I’ve never been to the ground of Dearne and District FC before but something tells me that this dog spends pretty much every home match in this position: he certainly did today. We all have to stand on the outer side of the fence, but this chap is clearly much more important than us. At least, in his head.
FC United of Manchester like to think themselves a sort of throwback to a more soulful and authentic era of football and, being honest, this is not an entirely fanciful self-image. Certainly they never worried about installing some fancy electronic scoreboard gizmo in their otherwise well-appointed Broadhurst Park ground. Does the operator get in for free I wonder? She only had a couple of bouts of activity: the final score was FCUM 1-1 Emley on this mild Tuesday evening.
Let there be joy and celebration, in the away end, anyway. After only being on the field five minutes, Hadjam has just scored the second and decisive goal for Brighton and the victory over Sunderland is complete. It was 1st December 2018 when I last saw the Albion win a Premier League game. Worth the wait? Just about.
The camera I used today, and will be using for at least a little while, is so old it virtually counts as an antique, this is kind of an experimental archaeology, the deliberate use of outmoded techniques and equipment so we can learn about how our ancestors did it. Well, maybe not quite that old (after all, I still have an old Kodak Brownie kicking around somewhere) but it’s certainly a step back. But it still works, and that’s a major bonus right now.
As for the photo: I did come to officially support the home team today, Bradford Park Avenue. mainly because (for various petty and tribal reasons) I don’t like the away team. Lancaster City — and it is pleasing to report a 1-0 victory for them in the FA Cup. Up the Avenue indeed. Before World War One they were in the top league of England, though not at their present stadium.
West Yorkshire is finally getting some rain. Although I’m not sure it was falling at the specific point this picture was taken — but what does she care? She has the shelter exactly as she wants it, and is quite comfortable, thank you very much.
On we go with year 16…. Now I have reached the advanced age I have, spending my birthday evening at non-league football seems quite the right way of going about things. And on such occasions, the substitutes’ benches are often good sources of portraiture. There is a mixture of enthusiasm, indifference and boredom on these faces, and we are only 10 minutes into the game, I’m not even sure how many of these guys eventually made it onto the pitch. But at least it was a win, and for those of us who have been watching Brighouse Town recently, there haven’t been a great many of those in recent seasons.
Well, the football season as a whole didn’t necessarily start today (do these things ever really ‘start’ and ‘finish’ these days, anyway?) — but England’s League One certainly did. Bradford City’s fans seemed cautiously optimistic at 2:55, but this was justified: they won 2-0 v Peterborough, with yours truly in the press box for the afternoon.
Wells, in Somerset, advertises itself as “England’s Smallest City” thanks to the presence of this big lump of medieval architecture, which, other than a lot of shops devoted to servicing the thousands of tourists that were there today, seems to be all it has — though that doesn’t mean it was an unpleasant place. But when it comes to finding a picture to epitomise the day then the cathedral has to be it, really. With a bit of a football reference thrown in.
The chances of my highly mediocre equipment getting the players sharp as well as the sunset, at this time of night, was virtually nil, but it doesn’t matter: the ball is what I wanted here, and there it is, a small and temporary, but definite, hole in the sky.
There are seven potential spectators in this picture, all present at Llanfairfechan Town FC in the later stages of a Welsh Cup Qualifying Round tie — five human and two canine. Fairly obviously, three of them are definitely watching the action, and they ain’t the three guys in the middle.
I hope they did pay attention in the end, because this turned out to be one of the better football matches I have ever seen. When this shot was taken the visitors were 5-2 up, but the final score — Llanfairfechan Town 5, FC Queen’s Park 5.
