football rambles

 This was my first FA Cup game of the season as Hitchin welcomed Leiston to Top Fields in what looked like the best fixture of the weekend that I could get to. Although, I do have to admit the real highlight was seeing Villa beat Spurs in a Spurs pub in the early kick off ahead of us going to the ground. The game started with Hitchin on the attack and they were all over Leiston for the first 10 minutes. However, as the half progressed Leiston looked the most likely to take the lead and on 28 minutes the visitors took the lead from a well worked cross that Adam Mills struck home.  This seemed to give Leiston the impetus and Adam Marriot (remember him) and Seb Dunbar gave Hitchin a few things to think about before the two teams went in at the break with Leiston having a one goal advantage. The second half started quite slowly with both teams looking a little laboured, but Hitchin seemed to be the most likely to score and so it was. Blue Joy (yes that's his name) scored from clos...

 Saturday saw me take a trip with Dean to Top Fields in Hitchin to see the Southern Premier Central match between Hitchin and Kettering. After seeing Maidstone beat Ipswich in Molly Malone's near the station we made our way to the ground. I had been to Hitchin before and it is an impressive ground and being able to race their lineage back to 1865 makes them amongst the oldest teams in the world. They started off the season pretty well, but a run of 5 (now 6 ) injuries has seen them start to plummet down the table, although they still are comfortable mid-table. Speaking to locals this seemed to be due to the fact that they have an ever growing injury list and more youngsters are having to be recruited to the first team. Kettering on the other hand have been facing a relegation struggle, however the result today did manage to raise them out of the relegation places. With Nuneaton Borough going bankrupt this week too there are question marks over what will happen to the teams at the b...

 I left it comparatively late (at least for me) to get to an FA Cup game this year with this local derby going ahead in the First Qualifying Round. I have usually been to the two preliminary rounds at this point. I made a bit of a day out with it with James and we went to a couple of pubs, both of which weren't great before the game. it became a whole day out when the shortage of train drivers after the game meant we had to spend a significant amount of time in the White Hart, which was a decent pub, after the game. What a pity! As for the football, there were a lot of Hitchin fans, it's just down the road and they definitely historically at least are the stronger of the teams. I was a bit surprised that they seemed to see themselves as the underdogs and in the opening encounters it definitely looked like Hitchin were the favourites. Despite all of their dominance Hitchin only led by 1-0 at the break and this was thanks to an Alex Brown penalty on 12 minutes. At halftime the ev...