football rambles

My first game back in Britain wasn't exactly clash of the titans, but Rocester and Oadby served up an entertaining enough game, which ended in a 2-2 draw.  Dean Smith put the visitors ahead with a cleverly worked move, that they had obviously worked on at the training ground.However, Lee Bagley put the home team level when he was left unmarked on the far post on 15 minutes.  What followed on for most of the game was a battle in the middle of the field with some breakaways and hard tackling in the centre of the pitch. For the most part Rocester looked like the better team, but they couldn't beat the off-side trap. However, on 81 minutes Rory Maxwell capitalised on a defensive error by Oadby, and it looked like The Poachers would be heading back to Leicestershire without any points. All Rocester had to do was keep possession and despite attempts to do this they continued to give free kicks away in the corners and fail to look comfortable on the ball when it was in the middle of t...

So the first match I will see back in England will be a ninth level affair between local team Rocester and Oadby Town in the Midlands Football Alliance. Oadby Town or 'the Poachers', as they are sometimes known started out life in about 1938 as Oadby Imperial. In 1939/40 they won their first competition 'The City Medals'. In 1943 they merged with a local junior team and became briefly Oadby United before changing back to Oadby imperial for 1949/50 season when they entered the Leicestershire Senior League Division 2. They only stayed in this division for a couple of seasons before gaining promotiom to the top tier of the Leicestershire Senior League.In 1951, the same year that they gained promotion Oadby finally settled on the name Oadby Town. However, it wasn't until 1963 that they received their first major piece of silverware when they won the Leicestershire Senior Cup beating Newfoundpool WMC in the final. The following year they retained the cup and sealed a tre...