Storrington 2 v 0 Billingshurst

Saturday 19th December 2020, Scheduled Kick-off 15:00 (Actual 14.55)

Southern Combination League Division One

Recreation Ground, Storrington

Admission: £5.00

Programme: Online

Attendance: 102

With Covid-19 infection numbers apparently rocketing in the south-east, prompting a much larger area being placed under the toughest restrictions of Tier 3 from today, and with it more leagues deciding to halt proceedings until the new year, I decided that travelling long-distance by train might not be the wisest of decisions, particularly with Christmas Day less than a week away. And so I decided to drive to a game within Sussex today, where the Southern Combination League still had pretty much a full complement of fixtures scheduled. Heavy rain in recent days, overnight and into the morning resulted in many games then being postponed, and I decided to head for the ground I had last visited the longest ago - just over 10 years - but which also offered the back-up of the plastic pitch at nearby Steyning Town should the further rain forecast to fall during mid afternoon cause a last minute postponement.

The Recreation Ground is located on the north western outskirts of the village of Storrington, and is part of the village's recreational facilities, with a cricket field alongside the complex's decent sized car park, and with a leisure centre, playground and a caged plastic pitch between the cricket field and the football ground. Admission is paid for at a small wooden kiosk in one corner of the ground, with the NHS QR code available for scanning, along with hand sanitising gel. Although facilities here are rather basic - more so because of Covid precautions - there is a nice village club community charm about the place. Hard standing is only available along the length and end closest to the entrance, although the rest of the ground is accessible. Grass banking around much of the pitch offers a slightly elevated view, and a length lined by a hedge, and various overhanging trees dotted around, add pleasant dimensions to the ground - which no doubt would be augmented in the late summer months. The Clubhouse building straddles the half way line, and although sadly its facilities are currently out of bounds, alcohol, hot food and other refreshments were available from a table just outside. Overhang pitchside offers some covered standing, and alongside which, 50 seats have been installed but that area was shuttered and out of use today. There is a public right of way through the ground, which results is dog walkers regularly passing through the ground. The club produces a 16 page programme, available exclusively online, and contained a decent welcome and preview message in the Manager's notes section, and offered various stats from the league to provided a decent preview of the game.

Storrington have had a difficult start to their season, although they have recovered from a nightmare start to the season, when they picked up just a point from their opening seven league games, before winning two and losing the other two of their four games since. They came into this game in 14th place in the 16 club division. Billingshurst were in ninth place, having won three and drawn four of their ten league games, but they were certainly not in good form coming into this game, losing 7-1 at Littlehampton Town last Saturday, and had lost their previous five league games, with their last league victory coming in early October, which was a 2-1 home win against today's hosts, Storrington.

With the pitch surviving a morning pitch inspection, a heavy downpour en route to the game was far from welcome, but happily it was indeed game on, with bright sunshine for most of the match, and light drizzle only arriving in the final minutes for the match. For some reason, the match kicked off five minutes early, and the first half was generally rather than uneventful, perhaps not helped by a heavy pitch that became increasingly muddy and quite boggy in places. But with three minutes on the clock, the visitors threatened when Tom Scott took the ball around the keeper and although he did seem to be fouled and might have won a penalty had he had gone down, to his credit he kept on his feet and his shot from a tight angle hit the side netting. And they had a couple of great chances in quick succession on 12 minutes, first when a pass upfield by a Storrington defender in his own area went straight to a Billingshurst player about 30 yards out, and he ran forward before unleashing a shot that was parried over the bar by the keeper, and from the resultant corner, a low shot was deflected just wide. The rest of the half was mostly a midfield battle, and the scoreline remained goalless at half time.

On the hour mark, the deadlock was finally broken when, after a long throw in wasn't dealt with by the defenders, and Jordan Suter headed the ball home via the woodwork. That really seemed to wake the hosts up, and straight from the restart, a low cross shot was well saved by the keeper's outstretched foot. Billingshurst had a decent chance on 70 minutes when, following a corner, a low drilled goalbound shot was blocked by a defender. But Storrington scored their second on 78 minutes with a lovely goal by James Benton, who ran in from the left and waltzed past defenders before firing low into the net from the edge of the area. That seemed to really kill off the visitors, and they had a player sent off four minutes into added on time for a second yellow card, as Storrington saw the game out fairly comfortably to claim their first clean sheet of the season, and to keep their revival on course, rising to eleventh place in the table.

As I drove home through a prolonged torrential downpour, so heavy it made driving extremely tricky, I mused that, had it arrived half an hour or so earlier, an abandonment might well have been on the cards. And listening to the tightening of restrictions in the battle against Covid, with the introduction of a Tier 4 in much of the south-east, it feels like the ability to go to games is becoming ever more precarious.