The Hare

Hartley Wintney  1  Metropolitan Police  1

Southern League – Premier Division South

Admission / Programme - £12 / £2.50

I genuinely thought that childhood memories would come flooding back last Saturday, but I was sadly mistaken.

Hartley Hare, a character from children’s TV programme Pipkins, a show screened throughout the Seventies aimed at the pre-school brigade, was someone who I connected with on so many levels. Not least due to the fact that my sister had a cuddly hare, that she called Hartley, an ugly moth eaten rodent, who once got left on a Portsmouth to St Malo ferry following a family holiday to Brittany.

Anyway, I was kind of hoping that the Hampshire village of Hartley Wintney may have been connected to the said buck toothed fleabag in some sort of way, maybe it inspired his name, maybe there was a blue plaque on a wall to signify his birthplace, or maybe even a pub named after him, but I was wrong, very wrong, and in the words of Jon Pigeon, frankly, I was livid about it!

The day hadn’t started that well to be honest. I was advised upon my arrival into the downstairs area of the house that it was indeed my Aunty Jill’s 65^th birthday so I had to hotfoot it to the shops, and then to Fritchley to deliver the gifts. That was fine, but it seems the one and only cash point in the town centre of Belper was out of action, so I was without wedge, and with the plan to go straight to Pipkins-ville from the drop off, I was going to have to pick up some cash on-route.

With gifts delivered and birthday greetings passed on, it was off to the dual carriageway and motorway network to head for Hartley Wintney, but with a sense of excitement that only a satellite navigation system can give you! I mean, do I go M42, M40 and then A34 followed by M4, or do I go M1 and A43 to the M40, or do I go M1, M25 and then M3? I had so many options but I was going to let the computer decide my route, and I have to say I was reasonably pleased with the M1, A43, M40, A34 then M4 option it gave me, simple pleasures like this in life are all I need, and of course memories of fictional children’s TV characters, that were probably created by drug-addled writers who filled scripts with inappropriate euphemisms that no one picked up on!

So with the route a happy one, the journey a straightforward one, and Hartley Wintney entered with little or no pain, it was just a case of parking up and finding a cash point, but not only is there no Hartley Hare in Hartley Wintney, it seems there is also no cash dispenser in the centre. To be fair though, in my own little tiny mind I’d assumed it would be a bigger place than it actually was, more of a small town, but it seems it’s just a village. I parked up, nowt could be found, so I asked someone…

“No, we don’t have a cash machine, you can try the Post Office, but that’ll probably be shut anyway.”

So I went to Tesco and asked if they did cashback, they did, so I asked for a lottery ticket, but then confusion caused by a breakdown in communication meant I’d paid for my ticket before the cashback had been sorted, so I had to buy something else, like a newspaper. By now my £30 cash withdrawal had cost £3.40 in a lottery ticket that won me nothing and a copy of the Daily Mail I never read……and still no frigging Hare!

Sorry, football, that’s right, I’d gone to watch a football match, I’d almost forgotten about that so much have I been ranting on about other stuff! So what was that all about then?

Well, Hartley Wintney were formed in 1897 and were originally called Hartley Row, hence the club nickname being ‘The Row’. They played in various local leagues for the bulk of their history until becoming founder members of the Home Counties League (now called the Combined Counties League) in 1978.

For a number seasons they’ve bobbed up and down between the two divisions of the CCL, until 2015-16 when they won the Premier Division. At the time the ground failed the grading so they were declined promotion, but then they went on to win it again the following year, and this time all was good in the hood.

n their first season at Step 4 in the Southern League, they finished fourth in the East Division and as a result went into the play-offs. AFC Dunstable and Cambridge City were beaten and promotion to the Premier Division South was secured.

Covid has been a bugger since then, but in their first season they were in eighth spot when things were curtailed, while last season they finished fourth bottom and managed to retain Step 3 status. This season they currently sit in a relegation place, but certainly by no means adrift.

You have to put this into context though, Hartley Wintney is a village of just 5000 inhabitants, and to have a side at Step 3 is a remarkable achievement.

The Memorial Playing Fields ground sits a short distance from the centre of the village and first impressions were of a friendly, welcoming and well run club. Parking on the road outside (after the cash debacle I was too late to get in the car park), the turnstiles sit in the South East corner, and to your immediate right is a changing room block with the clubhouse adjacent. The clubhouse is raised up from pitch level, and with an overhang in front of it, it’s a popular area for spectators to congregate.

Moving round anti-clockwise, it’s hard standing all of the way until you get to the West side of the ground where two seated stands are located, with a tea bar at the very end. Behind the South goal is an area of covered standing the runs two thirds of the way along the width of the pitch.

So that’s the ground, what about the game?

Firstly, Metropolitan Police, I’ve only ever seen them play once and that was in the 1994-95 season when Belper Town drew them in the FA Vase quarter finals, and we all trotted off to Surrey to see a memorable 1-0 victory. So, after a gap of nearly 28 years, it was nice to be able to see how the serving officers of the constabulary were performing on the field, and if league tables are anything to go by, I would suggest not too badly, for serving Policemen……..

They took a first half lead through a cracking free kick from Herson Rodrigues-Alvez, but in fairness to the hosts as the game moved into the second period they really took the game to the visitors and deservedly equalised in the 82^nd minute when Harry Cooksley smashed home an absolute pisswhistler from outside the box. On balance, Hartley Wintney were worth at least a point and on another day they could easily have got all three.

315 watched it, and having parked on the road I was able to make a quick getaway and be Reading bound without any major issues. Ok, I admit I was a bit let down by the lack of anything Hartley Hare related, but then again, there comes a point in all of our lives that we have to learn to let things go……..

Maldon & Tiptree next week, and my memories of an inappropriate cuddly toy with links to the jam making industry!