90 Minutes In Wyke

Wyke Wanderers  2  Leeds University  1

West Riding Challenge Cup – First Round

Admission / Programme - No / No

In a recent blog I talked about games I’d witnessed where they'd been abandoned, and some of the more bizarre reasons for the early termination of the said games.

One of those games was in the West Yorkshire village of Wyke, it was the run up the Christmas 2015 and a team called TVR United were playing Lower Hopton Reserves at the Appleton Academy 4G. I can remember it well in one respect because it was an incredibly windy day and a number of games fell by the wayside anyway due to the conditions. However, on the 75^th minute the referee bought the game to a sudden halt and simply walked off the pitch stating that it had been abandoned.

It was nothing to do with the weather, it seemed someone on the touchline had made a comment to the referee and rather than deal with it via the usual means and either have a chat or produce a card, he just decided he wasn’t having it and walked off.

Now you might think it was a culmination of incidents and this happened to be the final straw, but it wasn’t, in fact the whole game as far as I could see was not in the slightest bit contentious and everyone had behaved very nicely. Both teams pleaded with him to continue, but he wasn’t for changing his mind, and that was it, twenty two somewhat baffled players were left standing on the pitch.

That wasn’t my first visit to Wyke for a football match though, I went earlier the same year in the May to watch Wyke Wanderers play Whitkirk Wanderers at their Whitechapel Road ground. I am lying a bit though because Whitechapel Road isn’t in Wyke, it’s in neighbouring Scholes, and the ground itself was almost on top of the M62. But for purposes of the story, bear with me….

It came to my attention over the course of the recent Summer that Wyke Wanderers had upped sticks and were on the move, to a brand new sports hub (called Wyke Community Sports Village) which was being built at an old school site on Wilson Road in the centre of the village.

It has taken a wee while this season for the club to start playing home games, and to be fair they’ve played a good number more away from home than they have in Wyke, but on a wet day in West Yorkshire, I decided I mostly liked the look of a cup tie between what is effectively a Step 8 side in West Yorkshire League Wanderers and a Step 7 team from the ‘other’ league in the area, Leeds University, who compete in the Yorkshire Amateur League.

It’s a funny old state of affairs in West Yorkshire at this level. At one point you had the West Riding County Amateur League and the West Yorkshire League, both effectively covering the same footprint, fighting for clubs, and getting the occasional defection from one league to the other. When I say defections, it got to a stage over a few years where the West Riding variant was getting significantly weakened as clubs jumped ship, so it ended up merging with the Yorkshire Amateur League and effectively it’s top flight gained Step 7 status. But, the same issue exists, two leagues, same levels, same footprints. I wonder if they send each other Christmas cards?

Anyway, politics aside, what is the new home of Wyke Wanderers like?

You enter via a long drive and out in front of you is a car park to die for, a proper big lad, easily big enough to host a Def Leppard concert if you wanted, and possibly even capable of hosting Gardeners World Live, so getting parked was a doddle.

At the end of the magnificent car park is the building, a two story affair containing rooms and stuff, with the players getting changed on the ground floor. Directly in front is the 4G caged pitch where the game was to take place, while behind the 4G are a couple more grass pitches, one of which was hosting Wanderers reserve game against Robin Hood Athletic. To the left of the pitches is a cycle track, easily big enough to host a cycle race if you wanted to.

On a clear day you can get great views out towards Bradford, but today wasn’t a clear day, the views were rubbish. So where is Wyke you might ask? Basically get off the M62 at the M606 roundabout, and rather than shoot up to Bradford you take the Halifax road and then throw a right, where Wyke will appear in front of you.

I arrived nice and early and retired to a local establishment for a swift one, £2.60 a pint, how good is that? I might let Mrs H put the heating on an hour earlier with that saving…..

So, the game, it was a very decent one to be fair. Wyke took an early lead with a thundercracker of a shot, but the visiting students equalised just before half time with a somewhat dubious penalty award. At that stage the University were looking the side with the momentum but as we moved into the second period, the hosts changed things around and got back on top, scoring the vital winner, again from a well taken shot. Wyke also hit the woodwork a couple of times in the second period and as a result move into the Second Round of the West Riding Challenge Cup, where they will play Tadcaster Magnets.

It was nice to get ninety minutes in this time as well!