Artificial Intelligence

Heybridge Swifts  0  Grays Athletic  1

Isthmian League – Division One North

Admission / Programme – £10 / £2

Not getting any better is it on the weather front?

After the monsoons of the previous week, we have now entered the modern day Ice Age, whereby temperatures seem to be sitting at sub-zero, which of course, despite the wildly outrageous claims from some clubs about games being on, is a complete killer. Sub-zero and grass don’t mix and don’t let any groundsman or indeed match official who’s been called on to do an early inspection convince you otherwise.

Having looked at my list of options on the Friday night, I narrowed it down to one, and that was a game on the plastic in Essex, the game at Heybridge Swifts, located in an area of the Country that I have to say I’ve got limited knowledge of, or indeed travel experiences to count upon.

Heybridge is a village next door to the town of Maldon, which in turn if we are doing the map test, sits South of Braintree, East of Chelmsford, North of Southend, and also on the River Blackwater which runs into the sea South of Clacton (on sea!). To put it into a footballing perspective, you’ve got Maldon & Tiptree down the road, Witham Town up the road, Braintree Town, Coggeshall Town and indeed Chelmsford City all close by. It’s a busy area football club wise, but as I said, not one I’ve experienced a lot of, having only been to Chelmsford and Braintree of the ones mentioned.

Swifts are one of those clubs I feel like I’ve been very aware of for some time largely because they’ve punched at a good level for a while (Step 2), and had some impressive FA Cup runs over the years, playing the likes of Bristol City, Exeter City, AFC Bournemouth and Gillingham at the First Round Proper stage, a series of games that many a club at a higher level would love to have been involved in.

So what’s the deal with Heybridge then? Formed in 1880, they spent the first ninety years of their existence playing in minor county league football, until in 1971 when they became founder members of the Essex Senior League. Three consecutive title wins came in the early eighties and that in turn saw them move up to the Isthmian League.

By the mid-nineties they’d worked their way up to the Premier Division, they of course had their FA Cup glory, but they missed the cut for the newly formed Conference South after losing a Play Off to St Albans City. They also went on to lose another promotion play off a couple of years later in 2006 when they lost to Hampton & Richmond Borough.

They left the top tier of the Isthmian in 2009, and since then, despite a couple of close calls, they’ve remained in Division One North (Step 4). When I say close calls, they’ve lost in two play-off semi-finals, and indeed actually beat local rivals Maldon & Tiptree in a play-off final, but due to only five of the eight play-off winners gaining promotion, they were denied, somewhat harshly, by finishing in sixth place on a points per game basis.

I had a spiffing journey down to Essex. I elected to take the A14, which is a much better route now the changes have been made at Huntingdon and you can now basically have a clear run all the way onto the M11 at Cambridge. Off you get at Stansted Airport and then along the A120 dual carriageway to Braintree, before heading down through Cressing, into Witham and then out under the A12 and into Heybridge.

The whole journey took me bang on three hours, and upon arrival I was directed to a parking space by the friendly chap on the gate. In hindsight, I should have parked on the road, because at that point I didn’t realise the parking arrangements were going to be akin to the car deck of a cross channel ferry!

It’s a very nice ground is Scraley Road. You go in via the turnstiles behind the North goal, and to your left hand side is the building that houses the dressing rooms, the clubhouse and indeed the tea bar. Moving round in a clockwise direction you have a large seated stand on the halfway line, while behind the South goal is an area of covered terracing. Then as you move round to the West side of the ground you’ve got a smaller stand with a couple of rows of wooden bench seats. Obviously we’ve now got a 4G pitch, and with that you always get a shiny new pitch side barrier. Yes, it’s very tidy, well kept and aesthetically pleasing on the eye.

The game pitched two play-off contenders against each other, with Essex neighbours Grays Athletic in town, and backed by a good travelling support in a crowd of 369, it was they who took the points home thanks to a goal just after half time through Cheyce Grant who cut in from the left hand side and placed a shot into the bottom corner past goalkeeper Callum Chafer. Grays played the bulk of the second period with ten men after Rob Clark was given his marching orders for a second yellow (despite the fact the referee first of all booked the wrong person!)

The game was both tight and entertaining though, Heybridge can probably count themselves slightly unfortunate not to have taken a point given the amount of possession they had, especially with a man advantage, but, Grays you always felt had that bit of spark in attack that could cause problems.

It was nearly 5pm before the game finally finished, and when the cars finally disembarked the ferry in an orderly fashion I was back out and heading back home the way I came. No traffic issues again on the way back, let’s hope that next weekend, we don’t have any weather issues either, I’m running out of plastic options!