pay them a visit, this is a very good, and a very welcoming football club, and one to definitely bear in mind when the weather is not so good. As Rod told me, they don’t lose many games, if any, to waterlogging.

Snow is another matter!!

Loo

SV Loo   3   VV Arnhemia   4

Zondag 4E Klasse D

I think I might have finally got my head around how Dutch amateur football works.

It only really sunk in when I found myself hunting for what seemed like a needle in a haystack when it came to finding a fixture for the final day of the Football Weekend. The Sunday is typically a local day, so we try and find something at a lower level that's pretty close to home.

So then,you’ve got the top two national divisions which are both professional, and then a nationally based third tier that is a mixture of semi-professional and professional clubs (none of whom seemingly want promotion). The top division plays whenever TV scheduling dictates, the second tier turns out on a Friday night and the third tier rocks up on a Saturday afternoon.

Then you’ve got the fourth tier, which is again national, but two divisions, one for Saturday and one for Sunday. After that comes the Hoofdklasse, which has four regional divisions, two on a Saturday, two on a Sunday. This, along with the fourth tier, is semi-professional.

Right, following me so far?

Then comes ‘amateur’ football. This is split into regions, North, East, West 1, West 2, South 1 and South 2. Within each region there can be up to five levels of divisions, or ‘Klasse’ as they call it, and also within each region it’s split into a Saturday and a Sunday. You can also have up to five divisions at a level (Klasse), so a 5A, 5B and so on

But, it’s not that easy to know who’s who unless you actually come from Holland! You see, I wanted a game near Duiven, on a Sunday, which meant I had to filter down to East, and then to Sunday, but I had to scour the divisions individually, you see 5C might cover Duiven, but that doesn’t mean it will be 4C and 3C that covers the same area. The promotion pathway may go 5C, 4B, 3D, 2F, 1A for example.

No, the only way to work it out is to find the name of a team or a place you recognise that is local to the area you want to watch a game in, and work on the principal that the rest of the games in the division will be relatively close by.

It’s that bit harder on a Sunday though, because the Saturday sides often have the name of the town or village in their name, whereas on a Sunday it tends to be just initials, like DVV, WAVV, or my favourite SV AVIOS/DBV.

Consequently, the game we actually ended up going to, I’d not even known existed until the Saturday night. The nearest game my research came up with was half an hour away in Nijmegen, which didn’t help for watching the Ajax v Utrecht and the Liverpool v Manchester City games on TV.

Turns out that Theo knows his way around the divisions, the Klasse and the fixtures, and as a result he found a game in Klasse 4, less than ten minutes away, in a small village conjoined with Duiven called Loo.

So, we had a plan, watch Ajax demolish Utrecht and then arrive at the ground just before kick off. Then leave at the end to get home in good time for the Premier League action.

Loo is a tiny village, but they do seem to punch above their weight in the footballing stakes. The ground is also very tidy for a place of it’s size, comprising of a couple of pitches, a smart clubhouse that appeared to be doing a very good trade from the returning reserve team players and such like, while the main pitch has a quirky old stand sat on the half way line. It's a very rural location as you would expect, with a small farm down one side, complete with some very unusual and suggestive looking vegetables on display!

It hasn’t been the best of seasons for Loo, they sat third from bottom with just one win and four points from the opening seven games, while the visitors from Arnhem sat a point behind them with one win from six games. At this early stage, it was a pretty crucial game.

A decent sized crowd that I estimated to be around 100 paid over the requisite 2.5 Euro admission, and in all fairness they were treated to a very entertaining spectacle

The game did not start well at all for Loo, by half time they found themselves 3-0 down thanks to a brace from Germaine Lenting and an effort from Rewan Hamdaziz.

You did fear for the hosts at the break but no sooner had we left the confines of the bar they’d pulled a goal back, and then suddenly it was 2-3. The pressure was on Arnhemia but Awder Hassan netted to restore a two goal advantage.

Loo did make it 3-4 in the closing stages and despite referee playing what seemed like an age of added time, the visitors hung on for a deserved three points and leapfrogged the hosts in the process.

So that was it, we trudged back to the car, with just a meal and a few drinks to come before the Football Weekend was over and I made my way back to England the following day.

The meal was with Theo and Hendrik, at Edwin’s restaurant, and of course, the food was excellent as always, as of course was the company. It had once again been a quite superb experience, meeting new and old friends, visiting new and old places, and yes, without Mr H senior it did feel a bit different, but after spending the previous fourteen trips with him and then having number fifteen without him, that was always going to be the case.

We’ve already talked about next year, it’s far too early to make a plan, but that fact we still want to do it means we’ll make it happen. But for now, it’s about the memories, and laughs, the food, the drink, the people and the football.

Life doesn’t get any better, does it?

Fernando

Fortuna Sittard  1  ADO Den Haag  0 

Eredivisie

Somewhere in our garage is a box full of old VHS video tapes, I don’t know why we keep them as we are never going to acquire a video recorder and watch them ever again.

They vary somewhat from goals and highlights of Derby County season 1989-90, through to a live recording of the Happy Mondays at the G-Mex (in fact – has anyone got a VHS player, I wouldn’t mind seeing that again?).

Also amongst them are some recordings of TV programmes, and one of them is a recording of a current affairs programme about football violence. I’ve got this as one of my assignments at university was on the said subject matter. I can vividly remember that a large part of the programme was devoted to following a section of English football supporters travelling abroad for a European game.

That club was Everton, it was 1984-85 and in the Quarter Final of the Cup Winners Cup they’d drawn Dutch outfit Fortuna Sittard. The score was 3-0 from the first leg at Goodison so it was something of a party as the coach travelled over the water, and from memory, two things stood out from the video.

How small and cramped the stadium was, and, a large group of British squaddies turned up at the game who were stationed just over the border in Germany, and that did create quite a bit of angst amongst the local plodstabulary.

So, whenever I see Fortuna Sittard, I think Everton and I think about that video, that is still sat in a box, in the garage in fact right underneath me as I type this!

The fact that Fortuna were playing in the Cup Winners Cup was something of a surprise at the time, they’ve had a few seasons in the top flight of Dutch football but never pulled up any trees, although winning the Dutch Cup in 1984 was indeed the ticket to their one and only foray into Europe.

Victories over KB of Denmark and Wisla Krakow of Poland took them to the Everton tie, but since then the bulk of their time has been spent in the second tier. They won promotion at the end of the 2017-18 season after finishing runners-up to Jong Ajax, who could not be promoted, and as a result they were back in top flight for the first time since 2002.

Last season saw them finish a point clear of the relegation places after being one of the favourites for the drop. While this time around, on the eve of the game they sat just inside the drop zone, playing a side from Den Haag who were just above them in the table, so in some ways it was a six pointer even at this stage of the season.

The journey from Aachen was very straightforward, and after a minor altercation with a local over a parking space, we took a brief detour to the car park that sits right beneath the stadium, a bargain for just 5 Euro. With it being too early to purchase tickets we elected to head to a newly opened all you can eat buffet, which did both the job of providing sustenance, and also killing a bit of time before the game.

Suitably stuffed on a combination of Chinese, Italian and Dutch delicacies, it was simply a case of wandering round the corner to the main entrance where tickets were purchased with no problems whatsoever. It seems that despite earning a long awaited promotion to the Eredivisie, crowds rarely sell out at the 12,500 capacity Fortuna Sittard Stadium.

Fortuna moved to the stadium, which sits on the edges of the town, in 1999, after having previously played (against Everton) at De Baandert which was close to the centre of the town. It’s not untypical in it’s construction, with four box style stands adorning the sides of the pitch.

Before kick off we had a quick snifter in the Supporters Home, that in all fairness was a little tamer than the one we visited in Helmond, but after just the one, it was time to head into the ground.

We chose our seats opposite the main stand, but to be fair, it wasn’t necessary to sit in your allocated spot, plenty of space was available with a crowd of a touch over 8,000 present. To our left was an end that was split between home and away fans while to the right was the home end, now known as the Fernando Ricksen Stand, where the vocal fanatics base themselves.

Ricksen is idolised in Sittard, his home town and the club he once played for. Before the game a burst of Abba’s ‘Fernando’ is played over the PA system, while the club shop contains plenty of Sittard / Ricksen related memorabilia.

Ricksen tragically passed away recently at the young age of 43, from motor neurone disease, and perhaps one of the most emotional pieces of television you can see is available on You Tube, where Ricksen announced live on a Dutch TV chat show that he was suffering from the awful illness. He was no saint by any means, with various demons, but his charity raised over £1 million to the cause, and his death in a hospice in Airdrie was a sad end to a life lived to the full.

The game was entertaining, and very close. The only goal came five minutes before the interval when Sittard’s Amadou Ciss found the net after good work from Martin Angha. The visitors from the Hague pressed late in the game but resolute defending from Fortuna kept the clean sheet and earned them the three points that could be so critical come the end of the campaign.

Escape from the ground and indeed the car park at the end was pretty easy and within an hour and a half we were pulling up on Theo’s drive back in Duiven. This meant we could visit two pubs before bedtime, the first being ‘Neighbours Bar’ where if you ask nicely you can get a pint rather than the typical half. Some of the locals looked like they’d been in all day, swigging from bottles of champagne and generally lurching about, so we headed over to De Tol for a couple of late ones, where the night was spent talking to another fella called Theo who was a massive enthusiast of trial biking. I now know quite a bit about the subject, in addition to my previous knowledge of the fact Peter Purves used to present a programme called ‘Kick Start’ on BBC.

A very enjoyable night at Fortuna Sittard, don’t suppose anyone has a VHS player they can lend me?

The Sleeping Giant

Alemannia Aachen   3  Bergisch Gladbach  0

Regionaliga West

The Saturday of the Football Weekend is always a big day.

Typically we try and get to two games, taking advantage of the fact that in Germany the games kick off in the afternoon, while the Dutch games tend to take place in the evening.

We talked last year about the possibility of going to Aachen, if the fixtures allowed it, and of course, could we combine it with a game in Holland that wasn’t going to cause too much of a logistical nightmare?

Bingo, a plan came together nicely, Aachen were at home, and the game wasn’t being moved, but not only that, just over half an hour away Fortuna Sittard were playing in the evening.

Aachen is approximately two hours from Duiven and our route (with me at the wheel) took us via Nijmegen and Venlo, before crossing over the border. The hugely impressive New Tivoli is located on the main road that leads from the motorway into the centre of the City, so access to the ground, and also a very handy car park right behind the main entrance, proved to be very straightforward indeed.

Wow, just wow! What a place this is, but lets have a brief history lesson before the stadium descriptor.

Historically a Bundesliga 2 outfit since the early Seventies, they had a brief spell in the third tier until returning and then remarkably earning promotion to the top Bundesliga in 2006. This season in the top flight was the clubs only, and then came a steady decline which culminated in bankruptcy and a place in the fourth tier of German football (Regionalliga West), where they have remained since 2013.

In 2004 they lost to Werder Bremen in the German Cup Final, but as Werder had already got into the Champions League, it meant Aachen were to have their one and only season in the UEFA Cup in the 2004-05 season.

The First Round saw a comfortable victory over FH of Iceland by 5-1 on aggregate, while the Group Stages saw them pitched against Sevilla, AEK Athens, Lille and Zenit St Petersburg. A Third place finish got them into the Round of 32, where Dutch side AZ Alkmaar beat them 2-1 on aggregate.

The New Tivoli was opened in 2009, to replace the original Tivoli Stadium which stood nearby. The old Tivoli was a superbly atmospheric ground, but the new version is stunning, and is capable of holding over 32,000 spectators. Interestingly today, with Aachen sat just above half way in the league, and some distance from the promotion berths, a crowd of 4,600 were in attendance.

I’d better describe the beast then, the beats that is known as the Neuer Tivoli in your finest Germanic language.

From the concourses which run all the way around the stadium, the exterior itself gives you the impression that it’s going to be something pretty special. The clubs colours of yellow and black are used to define the exterior, notably the roof, and if you think San Siro but about a third of the size, that’s what it’s like from the outside.

Buying tickets was a doddle, it invariably is, and pretty soon we were inside the stadium and trying to decide whether to try and get into the restaurant / bar area first for a drink, or juts hit the Bratwurst early doors.

We went for the restaurant, and what a very impressive place it was. They were serving a hot meal (I remember not what it was) or just drinks if you preferred. We opted for drinks, and took the view that we’d wait until nearer kick off for our sausage. Also at the end of the bar area was the club shop which also incorporated a small museum. The museum was a fascinating place, not least for the model of the original Tivoli that was guarded by a large glass case.

With kick off fast approaching, the sausage was calling, so with that in hand it was up to the seats, and it’s as you walk out into the stand that you see the Neuer Tivoli for all it’s glory.  

Three sides of the stadium are all seater, with bright yellow seats, while behind one of the goals is a steep bank of terracing. It’s not quite the Yellow Wall as per Dortmund, but I suspect in Aachen’s World it compares! Executive boxes sat atop the stand opposite, while the away fans were housed to the side of this area, albeit they numbered two dozen at best. The opposite end of the ground to the terracing was not open for spectators.

In fact, while the terraces were reasonably populated, the seating areas were certainly not, you could pretty much pick your spot, in fact you could pretty much pick your row in some cases. Is the New Tivoli a white elephant, is the ground simply too big for them?

Maybe it is right now, but the potential to get back to Bundesliga 2 is certainly there. They have the history and they certainly have the facilities, they just need the team, and probably the money first and foremost to get the team to the right level.

Visiting Bergisch Gladbach, from the East side of Koln, arrived in Aachen in poor form and in the relegation zone. The first half was pretty dismal it has to be said and the standard of the football was not particularly good, but things improved somewhat in the second half as the temperature got noticeably colder.

An own goal gave the hosts the lead five minutes after the break, and then the game was effectively over in the 56^th minute when Florian Ruter got the second. A third goal arrived in the 63^rd minute and that came from Belgian striker Jonathan Benteke.

The game fizzled out somewhat after that, and we made our exit to the car park right on the final whistle, but a good five minutes later as we entered the car park, the lads and lasses on the ‘alternative’ yellow wall were still singing away and regaling their heroes.

It’s time Alemannia Aachen started to make some upward moves through the leagues, this club is far too big to be languishing in mid-table of the fourth tier. But that is someone else’s problem, and with the exit negotiated quite easily, we were back on the Autobahn, on our way back for Part Two, in Limburg…….

A Little Part Of Lancashire

Helmond Sport  1  De Graafschap  2

Eerst Divisie

“I don’t suppose you get many English people coming to Helmond to watch the football?” was my contribution to the small talk in a pub in the centre of the town.

“We had 100 Burnley supporters here two weeks ago” was the reply, and that clearly shut me up!

Yes, it appears that unknowingly we had arrived in 'Helmond Province', where the local football club has links with Burnley Football Club, a relationship that stems back over twenty years, quite why, I cannot tell you. 

Helmond is a small sized city that sits just to the East of Eindhoven, it’s twinned with Mechelen in Belgium and was also the birthplace of the famous footballing twins, Willy and Rene van der Kerkhoff.

Journey wise from our base in Duiven, it took around an hour to get to Helmond, and soon we were parked in the centre and making our way to the Lokaal 42 bar for food and drinkies. It was in here where the conversation was struck and the Burnley story came to light.

Now, I’ll be brutally honest, on our one and only trip to Turf Moor to watch Burnley a couple of years ago, it wasn’t the most pleasant of experiences. I guess when you are in with the home supporters and you are effectively an away fan (it was Spurs – the team of young Master Hatt), it’s never going to be the most comfortable of times. 

I did speak to a Burnley fan a couple of weeks later and he told me that we’d simply picked just about the worst area of the ground to get tickets in. So, benefit of the doubt, Burnley fans are great lads and lasses, we were just unlucky.

Anyway, Helmond Sport, the club formed in 1967 after local professional club Helmondia 55 had gone pop. They started out in the third tier of Dutch football until they were promoted to the second tier in 1968. They won the Eerst Divisie (as it is known) in 1982 and went on to have two seasons in the Eredivisie, before being relegated back to the second tier again, where they remain.

Other notables include a Dutch Cup Final in 1985 where a late defeat at the hand of FC Utrecht put paid to nay hopes of silverware. While twice they have got close to returning to the Eredivise, but on both occasions, in 2005 and 2011 they fell short at the final hurdle in the Play-Offs.

With a parking space secured we elected to make our way round the stadium to the Supporters Home (social club to you and me), where we were greeted on our way in, and of course my English accent was soon picked up on!

“Where are you from in England?”

“Is that anywhere near Burnley?”

Obviously the locals are not going to have heard of Belper so I told them I was from Derby, which quickly translated into Derby County, and of course those two magic words guaranteed to glean sympathy from any Dutchman, Phillip Cocu….

Suddenly we were guests of the Helmond Fanatics, in turn they came over to talk to us, they bought us beer, and offered us access to anything we wanted, food, taxis, bicycles, the lot! They were absolutely fantastic lads and really couldn’t do enough for us. They also told us about the clubs plans for a new stadium, but they were very much against it as the plans for the new Supporters Home did not met the expectations of the Fanatics (it was too small).

They try and make a trip to Burnley once a season, so they told us, and that visit is reciprocated as it was a couple of weeks ago during the international break. I couldn't see any similarities between the two places, or indeed the two clubs, so it might just be one of those things that started and simply just grew. Anyway, a signed Jeff Hendrick shirt sits proudly next to the bar in Helmond.

Securing tickets for football matches in the second tier is not difficult, you just walk up to the ticket office and buy one, with no need for a Passport, character reference or a DNA Sample, it was very easy.

De Braak, as it is known, is typical of many of the clubs in this division. It comprises of three box style stands, the main version having the hospitality areas at the back of it, while we chose to sit in the stand opposite, where the sizable number of away supporters are located at one end.

The Fanatics are located behind the goal, complete with their flags (with reference to the Clarets), while the opposite end is inaccessible for spectators. They also have proper floodlights, and by that I mean the old fashioned towers that could easily be climbed if you were that way inclined!

A modest 1,656 spectators had forked out to watch the game, and I would estimate several hundred had travelled from Doetinchem to support the visitors. The first half was not very good from a spectacle point of view, so the half time complimentary beer was well received, and having decided to take up a position behind the goal alongside the fanatics, we were treated to a much better second period.

Ralf Seuntjens gave the second placed visitors the lead just after the break and it did look like the three points were heading back to Gelderland, but then in the 85^th minute, Helmond’s Tibeau Swinnen found the net for an equalizer.

But like all good teams, the ‘Super Boeren’ were not fazed by the setback and in the last minute they grabbed the winner through Jasper van Heertum. De Graafschap are looking for a swift return to the Eredivisie after being relegated last season. Helmond fall to fifth from bottom, albeit in a league where in all fairness you simply don’t get relegated.

The escape from Helmond was easy and soon we were back in De Tol (a pub in Duiven), reflecting on our first game of the Football Weekend to have taken place in our host Country. The memory will always be of the superb welcome and the hospitality of the Fanatics, who have over the years as a national collective, had a reputation for some of the more unsavoury elements of football, but certainly not in this case.

Respect to Helmond, and somewhat grudgingly, to Burnley........

Taxation

Borussia Monchengladbach  2  AS Roma  1

Europa League – Group Stages

The third day of the tour started with the usual lie in, followed by the mid-morning breakfast, with our driver Hendrik ‘Keke Rosberg’ Elsinga due with us about thirty seconds after he set off from his home of two miles away!

This time it was myself, Theo and Ben who were jumping in the car, and with Ben being a professional in the field of tax along with Hendrik, we felt it best to let them sit together in the front and regale each other of amusing stories about VAT Returns…..

Myself and Theo talked football and beer, the lads in the front must have been bored senseless with us!

Anyway, we went via Venlo to the City of Monchengladbach (Gladbach hereafter for typing purposes) and were very soon parked in the club car park and making our way to the bus stop to head to the city centre. Just six hours until kick off this time, so we needed to find something to do!

That something came courtesy of the NaNaNaNa pub (a tribute to the Muppets?) on the Alter Markt, a real football supporters home with the walls covered in scarves and various other items of memorabilia. The pub filled up over the course of the afternoon with Gladbach fans, and also quite a few from Roma who had made the journey North. Bearing in mind Celtic were playing at Lazio at the same time, getting out of Rome probably wasn’t a bad idea if you were a Roman.

Once five o’clock chimed we made our way back down the main street into the heart of Gladbach and found a very nice Italian restaurant where very good fayre was had by all, and the food was pretty good as well! The final stop in Gladbach before we made our way to the very West edges of the City and the stadium, was he Humboldt pub which sat adjacent to the bus station. Once again, a real football supporters pub with memories of ‘Die Fohlen’ adorning the place along with the colour green which of course is so associated with Borussia.

The club then.

One of the biggest names in not only German football but also Europe, they currently sit top of the Bundesliga with Dortmund, Leipzig and Munich for close company. The clubs golden era came in the Seventies when they won the Bundesliga an incredible five times, and were runners-up twice.

They appeared in the UEFA Cup Final four times in the period, winning it twice. Dutch outfit Twente were beaten in 1975 while the crack Yugoslav’s Red Star Belgrade succumbed in 1979. They also famously reached the European Cup Final in 1977 but were beaten by Liverpool in Rome.

The days of great players like Gunter Netzer, Berti Vogts and Allan Simonsen came to an end and since the Eighties the club has never been close to returning to the summit of German and European football. That said, the club moved to the new Borussia Park stadium in 2004 after leaving the famous Bokelberg, and had something of a revival, certainly over the last ten years.

They’ve made it to the Europa League and the Champions League in that period, and it was for a Champions League game that we made our last visit to Borussia Park, when Manchester City were the visitors in 2015.

They are still a very big club though, with attendances averaging 50,000, and despite the game against Roma being sold out, we managed to obtain tickets via an official website where season ticket holders can re-sell unwanted tickets.

You can’t fault the Germans for their planning and organization. A fleet of buses are on hand from outside the railway station that transport fans free of charge to the stadium, and within fifteen minutes of jumping on board we were being dropped off a few moments walk from the ground.

Borussia Park is an imposing structure, but so much more impressive at night when the green neon lights shine on the interior and exterior of the stadium. It’s built in a bowl like structure, and once through the turnstiles the concourses are open to the elements, and it was a cold night in Gladbach. Alcoholic beer was being served, which was a change because in previous years for European games, in Germany and Holland, the beer had to be alcohol free.

With seats taken behind the goal, it was time for the game. Some familiar names were in the Roma side, Manchester United’s Chris Smalling played at the back, while ex-City striker Edin Dzeko played in attack. From a Dutch perspective, Justin Kluivert played wide on the left, and the former Ajax man is the Son of legendary striker Patrick.

The first half wasn’t overly compelling but a Federico Fazio own goal ten minutes before the break gave the Germans the advantage. That advantage was ended by Fazio who redeemed himself with a 64^th minute equalizer, but like the game in Leverkusen, a late goal was to come…..

The game was in the fifth minute of added time (the final minute) when Marcus Thuram (Son of Lillian) netted the winner, sparking crazy scenes. The bench invaded the pitch while the Roma fans responded by dispensing their beer over the security fences and onto the delirious Gladbach supporters.

It as a thrilling end to a decent, if not spectacular game, and keeps the hosts hopes of making it to the next stages very much alive in a group that also contains Istanbul Basaksehir and RZ Pellets WAC (no, me neither….).

Our car parking space turned out to be a very good one as once again thanks to super German planning and efficiency, we were back on the Autobahn and quickly over the border back into the Netherlands.

More tax talk in the front. We stuck to cheese, ham and Heineken in the rear. Hendrik got us back in double quick time, with time for one more before bed. Back in England, particularly in the East Midlands and South Yorkshire, all hell was breaking loose with flooding, we were blissfully unaware, but we do know how to mitigate higher rate tax…….