In Two Minds

Liskeard Athletic  3  Wadebridge Town  0

South West Peninsula League – Western Division

As the day wore on I was in two minds about the prospect of a jaunt across to East Cornwall and the game between Liskeard Athletic and my old pals Wadebridge Town.

A trip to Newquay in the morning had been an enjoyable one, it had been a good few years since I’d visited Cornwall’s answer to the Costa Del Sol, and upon returning back we decided to retire to the beach for the afternoon. Consequently, feeling chilled, and then contemplating a night in downtown Falmouth with a meal and few beers was starting to win the day, I was at the stage where Mrs H could easily have convinced me not to go….

“I’m not bothered about going to football tonight, we can stop here and have a nice evening in town.” Was the comment I threw into the mix.

“No, we’ll go, we’ll all go, no arguments.” Came back Mrs H.

She obviously wanted to go, so who was I to argue, and besides, we had beers in the fridge anyway!

I will be honest though, Liskeard Athletic are one of those clubs who I remember from my very early days of getting into non-league football. Back in the mid-eighties when I’d learned what shape the Country was, started to get a bit of an idea of which places were where, and, developed something of an understanding of what leagues covered which parts of the isles, I came across something called the Western League.

It all sounded a bit like the places we went to on holiday as a young child, where I would feel car sick, and then be dragged around with my sister in the pouring rain wearing a cagoule and some sturdy Clarks Commando shoes. Places liked Ilfracombe, Bideford, Barnstaple, Minehead and Weston super Mare. An old Non-League Directory allowed my Rainman like tendencies to kick into gear and before long I’d got an encyclopaedic knowledge of who, what and where, and, one of those names was Liskeard…..

The trusty Bartholomew Atlas quickly showed that Liskeard (from Lux Park – a great name for a ground!) was a bit isolated in the sense that while the bulk of the league was Somerset, Bristol and Devon, they were from Cornwall and that wasn’t the done thing it seemed.

A bit more research into the pages numbered 700+ in the old non-league bible taught me that if you were from Cornwall, then you played in the South Western League, which in theory fed into the Western League, but in reality didn’t because no one else wanted to be like Liskeard!

I liked Liskeard, they were different, they were special, they were probably the best club in Cornwall because they wanted to play bigger and better teams, and in fairness, they did a decent job of it. When they made the jump from the South Western League in 1979, having won it twice and finished runners up twice in four seasons, they got promoted from Western Division One at the first time of asking, and then in 1986 they had a five season spell in the Premier Division where they finished fourth twice, second twice and champions once.

But, after winning the league in 1988 (and in theory being eligible to apply for Southern League status), seven years later they had taken voluntary demotion and returned to the league they came from. That is where they stayed until the South West Peninsula League formed, and once in the newly formed competition they’ve had a mixed time albeit in 2019 they were crowned champions of the Western Division.

Last season they finished runners-up to Falmouth Town, by a distance, whereas this time around along with St Blazey they are favourites to make the jump to Step 5 football, in theory the Western League Premier Division, but restructuring may well mean it’s something slightly different to that, which doesn’t involve travelling to Bristol!

Liskeard is a decent drive time wise from Falmouth (it probably isn’t if you live in either of the two places, but for us mere mortals from the built up Midlands it’s a decent drive!). The 47 miles can take up to an hour and a half depending on the time of day, and of course the traffic jams getting out of Falmouth, through Truro and onto the A30. Fortunately it wasn’t too bad and before long we were exiting at Bodmin and getting on the Plymouth bound A38, which eventually lead us to our destination.

Liskeard looked a very nice town, in fact Mrs H at this point volunteered to me that she had indeed previously visited it and it was both pleasant and quite hilly! That said, once we’d located a supermarket for provisions and then found Lux Park, it was time for a little look around the place.

The ground sits at the back of a sports centre, and the entrance to it is through a tunnel that runs below the bar which is on the top floor of the two story building which also houses the dressing rooms. The bar does provide an excellent viewing point for watching the game from an elevated position, but with all the seats taken up we decided to make do with a pitch side view!

So, once through the turnstile that sits at the end of the tunnel, moving anti-clockwise you’ve got hard standing behind the goal at the leisure centre end, and then moving round to the side, just beyond the half way line is a seated stand that apparently contains seats from the old Mayflower Stand at Plymouth Argyle’s Home Park.

The far end goal is quite tight but then moving round onto the dugout side you’ve got a couple of terrace steps with a wooden shelter straddling the half way line. Beyond that is the large tea bar which runs down to the corner flag and probably sells things like pasties.

It’s a very nice ground, with a surprisingly green looking pitch under the circumstances. I would describe it as ‘old school’, but in a positive sense, one that doesn’t look to have been overly modernised over the years, but at the same time, it doesn’t show any signs of wear and tear.

The game was another entertaining spectacle. The first half did finish goalless but Liskeard went down to ten men on the half hour mark when Harry Jeffery was dismissed for a high challenge, but parity in terms of numbers was restored just into the second half when the Bridgers Ewan Reeves saw red for a professional foul.

Shortly after the second red James Lorenz scored his first goal of what was to be a memorable night when he found the far corner of the net, only for the same player to get his second with a sublime chip over the goalkeeper just over ten minutes later.

Lorenz then got his hat-trick in the 78^th minute as Liskeard threatened to cut loose, but in fairness to Wadebridge they battled incredibly hard throughout the game, but at the same time they were second best in the final analysis.

Liskeard look good, I wouldn’t back against them being a Step 5 club next season, they certainly have the team, the facilities and the support to warrant it. Quite what the Step 5 league they would go into is going to look like is conjecture at the minute, but all will be revealed in due course I’m sure.

Falmouth was reached by 10.30pm, the Cornish football adventure was over for another year, but we’ll be back again, of that there is no doubt! 

Still time to open the fridge though.........