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……

Shay

FC Halifax Town  4  Chesterfield  2

National League 

Admission / Programme - £21 / £3

Do you recall my blog from earlier in the season when I went to AFC Crossley, a club from the North side of Halifax?

No? Why not? Anyway…..

Well, I talked about the fact that Halifax was not a place I was overly familiar with, partly because it’s not an area I’ve been drawn to for football on that many occasions. I then went on to say that maybe as the season drew towards it’s close I may look for an opportunity to pay a long awaited re-visit to the Shay to watch FC Halifax Town, albeit on a Saturday via the train!

The train thing wasn’t going to happen after a bit of research, mainly because when I looked into it, it’s quite expensive to go to Halifax on the train from Derby, in fact I can get to Glasgow cheaper, but the foibles of the train ticketing and splitting system is for another day. What is for today is the fact that the planets aligned to set up what looked on paper a cracking occasion to get back to the Shay, after a 23 year absence, albeit by car, on a Wednesday night!

FC Halifax Town v Chesterfield, and the permutations were simple, if Chesterfield avoided defeat they would be promoted back to the Football League, finally, after stumbling a little over recent weeks. That was it, that was the plan, I was going!

All was indeed going to plan on the Wednesday morning, tickets for the away end were selling like hot cakes (it was all ticket for Chesterfield fans), 2,500 were expected to make the journey up, and no sooner had the ticket sales stopped, Halifax announced they were going to be having a pitch inspection at 3.30pm due to the heavy rain.

The Shay has seen a number of games called off this season due to the renowned state of the Calderdale Council maintained pitch, and had we now got ourselves a situation whereby the party had to potentially go on hold? Also of course, had a number of fans bought tickets for a game that they subsequently may not attend depending on when it’s re-arranged for?

I started to prepare for a Plan B, Carlton v Pontefract on the plastic at Basford was looking the favourite, because to be honest, given the recent track record at the Shay I fully expected the game to be called off, but, at 3.45pm myself, along with many others no doubt, got a very pleasant surprise when the club announced that the game was in fact on!

Memories of the Shay then? A bit vague to be honest, as I said earlier, it was over 23 years ago, the 1997-98 season and a home game against Yeovil Town. It was the season that Halifax won the Football Conference and were promoted back to the Football League following a five year absence.

The Shaymen beat Yeovil Town 3-1 on what was a Friday night in West Yorkshire, and I know that I travelled up after work with a mate, only just getting into the ground in time for kick off. We stood under a covered terrace on the Skircoat Road side of the ground, and at the time the Shay didn’t look anything like it does today.

Back then the pitch was surrounded by the speedway track, both ends were open terraces around the edges of the oval, while the main stand opposite the Skircoat Terrace was a small structure that housed the dressing rooms. It was a vast but an ageing and somewhat basic venue, however, things changed.

Nowadays it’s gone from an oval to a rectangle! Two steep covered terraces sit behind both goals, the old main stand has been replaced by a shiny new one, complete with executive boxes, while the old cover on the Skircoat Road side remains, but now it’s full of seats. The Shay is shared between FC Halifax Town and Halifax Panthers Rugby League Club, a marriage that from a pitch preservation point of view, is far from conducive.

From Halifax Town, to FC Halifax Town, what was that all about then? Well, Halifax Town were proud members of the Football League from 1921 when they were founder members of Division Three North, all the way to 1993 when they finished bottom of the fourth tier and were relegated to the Conference. Let’s be honest though, in the nicest possible sense, they were never really any good, life was always a struggle, and apart from a famous victory over Malcolm Allison’s Manchester City in the 1979-80 FA Cup, momentous back page headlines have not been overly forthcoming.

The Conference, as I said, lasted five years before promotion back to the Football League arrived, in fact I saw their first game back at Peterborough United in August 1998, but after four more seasons it was back to the Conference again. The club went into administration in the 2007-08 season, had ten points deducted, finished next to bottom and subsequently folded.

Was it the end? Well, as far as Halifax Town FC was concerned, yes, but let’s be right, while they might not have been World beaters, they had a small but loyal fan base in a good sized town, so football was never going to die completely, and along came FC Halifax Town.

They were allowed into the Northern Premier League Division One North in 2008-09, finishing eighth, but then the following year they won it. The Premier Division was also won at the first attempt, while it only took two years to be promoted from the Conference North when they beat Brackley Town in a play-off final.

The Conference Premier Division experience lasted three seasons before relegation came, but only for one season because this time Salford City were beaten in the play-off final and they were quickly back, where they remain. The 2021-22 season saw a fourth placed visit and a play-off quarter final defeat to Chesterfield, while this season a recent good run has seen them move to the edges of play-off contention once again.

Oh, I almost forgot, they’ve won the FA Trophy twice since reforming, in 2016 against Grimsby Town, and in 2023 against Gateshead, both times at Wembley Stadium. 

I got into Halifax reasonably early, parking on Skircoats Road, and having weaved my way through the large numbers of Police officers behind the North terrace (where the away following was going to be housed), it was round to the back of the main stand and into the bar for a pint. All seemed pretty relaxed, and I have to say, there was an air of quiet confidence amongst the Shaymen and women, recent form had been good, they fancied their chances.

The atmosphere inside the ground was electric, the Spireites were absolutely giving it the big one, and when they took the lead through Will Grigg on the half hour mark, the away end was absolutely bouncing, however, it changed very quickly.

Halifax got to grips with the heavy surface far better than Chesterfield did, and within seconds Rob Harker had equalised, only for the same player to turn the game on it’s head on the 39th minute with his and the Shaymen’s second. Andrew Oluwabori scored a third for Halifax in first half added time, and in hindsight, that was the killer goal as far as the Spireites were concerned, the task was now pretty monumental, but not impossible.

The second period saw Halifax look the more physically stronger on the surface, with Chesterfield looking tired and leggy, so it came as no surprise when Aaron Cosgrave netted Town’s fourth from close range just after the hour mark.

Chesterfield had nothing to lose now, and as they threw men forward they were guilty of missing some good chances before James Berry did eventually pull a goal back. Sustained late pressure came to nothing as the Spireites battled but lacked an edge, and in the final analysis no one could argue that Halifax didn’t deserve the three points, and a three points that did move them into sixth place and the play off zone.

The home fans moved into overdrive in the second period, and created an equally impressive atmosphere as the away fans did in the early stages, overall it had been a cracking game of football in a cracking atmosphere, I loved it!

I didn’t love the fact that the junction for the M62 and M1 was closed on the way back, meaning a journey over to the A1 to get home, via Doncaster, but other than that, I was so pleased I made the effort.

It wouldn’t have been quite the same on a Saturday via the train would it? 

Friends With Benefits

Gosport Borough  1  Harrow Borough  0

Southern Football League – Premier Division South 

Admission / Programme - £12 / £2.50

I like to do my homework before I go to a new ground, especially when it’s a town / village that I’ve never set foot in before.

Gosport was no different, and I’ve learned over the years that my first port of call (before I go to Wikipedia), is my old mate Derek. Derek is well travelled, partly because he’s moved house a lot over the years, but also because he used to be a bus driver, not just service bus routes, but also excursions. 

I also have a couple of other mates who I go to for advice, Steve and Dave, and to be fair, if you want food, Steve is your man, he is the Jay Rayner of eateries close to football grounds. Dave, bless him, can’t remember where he went yesterday, so that’s not helpful when you want to know about a place he visited in 1992….but anyway, he’s good with roads, congestion, public transport and car parks, so he does come in handy to be fair.

Anyway, Derek, turns out his Mum lived in Gosport for a bit, while his brother who was a Navy type, lived just down the road in Lee-on-Solent. Did any of this information help in terms of my day out in the town, no, not at all, but he did give me one very good piece of advice….

“Avoid the M25, it’s going to be shut at the junction for Portsmouth”

Gosport, of course, is just over the water from Pompey, so if I was serious about going, then it was going to have to be the trusted A34 and then of course the M27 in an Easterly direction. I just hoped that someone had told visiting Harrow Borough about the M25 and all that chaos……

I’ve made good inroads into the Southern League this season, and now I’m down to a stage where I’ve only got four grounds still to visit, all within very close proximity of each other on the South coast, namely Gosport, Sholing, Poole and Bashley. Gosport Borough have always intrigued me a little, largely because they’ve had a yo-yo existence over the years, but also because they play in yellow, I like clubs that play in yellow! I can also recall looking at pictures of their ground, Privett Park, in old non-league football books and thinking to myself, yes, I quite like the look of that place.

You can also catch a ferry to Gosport, it runs from Portsmouth Harbour Railway Station, and going back to the days of the infamous hooligan mob, the 657 Crew from Portsmouth, they had a chap who was a notable member called ‘Docker’ Hughes who stood for election as a member of parliament for the City (The 657 Party). In his manifesto he was going to introduce a Duty Free Service on the Gosport Ferry. He got votes, but he didn’t get elected, sadly! His manifesto also included taking Portsmouth out of the County of Hampshire, building a Horse Racing Track in Southsea and only having magistrates working in the City who had previously served prison sentences.

He spoke a lot of sense to be fair!

The journey was kind to me, no traffic hold ups barring a minimal queue to get on the M3 at Winchester, and as I left the M27 at Fareham my eta at Privett Park was scheduled to be a convenient 1.30pm. A leisurely drive down past HMS Sultan saw me turn down towards the ground and as if it were my lucky day, I found the one remaining car park space on the short driveway that runs up to the ground.

I said earlier that Gosport Borough have had something of a yo-yo existence, well, having been founded in 1944 they joined the Portsmouth & District League but within a season they had joined the Hampshire League where they remained until 1978 when a move to the Southern League beckoned.

The final years in the Hampshire League saw the league title won two years in succession, and upon joining the Southern League South Division they never finished outside the top four in their first four seasons, and by the start of the 1982-83 season they found themselves in the Premier Division.

This is when the club started to flit between the divisions in the Southern League, until 1992 when they suffered a relegation to the Wessex League, where they remained until the championship was won in 2006-07 and a return to the Southern League took place.

Within five seasons they found themselves in the play-off picture and after beating Southampton based rivals Sholing in the semi-final, they beat Poole Town in the final to make it to the Premier Division, where again they made the play-offs in the first season, beating Hemel Hempstead Town on penalties in the final, this after overcoming Stourbridge in the semi.

So, 2013-14 and the club were in the Conference South, they finished mid-table but in the same season they reached the FA Trophy Final at Wembley, only to lose 4-0 to Cambridge United. The semi final saw them overcome local rivals Havant & Waterlooville in a memorable encounter that saw much local pride at stake. The following season they finished sixth, just missing out on the play-offs, but two seasons later they found themselves relegated back to the Southern League Premier Division South, where they remain, but this season, they are well in contention for a play-off spot.

I loved the ground, you enter in the South East corner and then running half the length behind the South goal is a large club house facility, with some covered standing area in front of it where the more vocal and boisterous Gosport fans congregate. Moving round in an anti-clockwise fashion you then have the iconic old stand complete with bench seats and yellow / blue décor, with the dressing rooms underneath. I didn’t venture into it, but apparently from the back of the stand you can see the Spinnaker Tower in Portsmouth Harbour!

Next to the main stand is a two tier corporate box structure, while adjacent to this and running up to the North West corner is a gymnasium. It’s open standing behind the North goal, and then as you move to the East side you get the modern Harry Mizen Stand which is a long seated structure bedecked with blue seats, before finally stumbling upon a tea bar, just before getting back round the turnstiles once again.   

Behind the South goal, parked next to the clubhouse is a double decker, open topped bus, complete with a Gosport Borough banner draped across the back of it, presumably this was used when the club got to Wembley back in 2014, why it’s never been returned to the bus company is anyone’s guess! Wonder if Derek had anything to do with it…………….

Anyway, the game against struggling Harrow won’t live long in the memory, it was decided by a single but very well taken goal from Bradley Tarbuck in the first half who controlled and finished well to fire home while on the run.

Harrow, in fairness to them, took the game to the hosts in the second period but didn’t produce enough quality in the final third to threaten, and it was Gosport who march on to consolidate a place in what looks like a shoot-out lottery come the end of April.

My car parking space allowed a quick getaway, and the key was turned back in Belper at 8pm, avoiding the M25 was clearly good advice. It was a great day out, with the only disappointment being not having time to take the ferry, and of course, to see if Docker got his wish when it came to the duty free options!

Stones

Bemerton Heath Harlequins  2  Larkhall Athletic  1

Southern Football League – Division One South 

Admission / Programme - £10 / Online

After two weeks of relatively local ventures on a Saturday, the shackles, once more, were off!

The quest for the 410 or so (I’m not sure on the actual total number cos I can’t be arsed to work out ground shares and all that shite), is now down to just 26 grounds to complete the top eight tiers of English football.

I reckon by the end of the season I could be down to 20, but anything from 10 to 15 will go back on again due to promotions, so working on some basic maths, I reckon I’m probably two more full seasons away from being able to pop the champagne cork and announce to Mrs H that I am done, for the time being anyway!

Ok, Guernsey and potentially Jersey could be a right arse to sort out, but we’ll worry about that when the time comes, I mean, we got to the Isle of Man without any hitches didn’t we!!

I fancied Bemerton Heath Harlequins, a newly promoted team to the Southern League Division One South at the start of the season, after finishing runners-up in the Wessex League. I’ll be honest, while before this season I’d heard of the club, where they were actually from was a mystery to me. Yes, they were obviously from Wessex, which apparently is a fictional County made up by some bloke who wrote books and that, but that aside, it was Google Maps time.

Well I never, they were from Salisbury, the West side of the City, so that in turn meant along with the recent visit to Salisbury FC, I would be making two journeys to the place in relatively quick succession. When I set the route out, an added tinge of excitement unfurled when it became apparent that I’d be driving right past Stonehenge on the A303 to allow me to enter from the West. I’d never seen Stonehenge before, a Stonehenge virgin if you will, but we’ll not open that can of  paganistic worms….

While it’s probably shorter in terms of distance, bearing in mind I was approaching from the East, I’d been advised by every man, woman, child, animal and indeed Russian Secret Agent that if I drove into the centre of Salisbury, it could be a very long time before I appeared out the other side again (that’s because of traffic, not Russian shenanigans I might add). So rather than risk that, it was to be a journey across the top.

A very pleasant journey it was too, all the way down to the A303 and then despite warnings I’d be queuing for quite some time as road went down to one lane when Stonehenge was in the proximity, they proved to be unfounded and while things did slow down, the hold up was minimal. Stonehenge by the way is a pile of stones, people stand and look at them, after walking a fair distance from the car and coach parks, then presumably after staring at them, they go home again. That’s my input to the local tourist board sorted anyway, you can double your admission prices now!

Bemerton Heath (or Bemmy as the locals call it) is a large housing estate and to access the ground you have to meander your way through the streets before following a driveway which takes you down into a dip on the very edges of the estate where the ground (Moon Park) is located.

Moon Park is a tidy, and attractive tree lined location, and upon arrival a small car park greets you that sits behind the goal, with the large clubhouse and changing room block adjacent. The clubhouse serves the community and I got the feeling that many of it’s inhabitants had no plans to attend the game, although once you got to half time you could walk freely between the clubhouse and the ground without having to worry about things like handing over a tenner!

The top floor of the clubhouse leads you to an open viewing area filled with seats, right above the goal, but with a large net in front of the seats for safety reasons, presumably serving two purposes. One being to stop occupants being hit by stray shots, and the other reason being to stop people from falling off the edge!

The tea bar sits in what is effectively a tunnel that runs from pitch side behind the goal to the clubhouse building, and with a kids team acting as mascots for the game, it looked to be doing a roaring trade as the kids munched burgers and chips while grown ups necked pints!

Two areas of cover sit on one side of the ground, one being a terraced area, the other being seats, both of which are elevated slightly above pitch level to give excellent views. The rest of the ground is hard standing but what makes it a homely enclosed venue are the tall trees that surround the stadium on the two sides where no furniture resides.

The pitch was in great nick as well, I was mostly very happy with my surroundings!

What’s the story with Bemmy as a football club then? Well, it’s a merger of two clubs, one being Bemerton Athletic, and the other being Moon FC who were a Sunday side. They got together in 1989 to form BHH, being immediately accepted into the Wessex League, after Athletic had previously played in the Wiltshire League.

They had a long unbroken spell in the Wessex League, having a successful spell from 2009 to 2014 when they finished runners up twice in the Premier Division, but in the season before Covid struck they found themselves relegated to Division One.

They bounced back in 2021-22 by winning the title, and then in their first season back in the top flight, last time around, as we know they finished runners up and got promotion to Step 4 for the first time.

They have also had a couple of good runs in the FA Vase, reaching the Fifth Round on two occasions, losing out to Clitheroe and Spennymoor Town, both times away from home.

What about the big game against Larkhall Athletic then, could Bemmy get the win they needed to maintain their hopes of a play off place?

It started well enough, Daniel Young headed home firmly from close range in sixth minute and then five minutes before the break Remus Nixon produced an excellent free kick to leave it 2-0 at half time.

A goalkeeping error saw a looping effort from Jack Goodall find the net ten minutes after the break to reduce the arrears for Larkhall, but despite periods of pressure, Bemmy ran out deserved and relatively comfortable winners.

Pre-match, I did wonder if Mrs H had stitched me up. The tannoy bloke announced to those in the ground about a visitor from Derbyshire who had come to watch the game, I froze on the spot with fear waiting to be outed, but it turns out it was some chap from Buxton called Edward who had come on the train! I don’t know Edward, I never met Edward, I wonder if Edward has got home yet?

Anyway, the escape was an easy one, the traffic around Stonehenge had thinned significantly, I did think about calling in but there was a really interesting advert on Talksport so I didn’t bother, and before long the road back to the Midlands was being eaten up.

25 to go….I will eventually miss all of this you know!

Cutting It Fine

Bollington Town  1  Newton Athletic  0

Cheshire Football League – Division One 

Admission / Programme - Free / Free

It was going to be tight, very tight indeed!

It was the work annual awards night, and muggins here had been roped into being the Master of Ceremonies for the evening, which in the simplest of terms meant I had no choice but to be boarding a train in Belper at 5.34pm!

Any later and I would have been in a whole World of pain, so whatever plans I had for football, they simply had to tie in with the logistics. In short, I needed to get home, get changed and all that, and then be ready for my lift to the station which was coming at 5.20pm courtesy of Mrs H’s Mother….

So, plans had to be carefully made, and getting to a new ground, well, it did look like it was going to be an impossibility until I was looking at the Cheshire League fixtures in the build up to the weekend.

It came to my attention, after having visited Upton JFC the week before, that Bollington Town were also in the running for promotion, and in terms of the venue they played at, well it was a school 4G in Macclesfield. Google Maps told me that with a 2pm kick off, not too much buggering abut at half time, a modest amount of injury time, and a quick getaway, I could get home for 5pm, but, I needed to be on my ‘A Game’ if I was going to make it happen without a disaster.

I spoke to Steve, and very quickly I had a wing man, a wing man who was setting off before me to check things out, because my departure was going to be delayed due to another domestic matter that needed to be attended to. I was on the Via Gellia when Steve phoned me to tell me he’d arrived at All Hallowes Catholic College, but, he could see no signs of life. After a bit of snooping around though he discovered that the college had two entrances, and he had gone to the wrong one. A quick re-route and by the time I was getting on the Cat & Fiddle all was good in the World, the players from both teams were arriving.

Rumours of a snowbound Cat & Fiddle proved to be just that, while the terrain was very white, the roads were clear, and before long I was dropping down into Macc, and making my way out the other side to where the college is located. The college is located in an area of housing just to the West of the town centre, and Steve was very kindly stood at the side of the road to direct me into the car park. It was twenty past one, the pub was shut, so it was a simple waiting game, and a hope that everything was prompt!

Ok, so we may be in Macclesfield, but the neighbouring town of Bollington, what’s the deal when it comes to football? If I’m honest, I had no knowledge of any teams playing in the town (not saying that they didn’t, I just wasn’t aware) up until a couple of years ago when I was playing around with the Hope Valley League and a team arrived (Bollington FC), which to be honest felt a little out on a limb given the geographical patch. They did pretty well but then disappeared to what I seem to think was the Lancashire & Cheshire League, where as far as I know, they remain. 

Bollington Town, also as far as I know, have no connection to the Bollington that played in the HVL, and I noticed last season that they’d landed in the Cheshire League, after winning the Altrincham & District League. Anyway, after getting promotion by finishing in third place in the Second Division, they seem to be on a roll and are now well placed to get into what is effectively Step 7.

The ground in Bollington that Bollington FC played at was the recreation ground that was shared with the cricket. Set in something of a valley, it was a lovely venue, whereas the college in Macclesfield that Town play at might not have got the same scenic setting, but as you can imagine it’s a caged affair with a viewing area down the one side. Set in a dip to the North of the college buildings, it was far from an unwelcoming place, and indeed sat behind it was a small area containing sheep and pigs, that Steve and I went to have a chat with at half time!

The game was two minutes late kicking off, and given the fact it was second versus bottom placed visitors Newton Athletic (who share the same ground as Upton JFC), the game was far from one sided, and was indeed settled by the only goal of the game when the hosts scored late in the first half through George Richardson.

Half time took a little longer than I would have hoped, largely because both sides trooped off back into the college, and in the second period it was the visitors who were putting on the pressure late in the game, but it was ultimately to no avail. I moved fast, finally pulling onto the drive at 5.05pm, within fifteen minutes I’d gone from casual to smart, fully attired in a penguin suit, ready to bear the brunt of the ridicule from fellow passengers on the Belper to Nottingham train service, and then of course the Forest and Liverpool fans that were loitering around the proximity of the rail head.

Once a year I have to do this, just once a year, and I don’t think there are many more Bollington’s and the like that I can loop into the equation. But two years running now I’ve pulled it off, last time round it was joys of the Fairfield Estate in Buxton, which to be fair was a little less stressful than Macclesfield.

Can Belper United get into a new ground in 12 months? I somehow doubt it………