Wadhurst United 6 v 1 Hospital Social

Saturday 25th September 2010
East Sussex League Premier Division
Washwell Lane, Wadhurst
Admission and Programme: None
Attendance: 28 (head count)
Match Rating: 4

After only returning home from holiday in the early hours, what I felt like most was a football match in a peaceful and rural location, and a visit to Wadhurst in the East Sussex countryside fitted the bill perfectly. The last time I had watched Wadhurst was when they played in the Sussex County League for three seasons between 2003 and 2006. After two successful opening seasons in Division 3, the club then struggled to avoid relegation in terms of league placing, but resigned from the league anyway, and suffered a three division drop into the East Sussex League Division 2. After two seasons of consolidation, they have earned back to promotions as champions to reach the Premier League once more.

During their brief stay in the Sussex League, Wadhurst played at Sparrows Green Recreation Ground, however since their resignation they now play back at their spiritual home of Washwell Lane right in the centre of the village, about a half hour walk from Wadhurst train station, which includes a steep hill for about half the distance. Washwell Lane is a very pleasant, typically central village location for a football ground, completely peaceful and with sweeping views of the Sussex Downs in the distance behind one goal, a church and oast house behind the other, trees closely lining one length of the pitch with an old-fashioned (but recently given a paint facelift) building housing the changing rooms and covered standing on the other side. The pitch also has quite a major slope from one goal to the other.

Wadhurst have started the season well, winning three and drawing the other of their opening four games in all competitions so far. Hospital Social, a new club this season in the East Sussex League based in Eastbourne, opened their season with a 5-2 win, drawing their next game, but then losing their latest two games, including a 0-6 home defeat against Rock-A-Nore.

On an afternoon alternating frequently between bright sunshine and dark clouds, the game started evenly, with Wadhurst taking the lead, although within a couple of minutes Hospital Social equalised. Wadhurst went back in front and shortly before half time, extended their lead to 3-1 with a penalty. The game was seemingly as good as won within a minute of the restart when Wadhurst went 4-1 ahead, and indeed, Hospital Sports completely capitulated in the second half. Having already been reduced to ten men in the first half when an injured player could not be replaced due to no substitutes being named, Hospital Sports were reduced to eight men with an hour on the clock when another player had to go off injured as well as having a player sent off for a deserved second yellow card. With half an hour left to play and the visitors having completely thrown in the towel, Wadhurst could easily have notched up double figures had they had the appetite, however the game being too easy seemed to completely dampen Wadhurst's appetite and they only notched a further two goals despite wave after wave of attack against a completely dispirited defence.

HJK Helsinki 2 v 2 FC Inter Turku

Wednesday 22nd September 2010
Finnish Veikkausliiga
Sonera Stadium, Helsinki
Admission: 12 euros
Programme: Free
Attendance: 3150
Rating: 3

After travelling back from Tallinn to Helsinki on the catamaran in the morning, the final game of my stay was to watch by far the biggest and most successful team in Finland - and indeed reigning champions of the Veikkausliiga and comfortably leading the table this season with just four games remaining - HJK Helsinki. The Sonera Stadium - until last month known as the Finnair Stadium, a change of sponsorship causing a change of the stadium name, a perfect example of why naming stadia after sponsors is, in my opinion, unsatisfactory - is located about a half hour walk from central Helsinki (with trams also available), and is located very close to the Olympic Stadium, home of the Finnish national team. Indeed, the Olympic Stadium has an observation tower built into it and I would certainly recommend a trip to top of this tower for fantastic views of the Olympic Stadium, the Sonera Stadium, as well as the city of Helsinki. I would also recommend a visit to the excellent Sports Museum of Finland, also built into the Olympic Stadium, which houses some fascinating exhibits for all Finnish sports, with an obvious (but not exclusive) focus on Olympic sports.

I bought my ticket on-line for this game, which was not necessary but afforded a three euro reduction of the price of the ticket, with a glossy eight page programme available to be picked up just inside the turnstile for free. The all-seater Sonera Stadium has quite an interesting design, with three sides joined with a fairly low roof with unobstructed views throughout and with the back of the stands being open, allowing reasonably good views of the game for free from the adjacent hill. The fourth, main stand is a much larger construction, the cover of which extends far beyond the seating, to also provide cover for those entering the ground or at a refreshment kiosk. Apparently this stand even has heated seats and a heated roof, but I was sat in the opposite stand. The pitch is one of the sometimes controversial plastic variety - slightly surprising considering football is a summer sport in Finland and so not exposed to the harsh winter conditions.

HJK Helsinki would certainly have had to have been favourites to win this game, considering that they were closing in on winning the league, being five points clear of second placed FC Honka, although they have choked in recent weeks, taking only two wins from their last seven games. Today's visitors, FC Inter Turku, had been in similar form, and were anchored firmly in mid-table, in sixth place in the 14 team league and with only very faint hopes of reaching fourth place and Europa League qualification, which they did manage this season through winning the Finnish FA Cup last season.

After an even opening half hour to the game, all four goals of the game were scored in a quite crazy eight minute period between the 31st and 39th minutes. HJK opened the scoring when a free kick was headed towards goal and Mattias Lindström just beat the keeper to the ball to head Helsinki in front. Almost from the restart, HJK won the ball back and doubled their lead when a low cross into the box was cutely flicked towards goal for an easy tap in at the far post for Erfan Zenellu from a yard out. This was harsh on the visitors, and the quick fire double seemed to deflate them as HJK took full control of the game. However, on 37 minutes, Inter Turku pulled a goal back when a cross was missed by the HJK defenders and goalkeeper, with the ball falling to Henri Lehtonen who somehow managed to find the net from the edge of the six yard box almost on the touchline. Two minutes later and Inter were suddenly back on level terms through a controversial goal. The HJK goalkeeper carried the ball out of the box, but it certainly looked like he only did this as he was fouled by an Inter player. Nevertheless, a free kick to Inter was awarded just wide of the penalty area, which was played low into the box and turned into the net through a crowd of players by Severi Paajanen. After this, the game reverted to a much calmer affair, with the second half for the most part even. HJK certainly had the better chances to win the game, but overall a draw was a fair reflection on the game. Any disappointment at dropping two points was replaced by huge cheers came when news came through that near neighbours and chief challengers for the title, FC Honka, had lost. Indeed, the HJK fans generated a very good, positive atmosphere despite a modest (but normal for HJK and better than most other Finnish teams) attendance of 3150, and all in all a visit to the Sonera Stadium can be warmly recommended as an enjoyable experience.

Flora Tallinn 2 v 1 FK Sūduva Marijampolė

Tuesday 21st September 2010
Baltic League
A. Le Coq Arena, Tallinn
Admission: 50 EEK
Programme: Free
Attendance: 150
Rating: 4

After moving on from Helsinki to Tallinn, the very pleasant capital city of Estonia, I planned to take in what to me was an interesting looking match in the Baltic League - a competition played between the six best teams in Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania, played on a two-leg knock out basis, with FK Sūduva Marijampolė of Lithuania coming to Tallinn. The locals clearly didn't share my interest. After about a half hour walk from my accommodation in central Tallinn to the A. Le Coq Arena, it was hard to imagine a more unpromising scene when I arrived at the ground an hour before kick off, with almost nobody around and with no lights on in the stadium or doors open - no indication of a game taking place this evening. Half an hour before kick-off and the atmosphere was still quite surreal, still with hardly anyone present, but at least the floodlights being on and the TV camera crews present seeming to prove that I had indeed got the right day and time for this fixture. To continue the understated theme, I bought my ticket from an elderly couple at a table adjacent to the one entrance door that had finally opened. Fifteen minutes before kick off and I still could have counted the attendance on one pair of hands and the final total was just 150, which would be about average for an Estonian league game. Four page programmes were also handed out with admission, helpfully printed in English - giving basic information on the tournament and both teams - indeed, English appears to be the "lingua franca" for the tournament, with all announcements in English, as well as in Estonian and Lithuanian.

As for the stadium, it is a reasonably impressive facility, as one might expect of a stadium that is home to the Estonian national football team as well as Flora Tallinn, that was only opened in 2001. The all-seater stadium, with unobstructed views and plenty of legroom throughout, has a pleasant and fairly unusual design to it, all four sides have two tiers, although only three sides have cover. For today's game, one could roam anywhere around the stadium apart from the uncovered end and the upper tiers. As often is the case, having such a small attendance inside a 10,000 capacity stadium does provoke a rather surreal feeling, but a group of about 20 Flora fans certainly did their best to generate some good support from behind one of the goals. FK Suduva appeared to have only brought one supporter, who positioned himself with a flag in a corner of the ground - at the end of the game, it was nice to see the team walk over to applaud him.

Flora Tallinn, Estonia's biggest and most successful team since the country's independence in 1991, certainly came into this match in fantastic form, having been unbeaten in their last 23 domestic games, winning their last 11 matches in a row, and notching 20 goals without reply in their last four games, and were unbeaten in their previous 23 matches before that in domestic football. They also reached the semi-finals of last season's Baltic League, being eliminated by the eventual winners, Ventspils, of Latvia. This match would be a tough test though against FK Sūduva Marijampolė, of Lithuania, with Lithuanian teams generally considered to be stronger than those from Estonia, and last season they were beaten finalists in the Baltic League.

The first half was quite a cagey affair, a quite typical first leg game where the fear of losing the first game outweighs any ambition to take a lead into the second leg. For all that, it was still a reasonably entertaining and competitive half. Flora started the second half in a more attack minded spirit and got their rewards on 56 minutes, when Kart Palatu opened the scoring. He doubled Flora's advantage on 77 minutes, to seemingly set Flora on the road to take a comfortable lead to Lithuania for the return leg in early November, particularly as Suduva had already had Povilas Lukšys sent off for two quick yellow cards in between Flora's two goals. But, as so often is the case in these two legged games, the tie suddenly turned on its head when Suduva score an away goal thanks to an awful goal from Flora's perspective, their goalkeeper spilling a low cross and Andrius Urbsys slid in and just beat the defender to poke the ball over the line from a yard. The narrow scoreline sets the tie up nicely for the return leg in Lithuania, with Flora taking a one goal lead but with FK Sūduva.

In the second leg, FK Sūduva won 3-2, but Flora progressed on the away goals rule, before losing in the next round, the Quarter Finals, to Ventspils 0-5 on aggregate.

FC Honka 2 v 1 KuPS

Sunday 19th September 2010
Finnish Veikkausliiga
Tapiolan Urheilupuisto, Espoo
Admission: 5 euros
Programme: Free
Attendance: 2038
Rating: 4

For the first game during my stay in Helsinki and Tallinn, I headed to the far western suburbs of the Helsinki region for what threatened to be the trickiest ground to get to on my itinerary, given that the Tapiolan Urheilupuisto, home ground of FC Honka of the Veikkausliiga (the top league in Finland) is located over four miles away from the nearest train stations, and in deepest suburbia, not close to any town centre or landmark, which would make catching a bus there a challenge. Officially, the team's home town is Espoo, which is rather strange as the ground is about as far away from central Espoo as central Helsinki. Tapiola is actually the district that the ground is located in. In the end, I decided to catch a train for the 25 minute train journey from Helsinki to Kauniainen, from where the pleasant walk took around an hour and a half.

On arrival at the ground, I noticed what must be a rare aspect of a professional top-flight European ground - it is entirely temporary, with not one permanent structure in place. The club has taken one pitch of many on the complex and placed temporary looking stands along either length of the pitch, complete with tarpaulin-type cover, and with shallow wooden terrace steps behind both goals with no cover. Even with the temporary nature of the ground - which actually isn't temporary in that the ground has been like this for some years and plans to relocate to a bigger stadium still very much in their infancy - the capacity is 6,000, which is more than sufficient for accommodating fans here.

I bought my ticket for this game online through the club's website, for the bargain price of €5 for a standing ticket behind a goal, which curiously wasn't scanned and so presumably one could print off several copies of an e-ticket for friends to use - but trust is a significant and pleasing feature of the Finnish culture, which very rarely seems to be abused. 4 page glossy colour programmes were handed out on entry, providing the essential team and league standings info.

This game was between the second and third placed teams in the Veikkausliiga, with FC Honka one point better off than today's opponents from Kuopio, KuPS, and six points behind the leaders, HJK Helsinki with four games left in the league after this one.

KuPS started off this game in the ascendancy, and it was little surprise when they opened the scoring on 12 minutes through Dudu. That was about as it good as it got for the visitors though, as FC Honka equalised on 28 minutes through Rasmus Schuller. Despite reasonable chances for both sides, the scores remained level at half time. Within 4 minutes of the restart, Nicholas Otaru gave Honka a lead, a lead which they fairly comfortably held on to for the remainder of the game, indeed, they squandered several reasonable chances to increase their lead, whilst KuPS were limited in their ventures into the penalty area. This was a reasonably enjoyable game, although there was very little atmosphere generated throughout the game which was disappointing considering this was a game between two high fliers in the league. Considering it was now night-time, I chose the easier option in returning to central Helsinki by bus, which stops very close to the ground.
 

Bognor Regis Town 3 v 2 Hastings United

Saturday 11th September 2010
FA Cup 1st Qualifying Round
Nyewood Lane, Bognor Regis
Admission: £8.00
Programme: £2.00
Attendance: 374
Match Rating: 4

FA Cup action again today for an attractive looking tie between two clubs in good form in their respective Ryman leagues, with the lower division team at home against a club from a division above. This was also a tie between two clubs from the Sussex coast, although the match couldn't really be described as a derby, with the towns as far as apart as you can get along the Sussex coast, separated by over 50 miles.

Nyewood Lane is located about a 10 minute walk from the train station, and is an all-round very pleasant stadium that manages to combine very good facilities (a reflection on their recent higher league status), a spacious yet close-knit feel to it, and plenty of character. Along one length of the pitch is a small all-seater stand in the centre, with a further small stand providing covered terracing, and uncovered hard standing the other side of the seated stand. Along the other length is covered terracing, behind one of the goals is open banked terracing and behind the other goal is a covered hard standing area. The ground also has an electronic scoreboard - a rare feature of a ground at this level of football. The 30 page programme was fairly standard fare for the Ryman League, unexceptional but with enough to read to gain a good background to the match ahead.

After two successive relegations from the Blue Square South - a price worth paying from Bognor's point of view, considering that they were punching above their weight at least in the Blue Square South was unsustainable for them - they have started this season in the Ryman League Division 1 South well with mostly local players, and have gleaned 10 points from their opening five games, with a 100% record at home, together with a narrow 1-0 home win against Sussex League side Ringmer in the previous round of the FA Cup. Hastings United, a settled Ryman League Premier Division side these days, have gleaned 11 points from their first six games, losing their first game of the season midweek at home to Sutton, when they came back from three goals down to be denied an equaliser deep into injury time thanks to an apparently hugely contentious linesman's flag.

With half an hour on the clock, it looked like the higher ranked team, Hastings, would coast to a comfortable passage into the next round in this Cup tie. Bognor played reasonably well in the middle of the park, but it was Hastings who carried the greater threat, Bognor having their keeper to thank for keeping his side in the game. Unfortunate for him then that Hastings would score a quick fire double just before the half hour mark with two very avoidable goals, Russell Eldridge firing in a shot through a crowd of players that the keeper presumably thought would have been cleared by one of his defenders before it would have reached him, and then Jono Richardson firing a fairly tame looking low shot which took a very unfortunate bounce off of a divet to bounce over the keeper's dive. Game over, and the game would peter out for a comfortable away win. Not at all, so it turned out. As the first half drew to a close, Bognor suddenly became irresistible, pulling a goal back via simple tap in from Jason Prior after excellent work from James Fraser, and a minute before half time they were level when Phil Turner cooly slotted the ball under the keeper. Bognor would not have wanted the half time whistle to come, so much in the ascendency they were at that time, and after a hugely entertaining first half, the second half failed to live up to those heights, mostly being a midfield scrap with regular long punts up field, although both sides continue to carve out reasonable chances. A replay at Hastings was looking inevitable though, from which Hastings would surely have had to have been red hot favourites to progress, until deep into injury time, a horrendous back pass by John Beales gave the on-rushing Jason Prior a one-on-one with the keeper, and he showed fantastic composure to slot the ball past the keeper from fully 25 yards. Considering the level of football and with so much at stake and in injury time at the end of the game, it was a terrific finish. Hastings barely had time to restart the match when the referee blew for full-time to spark wild celebrations amongst Bognor's players and supporters, whilst the Hastings players slumped to the floor no doubt reflecting on how they could have lost a game they were cruising  to victory in but inexplicably - and fatally - took their foot off the gas having opened up a two goal lead.

Portadown 2 v 0 Coleraine

Saturday 4th September 2010
(Northern) Irish Premiership
Shamrock Park, Portadown
Admission: £10.00
Programme: £2.00
Attendance: 573
Match Rating: 3

It proved somewhat of a challenge to find a game on my latest day trip to Northern Ireland, with the Ryanair flight from Stansted now timed later to arrive at Belfast City Airport at 13.25, and the only match in the top two divisions in the Belfast area today, Linfield at home to Crusaders, was postponed due to international call-ups. The only possibilities left were a trip to Carrickfergus to watch Carrick Rangers in the Championship (2nd tier), Glenavon (although the train would only arrive in Lurgan 4 minutes before kick-off) and therefore I settled on heading for Portadown, which was reached by catching a bus to Belfast city centre, and then an intercity train bound for Dublin to Portadown. A very brisk 20 minute walk from Portadown station to Shamrock Park saw me taking my seat just as the teams were walking onto the pitch .

Shamrock Park is quite an odd ground currently, in the process of long-term development, although no building works are currently evident. It is an all-seater stadium but with several unused areas. The stadium used to house a stock car circuit, but this has built on and so spectators are close to the pitch. Along one length of the pitch is a very modern stand which offers excellent views of the action with no pillars to get in the way. An odd feature of this length is that there is no fence or railings of any kind bordering the pitch, quite unique in my experiences across many leagues and levels of football. Behind one of the goals is an fairly small stand set some way behind the goal which houses away supporters. Opposite the main stand there is the only traditional stand which used to be the main stand housing the changing rooms, but today just a handful of spectators used this stand. The stand is quite small - the other half of this length just has an overgrown grass bank. Plans are apparently in place to demolish this old stand for a new modern stand like the current main stand. Behind the other goal is also a disused and out of bounds area - here too there are plans for a new stand. If all the plans come to fruition, Shamrock Park should be quite an impressive facility. The programme was a very reasonable effort, in full colour with interesting articles and stats to read, as well as a copious amount of photos of recent match action, although maybe on the short side with just 20 pages.

This game was between two teams in the lower reaches of the table. Portadown had gained four points from their opening four games, and in midweek, they had a quite bizarre game against Premiership newcomers, Donegal Celtic, falling 0-2 behind, before hitting back with four goals, only to concede two goals in added on time at the end of the game to draw 4-4. Portadown are a decent side, finalists in the Irish Cup last season, and they beat Skonto Riga in the Europa League this season and were unfortunately to go out by one goal on aggregate in the next round - a very decent showing compared to how most Northern Irish clubs fare in European competitions. As for Coleraine, the season has been an absolute shocker so far, and unexpectedly so. Traditionally one of the strongest teams outside of Belfast, they threatened to challenge right at the top of the league last season before falling away badly. However, they have opened this season with five straight defeats, and have yet to even score a goal. They are a better side than that, and conceding only 9 goals in those five matches points to a team that haven't been outclassed, but the longer the poor run continues, confidence will be destroyed and so points are needed on the board as soon as possible if they are to avoid a catastrophic season.

Not for the first time, I left glorious sunshine behind in south-east England to be greeted by drizzly rain in Northern Ireland, and to match, the game itself was quite a tepid affair between two teams clearly lacking in confidence. The first half was lacking in real clear-cut chances and a goalless scoreline at half-time was no surprise. However, eight minutes into the second half, Portadown took the lead when a low driven free-kick into the six yard box by former Charlton youngster Neil McCafferty was turned into his own net by Paul Brown - evidence of when a team's luck is down, it stays down. It was difficult to see Coleraine recovering from this setback given their current plight, and although they battled gainly, they carried precious little threat in the final third and the game was as good as over when Portadown scored their second on 69 minutes when the goalkeeper was beaten to a ball at the edge of the area by former Millwall striker, Kevin Braniff, who passed the ball into the empty net from a tight angle. Coleraine did actually hit the woodwork twice, but in truth Portadown held out for a comfortable and deserved victory to leave Coleraine still pointless and goalless, four points adrift at the foot of the table.