Retro - Lowestoft Town 5 Gorleston 0 (Friendly - 2015-16)

18^th July 2015

Lowestoft Town  5  Gorleston  0 (Friendly)

Lowestoft Town Football Club has always intrigued me.

That probably started when I was a teenager and a colleague of my Dad’s gave him a huge pile of programmes from the club, dating back to the sixties. Not only that, when I first started watching Belper Town they had a manager called Evan Sutherland, who in my opinion built one of the greatest sides ever seen at Christchurch Meadow. Evan also managed Alfreton Town, Shepshed Charterhouse, and for some bizarre reason, Lowestoft Town!

In recent seasons the clubs rise, under stalwart manager Micky Chapman, has been pretty spectacular. They spent many years trundling along in the Eastern Counties League, albeit one of the bigger clubs, with one of the better grounds arousing decent support befitting a town of over 70,000 inhabitants.

But then they gained momentum, with a wee bit of financial backing thrown in!  They won promotion to the Ryman League First Division, then promotion again to the Premier Division, before finally making it to the Conference North after a couple of years of Play-Off disappointments. In between all of this they also played at Wembley in the FA Vase Final, losing to another upwardly mobile club in Kirkham & Wesham. For good measure they also reached the First Round Proper of the FA Cup, losing to Wrexham.

However, there is a problem with Lowestoft Town, and that becomes abundantly clear when you look at the map. Right on the border of Norfolk and Sulfolk, at the very Eastern tip of England, it really is out on a limb. When they won the Eastern Counties League, it was open to debate whether they went Ryman League, because of access to the M25, or possibly the Southern League, as technically and historically they would fit into that footprint. They went Ryman, all seemed good, but a further problem came when they made the Conference.

The Conference North and South split is a contentious one, at one stage Bishops Stortford were in the Conference North, and that was due to the imbalance of clubs forcing the boundary between the two leagues further South. When Lowestoft arrived in town, it was almost a case of neither league being a great fit because when you look at the sheer mileage involved, it was staggering. For example, is Lowestoft to Barrow any worse a journey than Lowestoft to Truro?

They went North, again mainly due to the balance of clubs, they could have left Bishops Stortford in the North and put Lowestoft in the South, but they chose not to. Lowestoft were not happy, Micky Chapman was unhappy because he had signed players on the basis they would be in the South, and we had the bizarre situation whereby the local derby for Lowestoft would be Boston United, 108 miles away! That is even more bizarre when you discover that as the crow flies, The Hague is actually nearer to Lowestoft!

They were tipped to get relegated, but they survived reasonably comfortably, however, it took its toll. They were fined after arriving late for the opening game of the season at Chorley, and after clocking up nearly 9,000 miles over the season, Chapman decided he could do it no more, an era was well and truly over for a man who had been involved with the club for over 30 years. When you think about it, setting off at 11am for a midweek game at Stalybridge Celtic, in semi professional football, is a bit much by anyone’s standards!

Yet I was intrigued, and over the years I’ve always kept on top of the Conference North in terms of visiting the grounds, but decided to shelve Lowestoft last season because I just felt they would either be relegated anyway, or they would be moved South at the end of the season. Neither happened, so I didn’t really have an excuse now. Pre-season seemed a good time to do it, nice weather, and also the game against Gorleston offered free admission, so costs wise it would probably be the cheapest time I could ever do it!

By the time I’d arrived in Lowestoft, almost four hours after setting off, I felt nothing but sympathy for the players, officials and supporters of the club. The journey for me, while relatively trouble free and scenic, was as tedious as it could possibly get, long flat roads, single carriageways, lorries, tractors, caravans, you name it! Having never gone further East than Norwich in my life before, it was nice to see a different part of the Country, but it hit home to me when I passed Kings Lynn and saw that it was still nearly 80 miles and over an hour and half away. They have Alfreton Town away second game of the season, and if travelling by bus for a midweek game, I reckon it will be 2.30am when they get back, and that’s one of the three or four nearer fixtures.

Once in Lowestoft I had a look around, I went through the town which to be fair was unspectacular, and dropped down through the industrial area to Ness Point, the furthest Easterly point of the Country, and it was there that I discovered Holland was actually nearer than Boston. Lowestoft is a seaside resort and has nice beaches, while the journey in along Yarmouth Road displayed some superb properties, but my overall view was that the town was one of real contrasts. It has its very nice bits, but it also has bits that are far from nice, and some of the areas around the football ground would fit into that category. It looks as though it has suffered economically, which is not unusual, but it has also suffered with its immigration issues, as typically happens in ports.

That said, once at Crown Meadow, the ground is smart, tidy, and the welcome was very friendly. A beer festival was taking place in the clubhouse which was dragging the crowds in, while on a beautiful day, the pitch was bathed in bright sunlight. The old main stand at Crown Meadow is a cracker, but other than a bit of covered terracing to its left hand side, and a very small piece of cover behind the top goal, it’s flat standing all around.

I liked it, but other than the main stand which is a somewhat iconic one in non-league football, it perhaps lacked a bit of character, now that may seem harsh, but it didn’t give you the same buzz as perhaps walking into Y Traeth did the previous week.

The game appears one sided if you look at the result, but the first half wasn’t a huge mismatch to be

fair. Lowestoft went in 2-0 up, but if Gorleston, who operate three leagues lower, had got someone who could finish, it might have been a bit closer.

Gorleston tired in the second period and conceded three good goals to give it a bit of a flattering look, but fair play to the visitors who battled hard and tried to play football. It was difficult as it always is in pre-season games to judge how the respective teams will do, but Lowestoft under Ady Gallagher now, should be ok. Gorleston for a step 5 side should be more than ok, they’ve not been a million miles away in recent seasons and I expect the same again.

I took a slightly different route back, rather than going via Great Yarmouth as I did on the way in, I went via the beautiful Oulton Broad and Beccles, and while slightly more scenic, it didn’t make much difference time wise. A van fire on the Norwich bypass slowed me down, and then the obligatory bus and horse box on the Newark to Mansfield road was hugely tedious. It took around four hours again, and I can’t recall ever being so glad to be getting home after a football match!

While a thoroughly enjoyable experience, and a level of curiosity now satisfied, I can look back on it and think to myself that I’m glad I won’t have to be doing it again, and that is where you start to have nothing but admiration for this football club, they do it and more every other week.

Lowestoft Town Football Club – I hold you in nothing but the highest regard!