From Wembley to the Wembley of the North : Matchgoing May 13th - 19th

[Snake Plissken]

There were fireworks at the Brentford hotel at 3am and countless blue flares thrown onto the pitch.

I'm surprised how a bigger deal hasn't been made of this sort of thing for the second home game in a row.

[cantagalo]

I'm surprised how a bigger deal hasn't been made of this sort of thing for the second home game in a row.

https://twitter.com/brentfordfc/status/1525890382025961472?s=21&t=1KJYwWzql1M-5n38_heq0g

[Patrick Thistle]

Southport Zeb Any chance of a picture of the dinosaurs?

[torres]

I think you’ll find that’s the Accies first team squad.

[Southport Zeb]

Sadly my camera phone is broken, but I did find a newspaper story promoting the event

https://www.dailyrecord.co.uk/in-you...-host-24919167

[Artificial Hipster]

Lex XI 5-1 FC Queens Park
NE Wales League Premier Division

A result whose main significance is to reduce somewhat the likelihood that no team is promoted from this division at the end of the season. The high flying visitors were the architects of their own downfall, waiting until half time, by which stage they were 3-1 down, to give up their approach of playing the ball out from the back which had seen them cede possession on the edge of their area time and time again.

Chief beneficiary was 45 year old former Oldham and pretty much every WPL club you can name striker Ricky Evans who rolled back the years - including those spent at her majesty's pleasure for masterminding (though clearly not very masterfully) a plot to steal farm machinery - with an exemplary display of the centre forward's art. He helped himself to 3 goals on the night, the pick of which was his third, his side's fourth, curled into the top corner from distance 20 minutes into a second half in which Queens Park were threatening to make a game of it. It was to be his last kick of a game which duly died a death as a spectacle with his departure.

A considerable proportion of a crowd I'd guess at 40-50 hadn't been enjoying themselves very much anyway having traveled across Wrexham to cheer on Queens Park. Stantsy Park is a pleasant enough spot to watch football but there is very little human settlement nearby and with the club having no geographical identity as such (formed in 1956 by lawyers, the name is a pun) I find it hard to believe they've managed to survive so long as it is. Survive they have though and on this showing they are not just surviving they are positively thriving.

[Uros Predic]

Stantsy Park is a pleasant enough spot to watch football but there is very little human settlement nearby...

Do you mind, my sister lives just over that hill.

[cantagalo]

Nottingham Forest 1 Sheffield United 2 (Agg: 3-3) Forest win 3-2 on penalties
Championship Play-off semi-final

A gripping second leg and a brave performance by Sheffield United who came very close to winning it in the final moments of extra time. Forest had taken the lead after 20 minutes with their first meaningful attack but the Blades clawed their way back and gave Forest a harder time than any other team has managed in the last six months. Forest deserve a place in the final for their performances over the season but they were really made to work for it.

A couple of things I was surprised at during the game - I don't know if they were discussed on the TV coverage. Sheffield United left it until the second half of extra time to make their first substitutions which struck me as unusual in a match of this intensity. Also, I just knew Norwood was going to miss their first penalty. He was standing with the ball on the spot a good two minutes before Samba, a master of shithousery, made his way to his position in slow motion.

The pitch invasion shortly before the appalling assault on Billy Sharp.

[Ray de Galles]

Dorking Wanderers 3 Oxford City 0
Conference South Play-Off Semi-Final
Meadowbank

Ebbsfleet United 1 Chippenham Town 0 (aet)
Conference South Play-Off Semi-Final
Stonebridge Road

Two ties that great contrasted in very many ways decided who will make up this Saturday's final.

Saturday's was a stroll for the hosts in punishingly hot sunshine in a ground that is far more of a "facility" with a good deal of artificially about the venue and the club overall. Wanderers scored in the 8th, 18th and 48th minutes to wrap things up just after half time. Oxford were outmatched by the expensively-assembled hosts anyway but the fact that the referee allowed thr latter to play an overly-physical game unchecked just exacerbated the divide.

Sunday's had Ebbsfleet labouring in the cold and rain to find an end product of their dominance over the visiting Bluebirds and needing a deflected goal from substitute and Man United "legend" to finally settle things. Their ground is a bit of a gem though, a great combination of a modern mail stand with three older more traditional sides that I really enjoyed. Like on Saturday the home team were clearly the better resourced but Chippenham hung grimly on. The fact that they didn't score a goal in their four hours of play-off football was telling though,

I can't see Ebbsfleet landing a glove on Wanderers at the weekend though, even if they will have a significant travelling support going to Dorking. The home side's absurd Gary Numan tribute act chairman/manager (has there ever been a chairman/manager that wasn't a vile egotist, apart from Roy Race?) is likely to strut in to the Conference Proper in his cartoon over-sized hat and elevator shoes followed by the arrogant upstart support that's appeared in the last few years since the money was thrown around. Hope I'm somehow wrong though.

[Artificial Hipster]

Do you mind, my sister lives just over that hill.

Does she happen to keep a collection of fairground rides in her back garden? If so I drove past her house.

[Uros Predic]

Does she happen to keep a collection of fairground rides in her back garden? If so I drove past her house.

She's got some swings and a climbing frame... fairground is probably stretching it though.

[JVL]

HFX Wanderers 2-2 Cavalry FC

Having been lulled into a sense of false security by the balmy temperatures on the previous day, we were perhaps not quite prepared for the icy wind blowing across the Wanderers Grounds on Sunday as Halifax lined up against Calvary in their second home game of the CPL season. Didn't seem to bother the Wanderers superfan a few rows in front of us though:


There was plenty of action to enjoy though: 4 goals, with both sides hitting the woodwork as well, rounded off by the visitors snatching a point deep into added time at the end of the game. Cavalry took the lead after 20 minutes with a weird, slo-mo goal as Christian Oxner appeared to be deceived by Bevan’s downward header, only able to divert it over the head of the defender on the line with a flailing arm. As had been the case for Edmonton two weeks previously, the goal was greeted by silence from the crowd, punctuated by a few whoops and roars from the celebrating players.

Didn’t take long for the crowd to find their voice again and for Wanderers to regain their composure, with young Canadian striker Samuel Salter looking particularly dangerous throughout. The equaliser came as half-time approached: big German centre-back Peter Schaale planted his header onto the bar and Akeem Garcia was on hand to tuck away the loose ball with the defence looking distracted.

It was Salter who then put Halifax into the lead with a neat finish from a tight angle on the hour mark, and the home team were dominant for much of the remainder of the match – only to switch off right at the death, as a stray pass led to a corner for Cavalry that was nodded (or shouldered) in by Daan Klomp. The result was probably fair overall, as both team had their chances and kept attacking throughout the match, but I then had the tough job of cheering up a very dispirited VL jnr. on the way home…

[Nocturnal Submission]

On my way to the Bridge for the Leicester game. Lovely sunny evening, nothing much to play for, half the team's injured - feels like I'm going out for a few drinks with my mates, which will indeed probably be the highlight of the evening.

Feels odd.

[Merlin the happy pig]

14th May. 3.Liga. Carl-Benz-Stadion. SV Waldhof Mannheim 7-0 TSV Havelse.

[Merlin the happy pig]

14th May. Stade de l'Aar. Championnat National 2 Groupe B. SC Schiltgheim 2-0 AJ Auxerre II.

[Merlin the happy pig]

14th May. Stade de la Meinau. Ligue 1. RC Strasbourg Alsace 1-0 Clermont Foot.

[Merlin the happy pig]

15th May. Rot-Weiss Sportgelande Platz 2. Hessenliga. Rot-Weiss Walldorf 3-0 SV Steinbach.

[ursus arctos]

You had a good week

[Southport Zeb]

Tuesday - AFC Knowsley 0-0 Lostock Gralam (Cheshire League Premier Division)
Wednesday - FC Farm 2-2 Collegiate Old Boys A (Liverpool Old Boys League Division Two)
Thursday - Woodstreet 6-1 Sacre Coeur FP (Liverpool Old Boys League Division Two)

Three local revisits. The game at Knowsley was very much an end of season affair, and after a few early chances, the feeling that it was going to be goalless spread early in the second half. With this being a relatively new ground, and few alternatives on offer, this match drew a good crowd of groundhoppers, some from as far as Birmingham. Amongst them was one individual, who is notorious for not counting grounds unless he sees a goal - earlier this year he travelled from Lancashire North Devon three weeks in a row after seeing North Molton draw 0-0 on his first two visits. Not so far to return on this occasion.

On Wednesday night the kits suggested I was watching RB Leipzig v Atletico Madrid, but it was actually FC Farm trying to get the big win they needed to keep up their theoretical chance of winning the title. They didn't get it as midtable Collegiate gave them a good tussle in which neither side were able to pull ahead for long. No cover by the pitch at St John Bosco, so as it rained heavily in the second half, I found some cover under the eaves of the changing rooms.

Much sunnier at Mersey Road on Thursday, about a hundred yards from Aigburth station. Surprisingly neither side was masquerading as a Champions League side (although Juventus were playing on the adjacent pitch) but Woodstreet had a split in the team about which of their kits to wear - four wore chevrons whilst the remainder wore stripes. The lack of sartorial unity didn't reflect their play on the pitch as they swept aside bottom placed Sacre Coeur, who were playing their final game of the season almost a month after their penultimate one.