Bus = £9
iPaper = 40p
Entrance = £7
Programme = £1
Tea = £1
Food and tea at Piccadilly = £5-49
Total = £21-99
For the second weekend running, I made the trek up to Burnley on the X43 from Manchester. The grounds around here are amongst the trickiest to get to from Sheffield, so I figured I’d make the most of the better time of year. I say ‘better’ cautiously – today was blustery and grey as I made my way across to Manchester and up into East Lancs.
Padiham is a couple of miles North of Burnley, so I’d opted to alight at Burnley bus station today, and walk the remaining distance. Padiham play at the Arbories ground on Well Street, which sits at the top of a steep hill, accessible through some narrow streets with terraced houses. This was going to be another impressive view today, and it didn’t let me down – from the terrace behind the near goal, you could see down into Burnley to the right, and straight on you could see what must be Nelson. Padiham are in their inaugural season in the Evostik league, having progressed from the NWCFL in 2012-13. According to a sign outside the ground, they’d actually won ‘The Treble’ in that season. To be fair, they were not doing badly in their first season at this level, and sat 17th before today’s game. The visitors from the Wirral – Cammel Laird – were in 9th place, but there was something of a cloud over their club as rumours were circulating that they would be resigning from the league this year. I’d visited Kirklands in around 2006-7, when they’d lost a narrow play-off final in extra time. Something of an intriguing clash awaited.
Cammel Laird started strongly, with John Couch firing wide in the early stages, before Joe Evans hit a dipping free-kick over. They took the lead with a bizarre goal on 18 minutes. Evans was running through on the right, and when he saw no options in the middle, decided to chip the keeper. The ball flew into the goal and over the unfortunate Sean Davis in the home goal. Padiham briefly threatened when Kieron Pickup hit a long-range drive straight at the keeper, and curled another shot wide shortly after. Cammel Laird looked in charge, but Padiham somehow equalised when a low cross was headed into his own net by Dysart. 1-1 at half-time, and it was proving unpredictable so far.
The home side looked eager to build on their strong finish to the first half, and Spencer Jordan headed over to send a warning to the away side. Cammel Laird duly responded when Gibiluru curled a right-footer in to make it 2-1. It still looked open, but the game was put to bed shortly after a hand-ball in the Padiham box resulted in a penalty which was calmly converted by Joe Evans. Who says Englishmen are rubbish at taking penalties?! The home side had a smattering of opportunities, like when Craig fired over on 68 minutes, but did not seriously threaten Mike Langley in the away goal. Not the best game in the world, but another distinctive Lancashire ground, and a brilliant view from the ‘top of the world’.
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