Zingari

MSB Woolton  1  East Villa Rail  1

Liverpool County Premier League – I Zingari Cup Group Stage

Admission / Programme - No / No

When I were a nipper, everyone seemed to have a newspaper delivered to their house. We had the Daily Mirror in a morning and then the Derby Evening Telegraph at teatime. We did eventually move to the Daily Mail in a morning, whereas on a Sunday we would indeed have the weighty tome that was the Mail on Sunday. 

My Grandma and Grandad, just a few houses up the lane stuck with the Daily Mirror and DET routine throughout the week, but on a Sunday it was the Mirror and the People, which to be honest I preferred because of the football transfer gossip columns, which the Mail on Sunday didn’t bother with.

Non-League football results were not easy to come by back then, we had no internet, so you had to rely on what you could glean from newspapers, so one of my Sunday rituals would be to pore through the scores. Looking back, many of them at the time meant nothing to me, like the Irish and Welsh results that used to appear, but what I do remember, and I can’t remember which of the papers it was, but they always listed the scores from the Irish Zingari League.

I’d got no idea what it was, where it was, who any of the teams were, but I did like the name. How many leagues have a word starting with a ‘Z’ in them? Not many I would suggest…

Anyway, in years to come I was to discover it was a Liverpool based league, and the ‘Zingari’ word effectively meant gypsies. The league merged with the Liverpool County Combination in 2006 to form the Liverpool County Premier League, but it seems the Zingari, or I Zingari link as it’s now known (probably deemed politically incorrect to stereotype the Irish, so just use the letter ‘I’ instead!), remains in the form the now League Cup.

I’ll be honest though, I had no idea that the Zingari link remained until as recently as last Saturday morning. I had a plan, and that plan fitted in nicely with the fact I needed to be home by a sensible hour as it was Wedding Anniversary day, and we had a meal booked that evening. A 1.30pm kick off at Tintwistle Athletic looked the favourite but early on Saturday morning I discovered they had switched the game from their usual home on West Drive to a 4G in Hyde, so I decided to shelve that plan.

I’d spotted the night before on the socials that MSB Woolton (a team who had applied to join the North West Counties League) had a home game against East Villa Rail, at their Leisure Simpson home on the South side of Liverpool. The game was also a 2pm kick off, so it fitted nicely with the evening plans. Upon further inspection, it was a League Cup Group Stage game, hence my re-acquaintance with the word Zingari (but no Irish remember!)!

MSB Woolton also applied last year but didn’t make the cut, so I’ve worked on the assumption that a second successive application means they’ve got themselves into a better place to make the step up, and from what I can pick up in terms of the noises being made, things are looking somewhat more favourable.

The journey to Liverpool was punctuated by slow moving traffic at varying intervals, notably on the M6 just beyond the Thelwall Viaduct where the junction with the M62 was proving to be a bit of a challenge. With that navigated and time having been lost, it was down past Widnes and then Southbound down towards Halewood, before heading back in again towards Allerton. The Leisure United Simpson complex was just of the A562 main road which conjoins Hunts Cross and Allerton, and is set in a relative area of greenery, with a cemetery to the South and woodland to the West.

There are a number of complexes like the Simpson around the Liverpool area, and my guess is that they are all part of the same organisation. They do appear to be named after people, my favourite is the Jeffery Humble Centre, I should imagine Jeff was a smashing chap!

Anyway, I arrived, the car park was roomy enough, and having made enquiries, it seemed MSB were playing on the pitch to the immediate South of the car park, one of three artificial surfaces at the complex. It was a standard 4G cage, but it did have a small area of cover on the one side that was accessible to the public. It was also noticeable that a number of advertising banners, and some MSB Woolton regalia was decorating the perimeter, so it looks very much like this part of the complex is very much the clubs own.

In the centre of the complex is a single level building that houses all of the dressing rooms, and a cafeteria area. Does it meet Step 6 standards, well, I assume it must be close. I notice you cannot access the pitch itself without going through the building so that solves the admission / enclosed issue, but I guess time will tell.

I’ll be honest, I know very little about MSB Woolton, or at least I didn’t before now. It seems they are a huge and incredibly well respected charter standard club with teams of all ages playing under the banner. They play out of two sites, the other being at Camp Hill, and in terms of their longevity, well it seems as big and as respected as they are, they haven’t been around an awful long time, ten years at the most, and as for the MSB bit, seems they are a firm of solicitors who sponsor the club, and they always come in handy!

While this was a cup tie, from a league position perspective, Woolton sat fourth and as long as though they will make the top five, which means they can go up. That looks like it should be ok, but breaking the top three looks a challenge, with the visitors sat second, eleven points ahead of them having played two games more.

The game itself, played in blustery conditions was a tight and entertaining affair. The hosts took the lead in the first half through a Callum Griffiths penalty, and then we had a spot of controversy right on the stroke of half time when what looked like a perfectly legitimate second goal for Woolston was chalked off following intervention from the linesman.

East Villa Rail regrouped and found an equaliser in the second period when Daniel Lowey finished well from a tight angle after some excellent build up play. Both sides had a go as the half wore on, but neither could find a breakthrough.

So that was it, an honourable draw, and the opportunity to find out what MSB Woolton are all about. If all goes to plan they will be a North West Counties League side next season, as the non-league game on Merseyside starts to build it’s profile with more clubs stepping up from the County leagues.

It’ll be one to watch with interest, and remember, if you are in Liverpool and you ever need a solicitor……