From buns to bunnies: Easter Weekend Football

[Gangster Octopus]

Obvious handball by our defender in the area overridden by the lino for a Charlton shove...

[Gangster Octopus]

Crap defensive header sets up a straight forward finish for Charlton.

[Gangster Octopus]

Then the referee goes off.

[Gangster Octopus]

Bollocks. 2-0.

[Gangster Octopus]

And now the standard southern whining and timewasting gets a new lease of life...

[Gangster Octopus]

Three cunting nil from a Rotherham attack...

[Gangster Octopus]

We pull one back from a corner.

[Gangster Octopus]

It was just as I was contemplating an early train back to London Bridge...

[Gangster Octopus]

I'm going to ram that fucking drum up someone's backside...

[Gangster Octopus]

There's a veritable flock of pigeons in Charlton's penalty area, which tells you the story of the game...

[Gangster Octopus]

I'm assuming that it finished 3-1. I need a seat on the train...

[Gangster Octopus]

There's a person on the tracks at Greenwich. Ho hum...

[Gangster Octopus]

There wasn't...

[Gangster Octopus]

Anyway, we're apparently going to the George.

[San Bernardhinault]

I hope the beer at the George has improved. I remember their own-label bitter being almost undrinkable a few years back.

[Gangster Octopus]

And we're not, we're in the Shipwrights on Tooley Street.

[Billy Casper]

Nottingham Forest p-p Barnsley

Negatives: I found out at two o'clock on the outskirts of Nottingham.
Positives: We avoided defeat.

[Janik]

Couple of games for me. Friday was Cambridge 3-1 Crawley in a complete dead rubber League Two encounter. Decent enough game for 70 minutes, with Crawley in particular looking to play a very watchable (if somewhat counter-productive in this one) brand of passing Football, until the rain made the pitch waterlogged and the last 20 minutes kind of farcical. If it had been like that at 2pm they wouldn't have started. Prior to the rain going from steady to a deluge, Cambridge had scored with a direct free-kick (George Maris), which is the first one of those I can remember seeing in person for many years. From the other end of the pitch it was clearly going in as soon as it cleared the wall.


And today was this:-

Royston Town 4-2 Bishop's Stortford
Evo-Stick Southern Premier
Att: 387

Yer typical game of two halves. Royston were toothless in the first period, Stortford looked more coherent and deserved their 1-0 interval lead given to them when their centre-back was left unmarked to power in a header from a corner on 20 mins. Stortford could have had more as they messed up a clear chance when a poor clearance by the Royston 'keeper was worked back to send their player clean through. He clipped it over the stopper, but across the face of goal.

The second-half was completely different. Royston had had a number of good chances and one very clearcut one prior to equalising on the hour when a ball in from the right took a slight but handy deflection to find the centre-forward. He control and held off his marker well and then swept into the corner from ~10 yards out. 10 minutes later it was 2-1, twice over. First Stortford failed to clear properly from a corner leading to a second and third cross coming in with both Royston centre-backs still up. The third one was going to be headed at goal from six yards by one of these, only for a visiting defender to barge him in the back. The ref immediately whistled for a penalty, which was unfortunate as the other Royston CB was directly behind and he had bundled the ball home off his thigh and the post. However whistle gone, the goal can't stand, it will have to be the spot-kick which, fortunately for the ref, the Royston skipper converted.

Five minutes later and it was 3-1, in an unusual fashion. It stemmed from a nearly perfect through ball from Stortford. The Royston 'keeper rushed out of his area and whacked clear just before the forward could get there. This clearance went just over the heads of the visiting defence to bounce midway up the Stortford half. Their 'keeper came out to try and make his own clearance, but the ball was taking a while to drop and the Royston right-winger spotted this, coming in on a full sprint (he looked unusually rapid for non-league doing this) to toe-poke past the 'keeper and then roll into the unguarded net. The sprint had so gassed the winger that he didn't celebrate the goal much at all, but was clearly gasping for breath instead which made to look to both the ref and linesman to see if it been ruled out for some reason. But no, it was just no energy so no joy.

And the goals kept coming, another five minutes on and 4-1 to Royston. Free-kick from the left, won by a forward and headed backwards towards the spot, no Stortford players there so the Royston midfield had time to steer a shot into the far corner rather than having to welly it. There was still one more goal, on 84 minutes when a ball through cut out the Royston CB and left Stortford's no.10 with a clear chance to shoot from 18 yards. He put it into the corner with a lack of fuss as if it was something he had done countless times before. Which, given the player in question was Jamie Cureton, he has. It's the second time I've seen Cureton at Garden Walk this season as he was also there with Farnborough.

No more goals after that, but a couple of handbags episodes between the teams.

All in all a good game.

[longeared]

Lewisham Borough 1-8 (eight) Holmesdale

Burgess Hill got called off so a mad dash across London brought me to an athletics stadium with an Atcost. Fortunately I arrived in time to secure a seat in the stand in the pouring rain. As Uros says Lewisham were truly awful, they had no pace, movement, defensive organisation or communication. Holmesdale were seven up early in the second half then eased off, Lewisham put together a few moves and scored a nice goal. Can't say I'm terribly impressed with this division, the pair of games I've seen have had an average winning margin of seven and a half goals.

Horsham 2-4 Walton Casuals

Horsham are playing this season in Lancing at the Sussex County FA headquarters (where Brighton Ladies are also based) while their new ground is built. The blokes behind me seemed pessimistic it'd be ready by Christmas. Said blokes also had a view on the non league reorganisation "we might have to go all the way to Marlow just to keep a few clubs in Manchester happy" which is a new one on me. Anyway they're a friendly club making the best of the situation and have a great mascot. Lively game played to a good standard, the impressive Yoseff Bamba hurdled the perimeter barrier and sat on the terrace after scoring Walton's second. Horsham went chasing the game in the second half but didn't catch it up.

Had half a dozen options for today but they all got wiped out by the rain - I suppose I could have gone to Stevenage v Barnet but, you know, Stevenage. Did a walk across London instead and ticked off a hipster Guide pub in Shoreditch. Did about twenty new Guide pubs across the weekend, the pick being the Selsden Arms in Worthing.

[Merlin the happy pig]

Started off to Hartley Wintney for a 12pm kick-off at 9am, we found out that was off just as we hit the A34. After a few minutes checking the Non-League Paper, the Groundhopper app and several twitter feeds we decided to head to Royston, which was handy as it was on. Got there rather early, so headed to the local Wetherspoons for something to eat before strolling to the ground about an hour before kick-off. A rather better match report than I'd be able to produce a couple of posts up.

[Janik]

There are better pub eating options than the Manor House about the same walking distance from the ground. Maybe not as cheap as Weatherspoons prices though. I would have suggested some if I had known...

Ref had a bit of an odd game, didn't he? Appeared to be utilising scattered random decision making at times. I was particularly taken by the one where the Stortford player slide across the front of the Royston man, got the ball completely cleanly and then got kicked and hurt half a second after it had gone - free-kick to Royston. Obviously.

[Ray de Galles]

Walton Casuals 0 Corinthian-Casuals 0

With nearby matches being washed out everywhere I looked and a bit sick of seeing games on saturated pitches this weekend I decided to take the easy option and go to my local 3G-equipped ground to see El Casualsco (El Casualco? El Casuco? Needs work) which had the added spice of the teams being fifth v sixth in the Isthmian Premier so a potential play-off rehearsal.

The main incident of note was the always welcome sight of an outfield player going in goal and it happened as early as the 20th minute when CCFC’s keeper went off after two separate injuries within five minutes, the latter of which looked like a season-ending knee problem.

The visitors’s striker was handed the gloves for the remaining seventy minutes which looked a strange choice as he was possibly their shortest player they had and had looked very useful up front. He did give a Man of the Match performance though, making quite a few agile saves, albeit most of them with his feet.

That illustrated the main facet of the game, the lack of quality in front of goal from either side. Walton had plenty of shots but either not on target or of insufficient quality to trouble a stand-in keeper and Corinthan-Casuals just didn’t seem willing to shoot enough despite their tidy build-up play.

It was enjoyable but there was a bit of a bloodless, antiseptic feel to it all - despite the healthy away turnout (including club luminary Alec Stewart) and other postponements both contributing to the ground’s record crowd of 314 (Walton’s best for over five years). It might be the 3G pitch, it might be that while the facilities are impressive that’s just what the ground is - a facility provided by the council rather than a ground. It had the same feel when I saw groundmates Walton & Hersham play there earlier in the season, though at least they allow alcohol to ban taken outside now which is a must at this level.

[Patrick Thistle]

Shrewsbury just about managed to beat Oxford 3-2, hanging on at the end having squandered several chances to put the game out of sight. Dismal weather, poor football, lots of effort on both sides.

The referee, Sebastian Stockbridge, was a farcical clown. Utterly inconsistent, penalising Shrewsbury players but not Oxford players. Clearly doesn't understand that being held by a defender is not a foul by the attacker. Or that being jumped into by two players is not a foul on both of them. Shrewsbury did well to win in spite of him. An utter nincompoop.

[Merlin the happy pig]

The fella I went with likes ticking off Wetherspoons almost as much as he likes ticking off grounds, I was hungry enough that I didn't care. The food was pretty good as it happened.

Yeah, a few odd decisions. After the booking for dissent I was a bit surprised a couple of later incidents didn't even provoke a talking too from the ref.

[Third rate Leszno]

Carlisle 0-1 Lincoln

Another sketchy journey up and down the M6, half expected to be tits deep in snow at the top of Shap but thankfully the blizzard wasn't sticking.

No complaints about the result as we weren't as good as Lincoln at the stuff that matters. We had a long period of dominance in terms of possession, but did precious little with it and then switched off to allow the visitors to score just before the break - even more gallingly, it turns out Curle had told the players to expect that kind of move, and they still didn't react or deal with it. Matt Rhead spent a hell of a lot of time crying to the referee, considering what a big lump of a fella he is.

In the second half we just weren't fluent at all. Lincoln were very adept at 'game management', and our one slim chance of a lifeline came and went when the referee, perfectly placed, gave us a penalty. After lots of Lincoln outrage, some pushing and shoving and about 5 minutes pissing about, the ref consulted his linesman, who was at least three times as far from the incident as he'd been, and changed his mind. After that, he failed to book a Lincoln player for a very obvious dive, but did give Mike Jones a second yellow for a nothing foul deep in the opposition half. Probably the worst refereeing performance I've seen this season, at any level.