Havant and Waterlooville 0 v 7 Real Betis

Saturday 30th July 2011
Pre-season Friendly
Westleigh Park, Havant
Admission: £10.00
Programme: N/A
Attendance: 800 (est)
Match Rating: 4

24 hours can certainly be a long time in football, during which time an errant catering truck in the USA would spark a chain of events that would eventually lead to an almost unbelievable friendly match being arranged between Havant and Waterlooville, of the Conference South, and Real Betis, of the Spanish La Liga. At Friday lunchtime, I was looking forward to my first ever visit to Fratton Park, to watch Portsmouth take on Real Betis for a 6.30 kick-off, whilst also considering a "double", by watching Gosport Borough against Havant and Waterlooville beforehand. However, with the Portsmouth players stranded in the USA after their flight home was cancelled due to a freak accrdent with a catering truck damaging their homebound plane, that friendly was cancelled on Friday afternoon. Almost immediately, it was announced that nearby Havant and Waterlooville would step into the breach and play host to Real Betis. Full credit to the club for having the initiative to move quickly and benefit from what would surely be a once in a lifetime opportunity for them, to welcome the first team of a top flight European team to their humble home.

Westleigh Park is located about a half hour walk northwards of Havant rail station, and the ground is a fairly typical modern non-league stadium. Very neat, smart and tidy, quite spacious, but lacking in any character or charm. There is one all-seater stand straddling the half way line, with floodlight pilons having the potential to obscure one's view, whilst around almost all of the rest of the ground is shallow covered terracing. Obviously considering how hastily this fixture was arranged, no programme was produced for this game.

Havant and Waterlooville are an established Conference South side these days, finishing in ninth place last season, but a whopping 14 points behind eighth place Eastleigh and 19 points shy of a play-off position. Matches against high calibre opposition are not completely unknown to Havant and Waterlooville, as in 2008, they beat Swansea City at home in the FA Cup and then leading twice at Anfield in the next round before eventually succumbing to Liverpool. As for Real Betis, they shall be returning to the top flight this coming season having won the Spanish Segunda Division last season after a two season absence from La Liga. And they could not have asked for a much better opening fixture to look forward, at home to city rivals Sevilla.

To play on the same pitch as a La Liga team would be a wonderful occasion for the Havant and Waterlooville team, even if the game would surely be a complete mis-match, certainly if the Spaniards would take the game seriously. The emphatic answer to that was that they would, as they opened the scoring on just three minutes, and with just a quarter of an hour on the clock, they had raced into a four goal lead, and the only surprise was that by the time half time had arrived, Real Betis had only scored five times, with Ruben Castro scoring a hat-trick and Jorge Molina a double (they scored 25 and 18 goals respectively in last season's Segunda Division). Their skill, movement on and off the ball, turn of pace and spotting passes and executing them perfectly were an absolute joy to watch and certainly far too good for a completely outclassed Havant and Waterlooville, whose best player was probably their goalkeeper Nathan Ashmore who made countless excellent saves to keep the score down.Credit though to Havant and Waterlooville for never letting their heads drop or resorting to cruder tactics to stop the opposition, and they did have a couple of reasonable chances to get on the scoresheet.

One imagined that the scoreline could easily reach double figures if the game continued in the same vein after the interval, however it was a completely different game in the second half. Real Betis replaced nine of their players at half time, presumably giving their second-string a run out, and the game became much more even. Betis did score a sixth on 55 minutes through Sergio, but by now the mesmeric skill and almost magnetic attraction of the ball to Betis' players had disappeared. Havant clearly sensed they were much more in the game and they really should have gotten on the scoresheet after several flurries of corners and close range shots were blocked. In the dying minutes, Real Betis were awarded a penalty following a clumsy tackle, which was converted confidently down the middle by Salva Sevilla for Betis' seventh goal of the game.

0-7 was how it finished, not that the result matters of course. Havant and Waterlooville will obviously never play this calibre of opposition in the league, and Monday night's rearranged friendly at Gosport Borough will be much more useful in terms of assessing where they are as they prepare for the new league season. One also imagines that, without the confidence that knowing playing against relatively very limited opponents brings, Real Betis will not look quite the world beaters they did today when they play the likes of Barcelona and Real Madrid in the league, but all in all, this was a thoroughly enjoyable evening's entertainment, and everyone present will take away very positive impressions of the Real Betis team, both of their professional yet down to earth players and officials and of their friendly fans. The only slightly disappointing aspect of the evening was the attendance, which was around 800, but perhaps this was due to the last minute nature of the fixture.

Charlton Athletic 1 v 0 Den Bosch

Tuesday 27th July 2011
Pre-season Friendly

The Valley, Charlton
Admission: £5.00
Programme: £1.50
Attendance: 3,951
Match Rating: 2

A long overdue return to The Valley this evening to see how the team I support, Charlton Athletic, is shaping up for the new season. Reading, of the Championship, were originally scheduled to be the friendly opponents this evening, however as the League Cup First Round drew the exact same fixture to be played in early August, and so FC Den Bosch, from the Netherlands, were late replacements to fulfil the fixture.

Tonight’s fixture was given a little extra edge as some silverware would be up for grabs, as a trophy, The People’s Cup, was donated by Den Bosch fans to be awarded to tonight’s winners, in recognition of similar turbulent paths both clubs have experienced over the years, both clubs being saved from extinction to a large degree by efforts of the fans.

It has been quite a hectic summer for Charlton, with no fewer than 13 new signings made, with the same number leaving the club. Indeed, tonight’s starting line-up – which presumably will closely resemble the starting line-up for when then league season starts – features seven players who have been signed up in this close season. Den Bosch currently play in the Eerste Divisie, the second tier of football in the Netherlands, where they have played since 2005 when they were relegated from the top flight. Last season they finished eighth and so qualified for the end of season promotion play-offs, but were knocked out in the second round. They have already played two other English sides this summer, drawing 2-2 with Hartlepool on neutral territory in the Netherlands before losing 1-3 at home to Ipswich Town..

Unfortunately, this was a typical friendly game, certainly throughout the first half, with lots of short passing and a very low tempo with very little urgency. The game was quite balanced though, with both sides fashioning some reasonable chances, mostly from long-range though, and it was little surprise that the scoreline was goalless at half-time.

The second half was slightly more entertaining, and Charlton had much more possession and chances, hitting the woodwork three times and sandwiched in the middle was the game’s only goal on 76 minutes, but what a terrific goal it was. Johnnie Jackson played a long ball down the touchline, which Bradley Wright-Phillips took towards goal, and with the Den Bosch keeper coming out to close the angle down, Wright-Phillips lobbed him perfectly to find the net via the inside of the far post. That goal proved sufficient for Charlton to lift the cup, with Den Bosch barely threatening for the rest of the game. So, a low-key friendly evening where the entertainment was extremely limited, although amongst the plus points were Danny Green, Paul Hayes and Dale Stephens in particularly catching the eye amongst Charlton’s new signings. Credit also to the Den Bosch fans, who had a small but very vocal following of 136, and credit to them for raising money to give to a local Charlton charity. 

Northampton Town 0 v 3 Reading

Saturday 23rd June 2011
Pre-season Friendly
Sixfields Stadium, Northampton
Admission: £10.00
Programme: £3.00
Attendance: 1554
Match Rating: 3

A bargain offer from the London Midland train company, currently offering half price tickets, plus the opportunity to watch football at a Football League stadium I had not previosuly visited at virtually half price, inspired me to make the trip to the south-east Midlands for an otherwise not outstandingly attractive friendly game with Reading, of the Championship, paying a visit to League 2 side Northampton Town.

Sixfields Stadium is located about a half hour walk westwards from Northampton train station, passing Franklin's Gardens, home of Northampton Saints Rugby Club along the way - whilst it is not a particularly pleasant walk, through industrial estates for the most part, it is flat almost all of the way. The all-seater ground consists of four separate stands, three small ones and a larger main stand. Being built in the mid-nineties, it is certainly one of the dullest stadia I can remember, lacking any character, although on the positive side, it is very neat and tidy and views are flawless from anywhere in the ground, with the stands close to the pitch and no obstructions of view. Another nice feature of the main (West) Stand is the first floor conservatory style concourse behind the stand. The stadium is set at the bottom of a large hill behind one of the goals, and the low stand behind that goal as well as the unfilled corners make it possible to watch the action from there - and plenty of people do just that, even though one of the goal areas is out of view. Programmes are always hit-and-miss affairs for pre-season friendlies, but full credit to Northampton Town for producing an interesting and informative publication which would appear to be the same style and size as they produce in the regular season, except this edition covers all three of their home friendlies.

This game was between two clubs who finished at opposite ends of the Football League last season, with Reading narrowly missing out on promotion to the Premier League, losing in the Championship play-off final, and Northampton Town only narrowly escaping relegation from the Football League after a sustained shockingly poor run of form in the second half of the season, the first half of which saw one of their greatest results of all time, defeating Liverpool at Anfield in the League Cup, having previously knocked out Reading on penalties at the Madejski Stadium.

On an overcast and relatively cool day for July, this was a surprisingly entertaining game for a friendly, hardly played at full-tilt, but it was an open game with regular chances at either end. The hosts had the better of the first half, and credit to them for always looking to play passing football along the ground, although they rarely looked like scoring. The visitors looked much more threatening as half-time approached, and right on the stroke of half time, they opened the scoring when Hal Robson-Kanu perfectly dinked the ball into the box and Shane Long - surely Premiership bound before the end of this transfer window - just beat the keeper to nod the ball home. A slightly harsh scoreline on the home side, who had acquitted themselves well. The second half was a completely different affair though, as Reading completely dominated proceedings. On 49 minutes they were awarded a penalty for a clumsy foul by the Northampton captain, John Johnson, on Mikele Ligertwood and Long sent the keeper the wrong way for his second of the game. Reading stretched their lead to three on the hour, when Robson-Kanu did well in holding off a couple of defenders before rifling low past the keeper. Immediately after this goal, Reading changed eight of their players in one go, although this didn't appear to break up their momentum as they continued to carve out some good chances. It was damage limitation for Northampton, although they should have scored with quarter of an hour remaining, when a Northampton forward took too long to get a shot in, and lost possession as he tried to find room for himself. In the end, it was a comfortable 0-3 away win, a scoreline which flattered Reading, who were rewarded for their clinical approach, although Northampton could certainly take positives too from their first half showing.

Fulham 4 v 0 Crusaders

Thursday 21st July  2011

Europa League 2nd Qualifying Round

Craven Cottage, Fulham

Admission: £5.00
Programme: £3.00
Attendance: 15,676

Match Rating: 2

Having decided to follow Fulham on their adventure in the Europa League this season – certainly as far as the home games concerned, as well as having an interest in Northern Irish football, I made the return visit to Craven Cottage this evening three weeks after my last visit, a decision made even easier by the repeat of the bargain ticket prices, £5.00 when bought in advance.

In truth, there was little riding on this second leg match, with the tie already seemingly as good as over. In the first leg in Belfast a week previously, Crusaders apparently played ever so well, coming oh so close to causing a major upset. Fulham held a 1-0 lead at half time, Crusaders equalised and then could easily have taken the lead when a shot struck the crossbar midway through the second half. In the end though, Fulham scored two goals in quick succession to take a 3-1 lead back to London, meaning that the part-timers of Crusaders would have to score three times to have any hope of progressing. An unlikely scenario indeed, but playing a team like Fulham in competitive action was probably beyond the wildest dreams of the Crusaders players and officials. Martin Jol again suprisingly named virtually the strongest team at his disposal, which included the competitive debut of John Arne Riise, the former Liverpool and AS Roma and current Norway player, whose signing must be considered quite a coup for Fulham.

During the first half, Crusaders battled well but struggled to keep possession of the ball sufficiently, but they looked fairly comfortable until the 19th minute, when Damien Duff played a ball across the bos, Bobby Zamora dummied, leaving Andy Johnson to side step the defender before slotting home from 10 yards. Crusaders, to their credit, stayed in the game with a battling performance, and had a couple of half chances to get back on level terms on the night, most notable on 35 mnutes when Crusaders' scorer in the first half, Timmy Adamson, flicked a shot over the bar from 10 yards, but 1-0 was how the score stood at half time.

Perhaps unsurprisingly considering Crusaders' part-time status, they appeared to fade in the second half as Fulham upped the ante, and after missing a couple of good chances to increase their lead, on 56 minutes, Duff ran onto a good low throughball by Philippe Senderos and drove into the box before dispatching a low shot into the corner. In almost carbon copy of the first goal, Fulham opened up their lead to three on 65 minutes, when Johnson crossed low from out wide, Duff dummied and Zamora curled his first-time shot into the goal from 10 yards. On 70 minutes, Fulham scored their fourth with a powerful header from Steve Sidwell - who had earlier missed several gilt-edged chances to score - following a corner from Duff. From this point, Fulham took their foot off the gas which was quite a relief as any worse scoreline than 04 would have been very harsh on Crusaders, who gave a good account of themselves, but credit should also be given to Fulham who showed clinical professionalism. This early in pre-season and considering the relatively weak opposition, Fulham could have fallen into the trap of complacency and sloppiness - but they didn't, and so they progress comfortably to the next round and a tie with the Croation side RNK Split.

Bray Wanderers 1 v 2 Derry City

Friday 15th June 2011
League of Ireland, Premier Division
Carlisle Grounds, Bray
Admission: €15.00
Programme: €3.00
Attendance: 1000 (estimate)
Match Rating: 3

Wishing to catch some competitive action in July rather than endless meaningless friendlies, I decided to book a trip to Dublin this weekend. The original stand-out fixture for me was one of the big Dublin derbies, St Patrick's Athletic against Bohemians, however as this game was postponed due to both clubs being involved in long away trips to Eastern Europe in the Europa League, the only realistic option left was a trip down the coast to the seaside resort of Bray for Bray Wanderers' match against the sole team from Northern Ireland plying their trade in the League of Ireland, Derry City.

Having taken the DART train from Dublin Connolly station to Bray - a distance of only 11 miles yet taking some 45 minutes, but on the plus side only costing €4.90 return - the Carlisle Grounds are located literally a stone's throw from the station, although it is certainly worth arriving a couple of hours ahead of kick off to enjoy the very pleasant and tranquil seafront of Bray with its Victorian promenade. Ireland, both sides of the border, contains some fantastic grounds considering the relative low level of support - some grounds very old-fashioned and in a state of disrepair but just ooze character, others moast modern facilities that would not look out of place in the English Football League. The Carlisle Grounds is, according to the club's official website, the oldest sporting venue of all clubs in the League of Ireland. So it came as a disappointment to find a ground that, whilst is neat and functional, lacks any character and is rather unmemorable. Tickets must be purchased from a ticket office before entering the adjacent turnstiles, and spectators enter the ground behind one of the goals, where there is hard standing with a small grass bank behind. Along one length of the pitch is the only covered area in the ground, a temporary looking all-seater stand with a green roof and with obstructing pillars along the front. Along the other length is terracing, with seats bolted onto the front half and four floodlight pylons between the spectators and the pitch . Behind the other goal is a very recently installed temporary all-seater uncovered stand, which was not in use today. Changing rooms and club offices are housed in portakabins at one corner of the ground. As for the programme, this was a major disappointment, being a double issue combined with Bray's match against Sligo Rovers two weeks previously. As a result, the programme was out of this date for this match, contained no statistics or season's results and whilst it was of modest interest to the occasional visitor, looking good and printed all in colour, it would be a pointless purchase for the regular visitor.

Bray Wanderers started the season fairly well but have very much been a team stuck in runs of form on either end of the specturm in recent months. They won four games in a row before losing four in a row, before winning last time out at UCD and found themselves in sixth place in the ten team league with 22 games played, although they were only 9 points behind leaders Sligo Rovers and 16 points clear of third bottom UCD, 23 points clear of Drogheda United, currently occupying the relegation play-off spot in ninth. Derry City, newly promoted to the Premier Division, have had a very solid season so far, winning their previous three games, including a win against then-leaders Shamrock Rovers and were unbeaten in their previous eight games. Going into this game, they were in fourth place, just two points behind leaders Sligo.In their encounters so far this season, Derry triumphed 2-1 at Bray in April, whereas the match at Derry ended 1-1 in May.

This match started off with the home side very much in the ascendancy, and after just two minutes, Chris Shields forced a point blank save from Gerard Doherty from six yards out - he really should have scored. Regularly pumping the ball upfield for forwards to chase, Bray looked the likelier to score throughout the first half, with Derry's defence looking somewhat shaky and their forwards only sporadically threatening, and Bray were slighly unfortunate not to lead at half time.

The second half looked like it was shaping up to be a dull affair with both teams cancelling each other out. However, just as a goalless draw was looming on the horizon, James McClean, whose time in the League of Ireland is surely coming to an end with several English clubs taking a very keen interest in him, turned the game in Derry's favour with two assists. First, on 65 minutes, he turned Bray's right back inside out on the touchline before sending over a perfectly judged cross which top scorer and former Bray man Eamon Zayed headed home at the far post in off the crossbar. Eight minutes later and Daniel Lafferty doubled Derry's lead with a firm header from a McClean corner. That seemed to be enough to seal all three points for the visitors, as Bray had seemed to have run out of ideas in the second half, barely threatening Derry's goal until three minutes from time, when an excellent free kick by Dan McGuinness bound for the top corner was well tipped onto the crossbar by Doherty in the Derry goal. However he was beaten in the first minute of added on time at the end of the game, when John Mulroy headed home a McGuinness corner from six yards off the crossbar. Bray suddenly sensed they could sneak a point from the final couple of minutes of added on time, but it was Derry who came closest to scoring, when a long range piledriver was gathered at the second attempt by Matt Gregg, the former Torquay and Crystal Palace goalkeeper. So a deserved away win which sees Derry rise to third place, whilst Bray drop a place to seventh.

London 0-13 v 1-17 Waterford

Saturday 9th July 2011
GAA Football All-Ireland Senior Championship Round 2
Emerald Grounds, Ruislip
Admission: £10.00
Programme: £2.00
Attendance: 1000 (estimate)
Match Rating: 3

Today was the first day of pre-season friendlies for the 2011-2012 season, however as friendlies are usually tepid affairs, especially this early in pre-season, it was not a difficult decision to take in a different form of football today, the Gaelic variety, to witness what was arguably the biggest game in London's history. Although I have been to the Emerald Grounds in Ruislip on several occasions, this would be the first time I went there primarily for a Gaelic football game, always previously going to watch hurling games there.

This was a historic day for the London GAA football team. Historically the whipping boys in Gaelic football, they had never won a game in the All-Ireland Senior Football Championship since its began in 1977 and have been in the bottom division of the National Football League for many years. However, emigration from Ireland to England in recent years has bolstered the London squad, and a strong sign of an upturn in fortunes for the London team came in the Connacht Championship last month when they took Mayo, of the First Division of the National Football League (London were in the bottom Fourth Division), to extra time before eventually losing. They followed that up with their first ever win in the All-Ireland by beating Fermanagh at Ruislip by 0-15 to 0-9. Although Waterford have always been strong in hurling, they have been also-rans at football. They played in Division 3 of the All-Ireland NFL this season, although they finished bottom, gaining just two wins from their seven games. In many ways, unbelievably considering their footballing record, London were considered by many as favourites for this game, as they are riding on a crest of a wave this season and had home advantage.

For my previous hurling visits, crowds have been in the low hundreds, however a bumper crowd was expected today, and was proven correct, with both lengths of the pitch thickly lined with spectators, and no less than three additional marquees were in place today. Full colour programmes were on sale today although was not good value at £2, containing just a welcome message, squad line-ups and a report from the Fermanagh match - and many, many pages of advertising.

It was crucial that London got a good start to this game, and they seemed to have got just that, in the opening couple of minutes scoring a point after a foul close in front of the posts. However, that lead was short-lived and proved to be the only time in the game when London were in the lead, as a mistake in the London midfield allowed a long range kick which looked like it was going wide, but the strong wind pulled the ball back to strike the post, and the ball fortunately dropped to Gary Hurney just a few yards out and he had the simple task of scoring a goal. Waterford went on to completely dominate the game from this point, helped by a strong wind behind them in the first half but also by London players making far too many basic errors with poor passes and also London's players losing their discipline. A difficult task was made even harder when London's Paul Geraghty was sent off for a second yellow card shortly before half time, and the half time score was 1-10 to 0-05 in Waterford's favour.

London certainly improved in the second half, although they never really looked like they would be able to make the game look interesting, and all hope really seemed to disappear midway through the second half when Ciaran McCallion was also shown a second yellow card for a wild sliding tackle to leave London two men short. Although London eventually scored more points in the second half, the difference was far too narrow and Waterford progressed to the next round with a comfortable final score of 1-17 against 0-13. A disappointing performance and result on their big day for London, however they should be able to build on their historic achievements and be more of a force next season.