Liverpool (27-09-2014)

Liverpool 1 – 1 Everton (Premier League), 27th September 2014

Match ticket: £56
Train (Sheffield-Liverpool advance): £17-15
Bus to Anfield: £4
Programme: £3
Tea x2: £3-37
Total: £83-52

Bizarrely, we managed to get tickets for this game whilst missing out for the lesser games in the bulk members’ sale. We qualified with this having had 9 games on our cards from last year – such are the vagaries of the way tickets are made available at Anfield these days! I’ve been determined this year to keep costs down wherever possible, and we managed to do the travelling for £17-15 each (advance fares with the Two Together railcard). Despite my best efforts, the costs are rising heavily for our trips to Anfield – tickets for this equivalent fixture in 2012/13 (likewise with Main Stand tickets) cost us £47 each. To be honest, we were more pleased to get the tickets in the first place as they are so hard to come by; and of course, this is one of Liverpool’s big games of the season.

The game started as you would expect for a Merseyside derby, with passionate tackling, quick passing and smatterings of good movement in midfield. Liverpool bossed possession in the first half, but couldn’t find that killer pass, so frequently ended up frustrated and nullified. This had all the hallmarks of the 0-0 draw in 2012/13, when a decent game finished all square because the teams were cancelling each other out. Mario Balotelli looked lively and more involved than in previous games, and according to the stats, had 10 shots on the goal. As ever, Sterling was fast and furious on the wing, but couldn’t forge many chances or assists.

The second-half began much the same as the first, this time with Liverpool in the ascendancy. There has been a real lack of fluidity to their play this season, but now they started to resemble the team who had come so close to the title last year. There started to be smarter interchanges in midfield, and flashes of the pace and aggression which took them so far barely a few months ago. Just when it looked like they might be frustrated again, Gerrard scored a superb 65th minute free-kick to make it 1-0. Within a minute, Balotelli had rattled the cross-bar, and actually replays showed it was tipped on by Tim Howard. They pressed and pressed, and while there was still sometimes a lack of directness to their play, the possession and command of the ball merited 3 points here. The clock at the Kop end ticked to 90 minutes, and it looked like they were on the way to a key win. Then up popped the unlikeliest of Everton heroes – Phil Jagielka – with a thunderous drive from outside the box which zipped into the top corner.  There was barely time to restart the game before the final whistle, and Everton had nicked a 1-1 draw here. Liverpool had been much better – the performance was definitely an improvement, but they need to get better at closing out games in which they are in control.

Northwich Flixton (24-09-2014)

Northwich Flixton Villa 2 – 3 Hanley Town, NWCFL (24th September 2014)

Manchester-Flixton train ticket: £5-80
Ciabattas: 80p
Chewing gum: 50p
Entrance: £5
Tea x2: £2
Total: £14-10

Flixton is one of a cluster of clubs in the West side of Manchester which border the M60. These include Irlam (which I’d visited a few weeks previously), and Trafford (where I’d been on a cold January evening in 2009). Technically, the full title of the club is Northwich Flixton Villa, as they are a number of clubs who have sprung up after the demise of Northwich Victoria (at least in their present form). I’m sure there is a book to be written about the history of non-league football in Northwich, which seems to have had a colourful history in recent years.

Tonight’s game was accessible via the same Northern Rail service I had caught to Irlam. After a wander around the vicinity, and discovering the ferry route across the Manchester Ship Canal, I headed to the ground to try and get a photo in the light. This was primarily because my iPod and camera phone seem incapable of taking decent photos at night! The turnstiles weren’t open so I headed into the bar for a cup of tea. I soon parted with £5 for entrance, and wandered out through the doors from the bar into the ground. This was a nice set-up. The bar/office building had a balcony on the first-floor, and further up to the right was a small stand of blue seats. The changing rooms were on the far side, where I found a couple of classic signs from past eras.

As kick-off approached, there was a steady hustle and bustle as more spectators arrived. Everyone seemed to know everyone else, which gave a real sense of community, refreshing to see these days. Northwich were currently near the foot of the table, while Hanley looked like they would be pushing for promotion, so this could be a tough night for the home side. However, they completely defied expectations, and started the game at an astonishing pace, which seemed to catch the team from Stoke off guard. Jonathan Poizer up-front was at the centre of a lot of the action, having a volley deflected wide early on, before opening the scoring after the away keeper mis-controlled the ball in his area. This put the cat among the pigeons (always ideal for the neutral) and Hanley (playing in blue) barely registered a shot, with the best one a snap volley from number 8 flying wide. The pace slowed up ever so slightly after the goal, and there were a lot of high and long balls. On one occasion, the ball arched over the balcony outside the club-house, and I couldn’t quite catch it. Almost immediately, a cheeky chap above shouted ‘You can’t try for keeper, but we are looking for a right-back!’. Back on the pitch, Hanley grabbed an equaliser almost from nothing when a simple cross caused havoc in the home box, and 7 headed in.

1-1 at half-time, which was quite unfair on the home side. Their bad luck continued after the break when an unfortunate Northwich left-back miscued a clearance and sliced the ball into his own net. Suddenly all their hard work from the first-half had been undone in the space of 5 minutes. This lot were a spirited side though, and grabbed an equaliser when Yousef (number 4) looked like he had taken too many touches before slotting home. Hanley didn’t look all that much better now, and the biggest threat they posed was a vague penalty shout (for hand-ball I think) late on. Northwich nearly took the lead when a dipping cross dropped just underneath the cross-bar, only to force a superb tip from the away keeper. At this point, I had to leave for my train back to Sheffield, and was disappointed to learn that Hanley had won this 3-2, thanks to a 90th minute goal from Josh Hall. For all their endeavours and fine efforts, Northwich had just come up short against a slightly sharper team in the shooting department. If the home side continue to play like this, they should get goals, and can take great confidence from this gritty and determined display, even if the result didn’t go their way. My trip back to Sheffield was smooth until Piccadilly, where I had to wait for longer than expected due to the trains being packed full of Wednesday fans. They had been thrashed 7-0 at Manchester City in the League Cup. Chins up Northwich – it could be a lot worse!

AFC Mansfield (20-09-2014)

AFC Mansfield 3 – 1 AFC Emley, NCEL Division 1 (20th September 2014)

Entrance : £4
Programme: £1-50
Tea: 80p
Tea outside: £1
Petrol: c£20
Total: £27-30

Before this match at the Forest Town Arena in Mansfield, I hadn’t seen a proper belter so far. There had been glimpses at Irlam, and some decent play in the Switzerland game, but nothing which had really captured my imagination. Today changed all that. Given the absurdity of public transport between Sheffield and Mansfield (2-3 hours plus waiting time), I borrowed Mrs. Groundhopper’s car for the 48-mile round trip. I’ve completely estimated petrol costs, and have partly factored in that I also owe her for the longer drive to Penrith in August.

I found AFC Mansfield’s ground relatively easily, as it is on the corner of a major junction in Mansfield, and is actually well-signposted. The ground was the most distinctive I’d seen so far this year. After parting with £5 at the turnstile for the ground (and getting an ink-stamp on my hand for good measure), I surveyed the surroundings. Like West Allotment Celtic last year, the entrance is actually at the top of an embankment alongside the club-house and a bit of terracing. The difference here was that there were ample seats and terracing down to the pitch, which was bounded by what looked like a cycle or race track. On the far right was an impressive looking hut more akin to a village cricket club than a football team. The floodlights were what I would call ‘classic’, and seemed to act as nests for roosting birds.

Today’s game pitted the league new boys (the ‘Bulls’) against the league leaders AFC Emley, who were looking in impressive form. They started this game with an absolutely cracking goal from Jordan Townend, who hit a volley superbly into the roof of the net, looping powerfully over the stranded home keeper. The fairly large travelling contingent from West Yorkshire were delighted, and even some home fans applauded the finish. The goal drew an immediate response from the Bulls, with Dean Rick firing a warning shot wide after a neat counter-attack and Joe Naylor just skewing wide across the face of the goal. Emley’s main threat at this point was coming from some dangerous looking free kicks. On 18 minutes, Danny Naylor caught a volley which flew just wide. Almost immediately, Mansfield were awarded a penalty thanks to a hand-ball by the Emley captain. The chance was fluffed by Carl Haslam, whose shot was well-saved by the keeper’s toes. Incredibly we were barely 20 minutes into the game! Emley’s Jerome then could have doubled their lead with a flicked shot just going wide. Half-time came, and I had a quietly optimistic feeling that we could be in for a cracking second-half.

Mansfield were fired up for this game now, and several smart interchanges in midfield gave the away side a warning of what they could do. Their right-back Tighe hit the cross-bar with a free-kick, before Mansfield forced a superb tipped save from Lawlor in the away goal on 60 minutes. Deservedly, Mansfield equalised on 70 minutes, with a swift counter ending in a pass from Haslam to Rick, who made no mistake this time. Game on. Rick then won a penalty for the home side, having been brought down by the unfortunate Lawlor (who up to this point had been solid). Tighe (obviously the dead-ball specialist in the team) stepped up, and calmly made it 2-1. You could almost feel the colour draining from the faces of the Emley players as Mansfield looked more and more confident. A double substitution by the away team on 85 minutes looked like it might turn the tide, and it had a temporary impact until Carl Haslam made it 3-1 after rounding the keeper and firing in inside the box. This was a deserved win from Mansfield, who had scored 3 goals in 18 second-half minutes.  On the evidence of this game, they will be a welcome addition to the NCEL set-up.

Liverpool (13-09-2014)

Liverpool 0 – 1 Aston Villa (Premier League), 13th September 2014

Match ticket (Anfield Upper): £45
Programme: £3
Train ticket (Sheff-Liverpool): £22-60
Tea at the Walker Gallery: £1-60
Bus to Anfield: £4
Total: £76-20

In Liverpool’s twice-yearly bulk sale, we had only managed to get two matches this year, so I tried for this one in late availability sales. This was a 5.30 kick off, and we had to book train tickets late, but looking at the breakdown here, we didn’t do too badly with costs. I was actually looking forward to this today, as Liverpool had done reasonably well away at City, and had flattened Tottenham again at White Hart Lane. For all the changes, and the muted win against Southampton, they were looking reasonable bets to continue their good form from last year. How wrong I was!

We were sat in the Anfield Road upper (right above the away fans), where we had watched Crystal Palace last year, which was also when I’d had a water bottle confiscated. Aston Villa scored an early goal (circa 11 minutes) via Agbonlahor and the game was pretty much set up from there. Like a growing number of teams, Villa seemed perfectly capable of grabbing a goal at Anfield, sitting on the lead, and frustrating the home team.

Despite tons of possession, Liverpool lacked purpose, bite and creativity (exactly what Suarez gave them last year). Adam Lallana looked seriously out-of-sorts, Balotelli didn’t look match fit, and Gerrard looked tired. Sideways pass to sideways pass ensued, and even a substitute appearance from Sterling couldn’t bring any joy to Liverpool. Villa are now something of a bogey team in recent years at Anfield, and this continued when they wrapped up a neat 1-0 victory here. This has frankly been a bad start to the season for Liverpool, and while I’m sure it will pick up, they’ll need to improve form soon if they want to keep pace with the big guns.

Basel (08-09-2014)

Switzerland 0 – 2 England (European Championship Qualifier), 8^th September 2014

Pounds Sterling (£311-81)

Bottled water: £1-99

Tea at Manc airport: £1-75

Manchester-Airport train ticket: £8-20

Match ticket: £39-45

Plane tickets: £246-95

Travel insurance: £8-93

Overseas card fees: £4-54

Swiss Francs (CF124-45) circa £82

Kit-Kat: CF2

Towel use: CF2

Bus to Basel centre: CF4-20

Fruit & sausage roll: CF6-65

Hostel: CF 97-60

Burger & drink at ground: CF12

Euros (at Brussels airport) (E22.45) circa £17

Mint tea: E3

Tea & ciabatta: E10-25

Water: E2-50

Smoothie: E5-20

Chewing gum: E1-50

Total = £410-81

I’ve had a long-held ambition to go to an England away game, and was delighted when I landed a ticket for the first Euro 2016 qualifier in Basel. The only down-side was that this came very soon after the summer holidays, so my bank balance is now feeling the effects of all this travelling. For posterity, I have recorded all the costs above, split up between Euros, Swiss Francs and Pounds. It makes interesting reading – all in all it cost around £410.

 

After a smooth evening flight from Manchester airport to Basel, I hopped onto the very efficient 50 bus into the centre, and easily found my hostel in the winding streets near the River Rhine. I had a breakfast in the hostel (a fairly basic meal of bread, cheese, butter and coffee), and then explored the city. First I headed East along the banks of the river and found an athletics-cum-football stadium for a photo, and then wandered back in to the centre. On my travels I located BSC Old Boys’ ground, very close to the city’s zoo. After a brief rest at the hostel, I decided to find St Jakob Park stadium, and managed to get lost in a nearby park, before finally finding my way back. The outside was nothing like a stadium, and more resembled a car park – in fact the ground had a shopping centre attached.

 

When I came back later – the ground was a short walk from the hostel – the atmosphere was building outside the stadium. What I found most noticeable was the camaraderie between the England fans, which I’d not seen at Wembley games in the past. It may have also reflected the fact that many had been enjoying Swiss beer all day! On entry to the stadium, I was padded down by a steward and managed to get my photo taken just outside the turnstile. It was all friendly enough and not what I had expected from an England away game (in a good way). I should also mention that I had also got a programme for free, so that was one less cost on an expensive trip. I did wonder why the stewards were chuckling as they handed it over, until I read it, and of course, it was all in the French and German. I was in the lower tier of the away section, near the back row and about 2 seats from the home fans. As flags from all manner of clubs were put up on advertising hoardings and the pitch barrier, a great atmosphere was building. Reading, Stevenage Borough and Coventry were there – plus I had seen one from Workington in the city centre earlier.

The game was open and one of the best away England performances for some time. This is exactly the response we needed after a dismal World Cup. Rooney was seeing plenty of the ball and really seemed to be leading from the front. Fabian Delph was like a terrier in midfield, though his over-exuberance resulted in a yellow card, and he was lucky to escape a second punishment. The biggest area of concern was England’s left side (an Achilles heel in Brazil), where Switzerland seemed to find it easy to penetrate and create openings. This may have been partly because Baines and Stones were being encouraged to push forward down either wing. It was looking very level, and the home side looked like a decent team, producing a superb save from Hart on 33 minutes. He is a keeper who I have a lot of time for, though I’m not sure if he is quite at the top level yet. Before the break, Rooney forced a save from the Swiss keeper, which took us into 0-0 at half-time.

 

We started the second-half on the back foot to be honest. The Swiss had clearly seen weaknesses on both England flanks, and for a while they had us pinned back inside our own half. We shouldn’t forget this is a team who ran Argentina very close in the World Cup. Hart was terrific, and kept us in the game with a finger-tip save, and I began to wonder if this was going to be a time for a tough rear-guard action. Then, out of almost nothing, we broke away down the field, and Rooney put a perfect pass into the box for Welbeck to make it 1-0. The move was very like the Sturridge goal against Italy. The fans were delighted, and I couldn’t believe we were leading in such a crucial game. Switzerland were not to be put off, and very nearly grabbed an equaliser but were denied thanks to Cahill’s goal-line clearance. They continued to pour forward, but without the earlier penetration. Phil Jones made several excellent tackles, but on reflection it was probably because he had got himself into such a pickle in the first place. Then, just as the game was beginning to slow up, another swift counter-attack resulted in Lambert setting up Welbeck for his second of the game. 2-0 and this was a fine result for England, Welbeck and Hodgson, who have taken a fair hammering in recent months. I was absolutely over the moon to be able to see our best competitive away win for a long, long time.

Irlam (06-09-2014)

Irlam 1 - 2 St Helen's Town AET (FA Vase), 6th September 2014

Train = £3-90 (Manchester-Irlam)
Entrance = £5
Programme = £1
Tea = £1
Total = £10-90

If you are driving Westbound on the M62, between junctions 12 and 11, you may notice floodlights in a distant field - this is the Silver Street home of Irlam FC. I reached the ground via a creeping Northern Rail train from Manchester Oxford Road to Liverpool, which seemed to be stopping at every conceivable stop to Merseyside. Irlam itself was fairly non-descript, and it took me circa 40 minutes to find the ground, just in time for kick off. I parted with £5 for entry, and cobbled together some change for the £1 programme. The chap commented that my wallet would be much lighter after that!

The ground was the usual fare - short covered terracing at  one end and seating along the near side in an 'L' shape. The wall behind the far goal had collapsed, with grass and weeds starting to claim it as part of the nearby fields. The away fans were clustered behind the near goal, with an England flag with St Helen's Town on - there were quite a few for this one today. The most distinctive feature of the ground was probably the row of conifers around the far side, which made it look like a Christmas market. I wonder if the club might cash in on this potential income stream nearer the festive season?





























The game came in fits and starts to be honest. There were some really exciting and open passages of play, but equally lots of time was lost to soft free kicks, niggly fouls and poor passing. St Helen's started on the front foot, seizing possession immediately, with number 10 looking lively. Irlam had a couple of dangerous counter-attacks, with 4's shot saved on 14 minutes and 8 curling over after a swift box-to-box move. St Helen's were a league above Irlam, but weren't looking all that much better. Their right-back was having a torrid game, mishitting and slicing every ball which came his way. This was looking a fairly level game until a looping header by St Helen's number 5 (how do I apostrophise that correctly?!) was judged to have crossed the line, despite what looked like a goal-line clearance from the home side.

The game really got going in the second half, with St Helen's looking good money for a win. First, number 10's free-kick hit the cross-bar, then the lively 7 had a volley cleared off the line. Not to be outdone, Irlam continued to counter, and very nearly sneaked an equaliser when number 9's shot rattled the post. They also had a decent shout for a penalty when it looked like 8's shot had cannoned off an Irlam hand. As the game became increasingly fractured by free kickd and silly fouls, it seemed like St Helen's would win this one. An excellent interchange between the improved number 2 and number 7 resulted in another good chance being fired over. Irlam were still in the fight for this one, and grabbed an equaliser when 5 headed in from a re-bound to make it 1-1. This was now heading to extra time.

St Helen's weren't done in the 90 minutes, and continued to press for  a winner. 15's well-struck volley produced a fantastic finger-tip save from the home keeper, which drew applause from both sets of fans. Then late on, 15 was fouled by 5 when clean, with the latter promptly (and correctly) sent off.

I only saw the first half of extra time, but there weren't many incidents. Again, the game was becoming broken up and despite the best efforts of both sides, hardly any chances were created. St Helen's looked in control now their opponents were down to 10, and re-established their lead when 7's flicked header made it 2-1. Unfortunately, I had to miss the second half of extra time to make the 17:44 train, but it didn't sound like I missed much. The score remained 2-1, and St Helen's moved a step closer to Wembley.