football rambles

 In this game Downham scored a couple of wonder goals with Valtar Da Rocha giving them the lead and Harley Murkin rounding off the game with a goal late in the second half after he had come on as sub. The other goal came from Nick Castellan in stoppage time in the first half. I also thought that Sivakumar had a really good game. Despite the result, the win wasn't as straightforward as it sounds, although some of that was down to the referee rather than a concerted effort by Long Melford. When one Melford player went down like he'd been shot, Downham right back, Jake Miller got his marching orders. The fact that referee didn't appear to see what had happened was more infuriating and at the time Downham who were 1-0 up were looking at playing with 10 players for more than an hour. The referee did even things up in the second half when he sent off a Melford player with 30 minutes left, again for something innocuous.  A good game and a good win for Downham, but why do referees ...

This was quite a bad tempered match and one that saw Ely score two whilst down to 10 men. Dan Brown gave Ely the lead after 10 minutes before Gibbs equalised for the visitors on 40 minutes, so the teams went into the break on level terms. The second half was pretty scrappy with a lot of tempers starting to fray and quite a bit going on off the ball that the officials didn't seem to notice. Ely had Hida sent off on 55 minutes for a studs up challenge and it looked like it was going to be difficult for the Robins. However, it just seemed to galvanize them and two wonder strikes settled the game. Substitute Frankie Lee Webster scoring on 80 minutes and Hamer on 88.

 The day after Cambridge beat Fleetwood saw Ely take on Long Melford. I hadn't been to a game down the Unwin AKA Demcon Arena for a while and it doesn't seem like I had missed much. At half time Long Melford had a slender 1-0 lead and Ely were by no means out of it. However, some poor keeping decisions and a disorganised defence  saw Long Melford soon extend their lead to 4 before Ely got a late consolation goal. It was good to catch up with some people, but not worth the £8 entrance fee, to be honest. 

It has been a superb season for Thetford and at the start of the season I think that most people at the club would have been more than happy with promotion, which they had achieved a while back. For a long time thought they were at the top and after seeing off the challenge of Whitton United looked like they would walk their way into the Premier Division as Champions. However, a late surge by Godmanchester meant that Thetford were in second on goal difference and needed Godmanchester to slip up against Whitton or to hope that they beat Long Melford by 3 more goals than Godmanchester won by. Both teams looked pretty even for the first 10 minutes, but it was obviously Thetford who had the bit between their teeth in their endeavours to try and score as many as possible. The best chance in the opening encounters was when a mis-hit clearance by Paul Wood in the Melford Road hit Thetford hot-shot Matt Dixon and nearly went into the back of the goal. One thing to note though was that even in ...

Last time I went to a fixture between these two teams was in the Ridgeons League 1 Cup last season and it was a pretty bad tempered affair with friction between the two clubs occurring on the pitch, in the stands, in the club room and on the Internet. Therefore I was expecting a spicy affair yesterday, but this wasn't to be the case. The first half was a fairly drab affair, which was equally balanced. Thetford looked the stronger side but the best chance fell to Melford who hit the post just before half time. The highlight however was probably the cheap prices in the club house though, as although I've been to Thetford a few times before I haven't partaken of the cheap and good quality ale. They probably have the best and most reasonable priced beer in Thetford. The second half was a lot better thankfully with Thetford looking a lot more lively. Melford though still looked slugish. In the early encounters Thetford were unlucky not to get a penalty when Dan Grindrod handled ...

Not a bad picture of Thetford on the attack by Nadiya

Here's a picture of the main stand at Thetford from a weird angle and the badge that is in the centre of the stand just above where the players enter and leave the dressing room.

The kids took the photos at Thetford v Melford. Most of them are by Nadiya. The top one here is Sean's and the bottom by Nadiya.

Yesterday the FA Vase got underway with the first qualifying round. The competition has seen local side King's Lynn reach the semifinal last year and Ely's Eastern Counties League counterparts, Wroxham reach the final the year before. Onr thing is for certain Ely won't be walking out at Wembley as they went down away to Clacton. I was at Thetford though for their Vase match against Long Melford. Thetford are still in it, however with the team looking for promotion they might at one point decide to sacrifice the Vase. Match reports and photos to follow

Yesterday and today was the fourth round of the FA Cup, in fact Notts County and Man City Plc are playing on the TV in the background as I write this. So the media has been going on about the magic of the cup and several hundred other cliches, although looking at the attendances the general public hasn't been that enthralled by it. That said the way the TV has controlled the fixtures probably has something to do with it. I can't think that Huddersfield fans would have been happy about getting up at the crack of dawn to get to London even if they were taking on Arsenal or should I say 'the mighty Arsenal'; I really have been watching too much TV. I still can't stand Crawley though, so they haven't completely brainwashed me. Anyway, it was a very different sort of cup game that I went to, but it had all of the elements of a classic cup tie. I travelled over the border into Norfolk for the Ridgeons Division 1 cup semifinal between Thetford Town and Long Melford. Th...