highpeak

I really think football at that level, even if it doesn't have the skill of the elite players, is closer to its roots. On my next visit to the old country, I have to choose between watching Buxton or Derby. I'm thinking a visit to the Silverlands is a better idea.

Highest ground in the league pyramid.

Never a truer word spoken!

 

Tomorrow Hailsham are away at Lingfield. It's a 60 mile round trip on a Tuesday night. In our last match, we lost 6-1. Last time we played Lingfield was on the 15th of August, in the FA Cup. We lost 7-1.

 

Why then, are me, my brother, and no doubt a few other hardy souls making the trip?

 

Because we do - and that's all there is to it. It might sound totally mad to most people, but not to football fans - and, as derided as the game may be by some, there is a mutual 'culture' amongst fans that all would understand. It's what we do.

Last week, on a chilly evening, I set out to work an O-40 match under lights at a high school in the next town. The first half was reasonably pleasant, cool, but no wind. During the half time break we felt the first scuds of rain. By the time I blew the whistle for the kick-off, the rain was steady. Three minutes in, the rain is diagonal. Five minutes in, it's sleet and horizontal. Now it's hail. "Hey ref, it's easing up, I feel a bit warmer!" "That's hypothermia setting in lad" I was thinking it was going to be a long 45 minutes and wondered at what point could you say that the hail and sleet was making it hard to see (the field was artificial turf, so no real chance of declaring it unfit) when a dramatic flash of lightning put a sudden stop to proceedings.

Thirty minutes before we can restart lads, that's the guidelines I have to follow. Aw ref, let's play another ten minutes and see what happens. Flash, boom. OK, that should show you why we're not doing that, I enjoy having a house to live in and have no wish to be sued.

Well, who's won? Not up to me lads, if you don't want to wait for the storm to pass, I'll write it up and let the league decide.

At this point the home team, who were losing 0-3, said they would take the loss, they wanted to go home. And so it ended.

Now, if that lightning hadn't intervened, I know we would all have stayed to the bitter end, wet through and frozen. We're all mad.

So Poojah, tell us how you feel...

Looks like a collective effort to put the Grim in Grimsby. Scunthorpe United players should not get complacent.

Being a football fan is so much fun. Think of things like beer. If you'd been drinking Old Pudpuller's Liver Compromiser for years and then some money-grubbers changed the brew to save money and it tasted like the proverbial gnat's, then you'd simply find another brew and tell folks to stay away from your previous favourite suds. But sports enthusiasm has this hold on us and you can't just switch allegiances when your team is rubbish. Well, not if you want to have any credibility with your mates.

Mr Poojah is going to keep going to watch Grimsby no matter what. He probably feels a lot better after writing his letter, but he'll be back, suffering to the end. And enjoying every match in a masochistic sort of way. As we all do.

Good game this morning: O-40 State Cup match, bit of an upset. White not too happy that I waved away a couple of penalty shouts, but to be honest there was minimal contact and the attacker made a three course meal out of an appetiser.

Coaching hat on, big disappointment. For me, there are four outcomes to a match, in order of desireability: play well and win, play well and lose, play poorly and win, play poorly and lose. Today it was the last of those. We deserved to lose, couldn't string three passes together, played far too many vertical passes, too much long ball, too many unforced losses of possession. Drives coaches mad.

My thrills and frustrations about football are a bit more personal in that they revolve around refereeing and coaching (O-30 women).

Thrills: I passed my fitness test this morning and improved on my performance over last year, which is a surprise because this fall I strained a hamstring and had the flu, so I haven't really been doing much training. For my age/grade I needed 1800m in 12 minutes, managed 2500m, allowed 9.5 seconds for a 50m sprint, managed 7.7 and did the 200m sprint in 35, allowed 40. I am especially pleased with the 50m sprint because I am not exactly built for speed, and it was especially good to do it under the nose of the assignor I work for in the Sunday morning men's comedy league so that he can see I am still fit enough to do O-30 matches.

Refs seem to be more in the spotlight of late than I think any ref would want to be, and it doesn't help matters when the understanding of the laws on the part of players, managers and commentators is not accurate or current. The referee world doesn't help matters because I don't think a good job is done on educating non-referees (actually, we struggle to educate referees at times!) but some of the things you hear are so inaccurate that it beggars belief I would like to see some of the critics take the ref class and have a go at refereeing.