Great Yarmouth Town 0 v 1 Downham Town

Saturday 6th November 2021, Kick-off 15.00
Eastern Counties League Division One North
Wellesley Recreation Ground, Great Yarmouth
Admission: £6.00
Programme £1.50
Attendance: 70 (estimate)

For my adventure today, I took advantage once more of Greater Anglia's excellent recent promotion of offering single tickets from London to virtually anywhere on their network for £5 each way, not put off by a rather arduous journey in prospect today, with buses replacing trains between Ipswich and Norwich, The trip promised to be well worth it, to make a long overdue visit to what is arguably one of the bucket list grounds in non league football.

The Wellesley Recreation Ground is about a twenty minute walk from Great Yarmouth station, located parallel to the coastline, from which the ground is separated by just a row of seafront housing and a road. Although the grounds have old fashioned entrance gates in one corner, these are locked and out of use when the football is on, instead spectators enter via a short lane in the opposite conrer, handing over admission and obtaining a programme at a portable kiosk. Once inside, this is a ground to really savour, full of charm, character and history, and is immaculately maintained. Walking down the length from the entrance, an old fashioned, flat roofed building apinted in club colours of amber and black houses the tea hut, selling hot and cold drinks, crisps, confectionary, as well as sausage rolls and pasties. Various club merchandise is also available here, and there is a small area to gather in the warmth. Then, straddling the half way line is the absolute standout feature of the ground, the large and imposing grandstand, which is thought to be the oldest grandstand still in use in England at least, having been officially opened back on 11th June 1892. A blue plaque commemorates this on the stand's exterior wall. And perhaps unsurprisingly for a structure dating from that era, the stand has some really attractive and intricate detailing in its structure. It has a brick base, with some ornate windows and doorways to the changing rooms along the front, The seated area and roof is made of timber, finished in a light olive colour with an ornate roof and a gable featuring a clock. It is also very spacious inside with about six rows of wooden bench tops to sit on, and although the elevation gives a great view of the action, there are plenty of supporting pillars along the front, as well as floodlight pylons, to obstruct one's view. Immediately to the front of the stand there are a couple of terrace steps to stand on, and a couple of rows of uncovered wooden benches. Behind the end closest to the entrance, a small flat roofed brick building houses a modern bar, and alongside that is a pitch roofed brick building housing the toilets. Along virtually the entire length of the far side, three terrace steps are covered by wooden structure painted in olive green and white colour, while the remaining end is mostly lined by wooden panel fencing, and the rest of the recreation grounds behind. Facilities here are shared with the local athletics club, resulting in a running track being present around the football pitch, which inevitably means that spectators are quite a long way from the pitch. That is a minor inconvenience however in consideration of the splendour of the ground, and some elevation is available along both lengths anyway. Pleasingly, the club do produce printed programmes, with 36 pages printed in full colour and on good quality paper, and with plenty to read about the club, the league and the history of the Wellesley.

Great Yarmouth haven't had the best of starts to their season, coming into this game in 14th place in the 16 club division, having won two and drawn three of their 10 league games so far, and have picked up just a point from their last three games. They do however have at least two games in hand on all clubs in the lower half of the division. Downham have had a better start to their season, coming into this game just outside the play-off places in sixth place, following seven wins and seven draws from their 11 league games. They were in good form too, winning their last three league games, and were unbeaten in their last five.

On a very grey, chilly afternoon with a fair breeze blowing in from the North Sea, this game started off quite evenly, and it was Great Yarmouth who created the first couple of chances in quick succession around the ten minute mark, when a ball forward down the right drew the keeper out, and a cross shot on goal went just beyond the far post, and shortly afterwards, a long range shot was tipped over the bar. On 17 minutes, it was Donwham's turn to come close to opening the scoring after the Yarmouth right back just failed to cut out a diagonal ball to the left side of the penalty area, but the eventual curled shot by Kieran Hagan went just beyond the far post. On 22 minutes, a first time clipped shot by Yarmouth's Jamie Smith forced a smart parry by the visiting keeper, but on 25 minutes, the visitors opened the scoring. A ball low into the box caused some confusion between the keeper and his defender, allowing the ball to bounce clear of them both and towards goal, and Hagen had the simple task of tapping the ball into the empty net. Great Yarmouth did manage to create some reasonable chances during the remainder of the half, but they could not find a way through as the visitors held a slender lead at the break.

Into the second half and the game started to get a little feisty at times, and the visitors were probably lucky to retain their full compliment of players on 49 minutes, when Simon Bird put in a late and rather high tackle, but was only shown a yellow card. The home side came close to restoring parity on the hour mark when Ryan Jacobs saw his curling shot come back off the crossbar. Their cause was not helped on 65 minutes when they were suddenly reduced to nine men, with Kyle Barker was sent to the sin bin, and his protests were continued by Cameron Barnes, which led to him joining Barker for a ten minute breather on the sidelines. Downham couldn't make their numerical advantage count, although on 70 minutes, a Downham player ran clear down the right, heading towards goal, only to be brought down by Yarmouth defender Kyle Howell, but fortunately and surprisingly for him, only a yellow card was shown. In the closing minutes, Yarmouth did try to mount some pressure on the Downham goal, but did not really look like they would grab an equaliser. The narrow win lifted Downham one place into fifth position in the table, while Great Yarmouth remained in 14th place. Rain arrived shortly after the final whistle as we hurriedly sought shelter with a pint, before starting the long journey back home.