The Kingstonian Scouser

Broccoli and cauliflower in a football blog?

2012-02-09T17:04:00.002Z

English snow and ice goes together for me go together with Alex Ferguson and broccoli. I detest them. They’re as welcome as a “Margaret Thatcher is doing well” report. My life would be so much better if I never saw them again, though I suppose broccoli does have some aesthetically pleasing aspect to it. If ever I wanted to do a model forest, then using broccoli and its lighter-coloured counterpart cauliflower (equally as tasty) would make ideal trees.

This part of south west London is even less prepared for this type of weather than most of England when it shocks us all and strikes without warning at a time of year when it happens on a frequent basis. It’s almost as if the London Borough of Sutton pretends that Roundshaw is just on the Croydon side of the boundary line and tries to leave everything to the London Borough of Croydon, whilst Croydon looks on and laughs, not that it has an awful lot to laugh about apart from being a convenient place for train travel. Nothing personal, Croydon, it’s just that you and me will never get on...and I like you more than Central London...

Snow and ice also means that non-league football generally shuts down. Kingstonian’s match with Margate bit the tundra, as did our U18s match with Metropolitan Police and tonight’s U18s match with Egham has died a frozen death once again. I have no confidence that the U18s games at home to Whyteleafe and away to Egham (attempt 4...or is it 5?) will go ahead.

More immediately, I haven’t much confidence that Saturday’s game away to Lowestoft Town will go ahead. The entire situation there can’t be helped by anybody, but it’s a swine on a number of counts – we’ve booked two nights in a swish(ish) hotel in Ipswich, do we cancel? How late can we cancel? Do we guess that the game will be on or not, after all the forecasts I’ve seen for that particular part of the world are actually better than for here at home. If we guess not, we’re going to have to guess probably tonight, well before the game actually is allowed to be called off. And then the probability will be that the game goes ahead and I sit at home feeling regret regardless of the result. If we go, and the game is called off, what the heck do we do? Go to the seaside, said the wife. She wasn’t joking. Ipswich Town against Middlesbrough is an option, but £35 per ticket? Second word is “off”. And I don’t mean first word being “game”.

The other issue is that I’m currently experiencing some health problems, some physical (not quite sure what’s going on, but I’m knackered), a lot being the usual mental morass I’ve put myself in for years but it feels a bit worse than usual (finally I am seeking professional help, watch this space, I suppose) – if the home game with Margate had gone ahead I have severe doubts as to whether I would have been able to go due to the physical aspect. That’s a bit better at the moment, but at the moment the idea of travelling to Lowestoft is not filling me with delight. Nothing personal, Lowestoft, it’s just my general dislike of travelling getting in the way.

So, while I idle the time waiting for the pitches to become muddy instead of solid, all heck breaks loose here, there and everywhere, mostly about England and some Italian guy who is proven as a club manager, yet has found international football to be a completely different mindset, which he was unwilling to adapt to. And now his little political games are over, and not before time, in fact time should have been called after a World Cup that was so spectacularly bad, even given the unusually low expectations in 2010, yet somehow overshadowed by a French squad that defied belief with its behaviour, so it was swept casually under the carpet.

England has never been a high priority for me, as evidenced when I found out after arranging the game that Kingstonian’s Vets Cup semi-final is on the same night as an England match against Holland. I have no regrets, however, as I’ve got a fabulous excuse to miss the England game, which would probably have served no more purpose than to send me to sleep, which is a good thing seeing as I don’t sleep very well these days. My attitude towards England is usually borne out of two main factors, there is a self-defence system which allows me to not care very much when things go wrong, and the fact that Liverpool (and now Kingstonian) take up so much of my emotional energy means that there is no room for England.

However, I am pleased that Capello has gone, and his temporary replacement is on to a winner. There are talented young players around these days (the FA has done something right for once when it comes to encouraging youngsters to play football and their policies are beginning to bear fruit), and if they go to the Ukraine for the European Championships they will be under little pressure. There is little expectation to succeed and there is a readymade excuse should things go awry, which is a bespectacled, unloved Italian who has just walked away from his highly paid job.

Enough of that wastrel, who as you can tell did not include me as one of his supporters (not that he’ll lose sleep over that), Monday was frustration aplenty. Not only was the Ks U18s game called off, but I sat down and watched Liverpool huff and puff against a Tottenham team stuffed full of backbone, which was not something I’m used to seeing over the years. Suffice it to say that I am a little frustrated with Liverpool this season, the club spent pot loads of money and don’t look like getting the rewards demanded.

Andy Carroll, sad to say, looks like a rabbit in the headlights, Stuart Downing probably owns the headlights and doesn’t do anything with them, and I’m still not sure what Jordan Henderson is supposed to do. Isn’t it ironic that our best “new” players have been a free transfer from Manchester City (Craig Bellamy) and two lads from the youth system (Jay Spearing and Martin Kelly)? Darn, I forgot Jose Enrique, who has been a revelation since his move from Newcastle United, but in the main the multi millions spent are, whilst not quite wasted, still in the to-be-appreciated department. Luis Suarez has been outstanding, when he hasn’t been booting the balls off from Scott Parker’s anatomy, and Charlie Adam has quietly been a good signing.

Whilst it’s lovely that we’ve made it to the League Cup Final (as I might have explained in previous blogs, this was seriously a desired target for the season) and we’re going well so far in the FA Cup, our form at Anfield has been disappointing (unbeaten but too many draws) and we’re not as close to where the action is than I would like. However, Kenny Dalglish is always going to get something that Roy Hodgson never did, which is time. Things are definitely improving at Anfield, though, we need a little more cunning going forward, but we are moving in the right direction.

Dare we dream?

2012-02-02T16:34:00.002Z

The first major frustration of the week has just happened – I’ve looked out from my tenth floor office window (which doesn’t open), and seen blue skies with one or two fluffy white cotton wool clouds. The frustration is knowing that the big U18s game that I was going to was postponed ages ago. The weather looks lovely, but I know full well that the pitch will be frozen solid and that Banstead Athletic the hosts and Sutton United the actual home team have no choice but to call it off as early as possible. It’s just one of those things that no-one can do anything about, and I was very pleased when my colleague at Sutton phoned me at 9am with the info. [Edit: going out this lunchtime and walking in the wind has made me pleased that the game is off as it’s certainly the weather for picking up appendages off the floor for unfortunate suddenly-appendage-less metallic primates.]

Last week ended very teeth-grindingly when I was forced to miss Kingstonian’s trip to Cray Wanderers. Even though I severely dislike the journey, the 119 bus route seems to take forever and I always get off at the wrong stop without fail, I like the ground immensely. I was annoyed to miss the debut of Ryan Woods and the second debut of Saheed Sankoh. The target of my written scowling is the 154 bus route, which decided at Saturday lunchtime to be completely and utterly rubbish, leaving me waiting at my bus stop until about 1.45pm.

I decided that I wouldn’t be able to get to the game, so I went home via the chip shop, which got my custom a few hours earlier than planned. When I switched the television on, there was Dirk Kuyt celebrating scoring against Manchester United. That was very pleasing indeed, but it didn’t take away the annoyance at missing the Kingstonian game, following the game on Twitter was no fun. Though the cod, chips and sausage in batter were all rather spiffing (with Worcestershire Sauce and soya sauce on my chips, yummy).

The result was pleasing, a goalless draw against Cray Wanderers, a team pressing for a play-off spot, can’t be sniffed at. I still considered us to be just outside the race for the play-offs so that result was not too bad at all.

I didn’t expect an awful lot from the game against Lowestoft Town. I wasn’t fantastically looking forward to it, writing the programme was a severe strain as I couldn’t make myself even start the darn thing until Sunday morning, the day before the game. Big mistake. It is true to say that, despite the enormous amount of help I get (and it’s a lot, believe me), I have found it a struggle this season, and Sunday the struggle continued, hence why I didn’t really relish this game. I was pleased to get the programme finished, however, well before midnight, which is unusual.

So, it was a cold evening as I sat where the press box used to be. How I miss the press box, especially now that it’s cold. Anyway, it would be correct to say that Lowestoft went into this game as favourites, but no-one really told Kingstonian. As the first half went on, I seriously couldn’t believe what I was seeing. I wrote in the programme notes that we would have to produce our best performance of the season to stop Lowestoft going top that night – a win for the visitors would have seen them do just that. However, we were indeed producing certainly our best half of the season – we even had a functioning midfield unit, something that we’ve been shouting about for a long time.

On the half hour, we scored. Matt Pattison’s brilliant cross allowing Ryan Woods to score. Surely now Lowestoft would come roaring back, but no, it didn’t happen, not through anything they didn’t do, it was our players doing the damage. The second half was more fraught and fractious, there were times when frustration boiled for the visitors and we did well not to rise to it. Lowestoft did have a man sent off, I understand he was sent off in last season’s fixture as well so he must really love playing at the Kingsmeadow...

Bobby Traynor came on a sub, went up front on his own, but this time he got a little bit of service. Picking up possession on the halfway line, not many defenders in front of him as Lowestoft were pressing hard for an equaliser, he set off and ran. And ran. And ran. Around the one defender that was back, bore down on goal and slid one of the most aesthetically pleased shot, curling gently around the outstretched arm of the goalkeeper. 2-0 for the Ks, deep into injury time, and Son of Dowse had finally scored an outfield goal in a league game, his first since the end of September. And it was a brilliant, brilliant goal, not the strike of a man bereft of confidence but of a prolific striker who confirmed that (as I’ve said at least twice before) form is temporary, but class is permanent.

If a stadium with less than 300 spectators in it can erupt, the Kingsmeadow did. Not only had we won the game, but Bobby had settled it in emphatic style. A fabulous win against a very good team, and us only seven points away from the play-off zone...dare we dream?

We wouldn’t be football fans if we didn’t.

I know nothing...

2012-01-24T16:55:00.001Z

In the previous blog I joined a decent clamour for Kingstonian to use two up front. I got what I wanted for the game against Concord Rangers...and for large parts of the game we were swamped, trampled and overrun in midfield, giving up a whole host of chances against a team who are good going forward – that we let in only one goal is largely down to an excellent Rob Tolfrey performance. We could easily have scored ourselves several times, but Concord’s goalkeeper was matching Rob for his standard of performance and we missed a pile of chances as well.

Going forward, two up front looked like it might have worked, but effectively sacrificing a midfielder from the formation we’d been employing (positive results in recent weeks matched by difficult-to-watch matches, Lewes game aside) meant that the midfield was given too much to do and were, as I said before, overrun.

Before there’s any more sub-standard analysis on my part, Concord Rangers deserve credit, as they were excellent going forward. The winning goal, curled in elegantly by Tony Stokes, was of the highest quality. In one sense, it is a surprise that they are not much higher in the league table, however, they always give you a chance at the other end and, as I mentioned before, they had to thank their goalkeeper and his outstanding showing for keeping us out on a number of occasions. It is a mystery how only one goal was scored, but in the cold dank light of day (it’s a bit overcast here in south of Sutton where my office is) Concord deserved the win, though we were not lacking in effort in commitment.

So maybe it’s not a formation problem that we’re having, it’s simpler than that. Maybe it’s a personnel issue instead; maybe it’s as simple as the current squad isn’t as strong as it needs to be. I’ve certainly pointed the finger at the midfield all season, whoever we’ve had in there has either put too much pressure on the forwards by not giving them service or not helping out with the goal scoring or too much pressure on the defence through isolating them. Or both. Whether it’s been a midfield containing Dewayne Clarke and Jerome Maledon or a midfield with Bashiru Alimi and Simon Huckle, it’s been a rare game in which we’ve won the midfield battle (whether we’ve had four or five playing there).

Going off on a slight tangent, the U18s team has been in danger of losing the midfield battle at times this season – in their case I mean central midfield. The U18s have had wingers and full back not only capable of playing but of crossing the ball into the box, once or twice we started losing the battle in the centre circle. Yesterday at Tooting, we had Scott Elgar in the team for the first time and his partnership with Jack Wadmore in those trenches was just one of a number of excellent things about that game.

Questions are being asked on the Ks forum as to whether we can make it to the play-offs or not – I personally don’t think we can at the moment, as I said, the squad isn’t quite good enough and it will take a remarkable change of fortunes to push us into that top five. It’s possible, we have some very good players indeed, but I feel that we’re unofficially preparing for a proper crack next season at promotion.

That’s not to say that I’m personally writing the season off. In fact, no way am I doing that. There are no less than four competitions that I feel we can perform sufficiently well enough to add something to our honours board at U18s, Veterans and First Team level, so we still have three very important months to go.

An appreciation of a particular number nine

2012-01-20T13:40:00.003Z

Yesterday, we've had some "fun" following the alleged loan move to Farnborough FC of Bobby Traynor. Now from what I understand, somebody at Farnborough not so much jumped the gun as beat the crap out of the starting official leaving him unconscious and announced something as fact when it was not the case.

Quoting from my good friend Ali, the press officer at Kingstonian - "I've just been discussing the rumours with Dowse and yes, we are considering sending Bobby out on loan for a month in order for him to regain his sharpness. We have on one occasion spoken to Farnborough about the possibility of this but nothing has been signed."

In this blog, I have been worried about Bobby most of the season, it's not been a great one for him and yes, his sharpness has gone to some extent.

Dropping him temporarily has been a good idea, either to have a look at someone else (and Stuart Duff has done reasonably well, his goal at Lewes was top class, though as Johnny D did rightly say to me it was set up by Bobby) or to put a little fire into Bobby. I'm not sure that some fire is needed, particularly, as I'll explain a little.

The problem started for definite during the summer when we lost Paul Vines to Carshalton. Trying to replace a quality striker like Paul before the season began proved impossible. During the season we thought we had someone in the shape of Ali Chabaan, but I feel that we were let down by him when he left at short notice.

Bobby Traynor and his goalscoring record has been fantastic, we have relied very heavily indeed on him, not quite to the extent of Liverpool and Steven Gerrard, but approaching it. If Bobby doesn't score, Kingstonian doesn't score. Other teams have known it, defend Bobby, you keep out the team. That's a lot of pressure on one player. When he's had partners with him, like Carl Wilson-Denis (especially), Paul Vines, Ali Chabaan, even Dean Lodge, he's been provided with some great service and he's produced.

This season, he's had no help. A lone striker can't do the fetching, carrying, crossing, donkey work as well as putting the ball into the back of the net - something has to give. Bobby has been a lone striker for much of the season, sometimes through necessity because injury and lack of personnel has robbed the team of forward man number two, sometimes through tactics. I've said it before, as a tactic I do not like one up front, I don't think it works, it's not entertaining, it's defeatist and sends out the wrong signals..

Despite being lone striker, Bobby has worked harder than he's ever worked before and given his workrate has been incredible for the last five seasons, that is indeed saying something. But he's being forced to work in the wrong places, he has to go into the corners, any dead ends, on the wing. He's at his best with his face to goal and either getting good service (for example that play-off goal against Sutton United) or running at the defence (a goal away to Molesey in midweek springs to mind, it was brilliant).

With the third coming of Matt Pattison to Kingstonian, if Stuart Duff stays with us (I hope he does) and we play two up front with Bobby and Stuart together, I hope that will allow us to play to Bobby's strengths, because if we do, then the goals will start coming again. Dowse has hinted in his last web interview that we'll stop going one up front, I hope that's the case.

I can't remember whether I wrote this before, but it's definitely true for the man who has worn the number nine shirt with epic distinction for about five years - form is temporary, class is permanent.

Tales of the Unexpected

2012-01-16T13:55:00.002Z

Before kick-off on Saturday, the Dripping Pan was for me merely bad memories of a bad defeat for Kingstonian. Some of the pain of losing that play-off final at Lewes in 2004 came back to me as soon as I entered the ground and looked down onto the pitch from the top of the terracing. I also remembered the stairs leading to the dressing rooms and the boardroom, most Ks people were trying hard not to look too downcast whilst Lewes officials were trying even harder to be good hosts and not overdo the celebrating (in fact I remember being treated very well indeed by the Lewes officials). I remember telling one of their officials to just go for it and celebrate, you don’t win promotion every day, you rarely get promoted twice in a week, which is effectively what Lewes had just done.

For all those bitter sweet memories – this is the time when I shudder at the thought of us in Conference South in the Khosla days and how awful they would have been – I like the Dripping Pan immensely. It’s different to all the others, it’s next door practically to the station (and it’s direct to East Croydon), it’s an amphitheatre as well (which helps an atmosphere), and there’s not enough of them in football. The food that I chose to munch on was a homemade meat pasty – it was lovely, it would have been appreciated in Cornwall, many appreciative nods to the chef from me.

I’d like to think that Kingstonian’s standard of play would be appreciated in Cornwall (insufferable segue, there, many apologies), as we produced one of our best performances of the season, in my completely unbiased (yeh, right) opinion I felt as if we could have won the game against Lewes, as we upped our game against genuine promotion candidates. Once again, some new signings made us a stronger team. Matt Pattison was a breath of fresh air, Fola down one wing was excellent, Aaron Goode (despite conceding the penalty) was outstanding. Stuart Duff is in serious danger of turning into a decent forward – although he was as ordinary as the rest of them when we somehow squeaked past Harrow, he was a small bulldozer against the Lewes’ defence, faster than he looks, and that finish was sublime.

I still think we need two up front to find a way of easing the load, I don’t think a makeshift striker like Simon Huckle is the answer, Hucks is needed elsewhere, and again I thought that he was excellent, the existence of Matt Pattison once again allowing him to up his level. Duff together with Traynor? Again I don’t think so, partly because Stuart Duff isn’t actually our player (on loan from Hampton he is) and partly the question seriously needs to be asked as to whether Bobby Traynor is worth his place in the team. What a blasphemous comment that is! But the painful fact is that Bobby hasn’t scored an outfield league goal since September, ironically against Lewes. He got a couple of excellent goals against Welling United in the London Senior Cup to prove that form may be temporary, but class is permanent, but the way we play at the moment does not favour Bobby, he needs to be fed and he needs to have support, neither of which have been provided for him for far too long.

So whilst Bobby’s travails are not close to being totally his fault (one up front tactics and not enough quality around him), in recent league games there have been things seen from him that wouldn’t have been even contemplated twelve months ago, and even more worryingly now is that he’s beginning to not get into the right places in order to miss his shots. When he came on a sub late in the game, he missed one chance but seemed terrifically out of sorts against the Rooks. Desperately hoping that this is a blip, but it’s a worryingly long blip at the moment.

After three dour matches around Christmas (ironically two wins and a draw), it was most unexpected that we produced a performance like that – we passed it around, we passed to feet, we outplayed Lewes in parts of the game, overall it was unexpected that we would play so well, possibly the best we’ve played since the Lewes home game. Why we can’t play like that or approaching that way in every game is baffling, but football is a funny game.

Ks Vets Still Have The X Factor

2012-01-13T16:32:00.000Z

Forget Simon Cowell and all his many hangers on, forget the singers, the flashy stage, the overreacting audiences, the hype, the people that have only one name, the spin-off programmes, the Christmas number one singles. For me, there is no X Factor. I’m not a fan of any of those programmes, with the genres of music that I love seemingly being constantly overlooked, I see no reason to tune in (which suddenly makes me wonder how on earth I know that they’re being overlooked, I just assume they are). And anyway, could you ever envisage Sharon Osbourne voting through a (reformed) heavy-drinking, drug-crazed, almost completely out-of-his-mind-yet-genius of a Brummie vocalist who prowls up and down the stage like a slowly scalding cat? No...didn’t stop her marrying one, though.

Anyway, I have digressed even before I started.

On Wednesday, Kingstonian Veterans team played a long-awaited quarter-final away to Metropolitan Police in the Isthmian Veterans Cup. We wanted to win this game quite badly, it was a little bit of a grudge match on our part after that game two years ago when we only turned up with eight men, yet still very nearly won the match. I know Eddie Akuamoah has been itching to play Metropolitan Police ever since then. So, my nerves were racing in the hours and minutes before kick-off, we wanted to win this game so much.

Our team did have the X Factor. Talent to the left of me, talent to the right, talent on the bench, we had a mightily strong line-up on the night, the only regret for me being that we were missing Matt Crossley, who played alongside Mark Harris in the game two years ago, the pair of them putting on one of the greatest performances for a back four that I had ever seen.

We had an eleven-a-side debut for Mark Beard, last seen being unfairly in my opinion shown the door by Tooting and Mitcham United – the job he did at the Imperial Fields under the circumstances he was working under was absolutely top class. The Terrors loss will be someone’s gain, I’m happy that he was our gain on that evening.

It was practically a full complement of players that turned out for us, fifteen in all, and even though we didn’t play too well in the first half, when we turned it on it was full throttle and really good to watch at times. It was worrying that we took 35 minutes to score, but once the half time whistle went and we still led 1-0 (though Andre Forrester was forced into an excellent save in the closing stages of the half), the guys gave themselves a serious talking to during the break and the result was never in doubt once the second half started.

We managed to win by four goals in the end, a satisfying result that has put us into the last four of a competition that we’d seriously love to win for the second time running. We did do something I didn’t approve of before the game when we had a team group photo taken – it wasn’t so much that that concerned me, I didn’t want to wind up the opposition by having the photo taken with the actual trophy. I needn’t have worried in the end, but normally to say something or do something to wind up your opponent is not a good thing and something I try to avoid.

Some of our players still look like they can do a job in Ryman League football, their fitness levels are usually incredibly high and Wednesday was no exception. Yes, there were some creaking limbs in the dressing room after the game, but most of them were mine, some guys looked like they wanted to start the semi-final right there and then. Either that or they’re darn good actors.

The other major good thing about Wednesday night was the crowd – it was an excellent one and it was great to look behind the dugouts from time to time and see friends and other Ks supporters sitting in the stands or standing in the sits (never worked out where the sits were), having a good time watching Kingstonian win a big game with a great result. As I said on Thursday on the Ks forum, it makes getting involved in the Vets team so very worthwhile.

I can’t wait now to try and arrange the semi-final game. Hopefully the weather will behave and Burgess Hill Town can play Crawley Down on Tuesday 17th as advertised and then I can contact the winners to offer them a date or two. I’m not sure when the game will be, nor even where it will be – instinct tells me that it will be Banstead Athletic I approach initially to hire Merland Rise, we know them so well, they treat us so well, we enjoy having the U18s there, so why not a Vets Cup Semi-Final? And no, it doesn’t get cold there any more.

Of Terrors, Late Goals and Footballing Ribena Berries

2012-01-10T15:37:00.003Z

2012 has begun reasonably well for Kingstonian. It could be argued, with some credence, that performances have not been fantastically wonderful, however apologists like myself point gleefully to the six points the first team have claimed so far.

The game against Tooting, the first home game in which I’ve been able to see the numbers on the Tooting shirts without squinting or guessing (a handy non-problem to have for a PA announcer), saw the Ks start very well, get a goal, press hard to finish the game off but then retreat into their shell when Tooting took advantage of a goalkeeping error to equalise.

We had two new guys in the team, Fola Orilonishe on loan from Sutton United (not just the third player on loan from Sutton this season, but the third quality player on loan from Sutton this season) and Matt Pattison, making his third debut for the club. Both players energised the team, especially in the opening stanzas, Fola was directly responsible for our goal, crossing into the box after a mazy defender-trailing run, forcing Tooting captain Ronnie Fletcher to score an unlucky own goal.

Matt Pattison may be one of the players we’ve been aching for all season (and maybe all last season and the season before...) – a ball playing creative midfielder. He was excellent against Tooting, though much quieter against Harrow. Having said that, almost everyone was quieter against Harrow...

Having said that...Matt and Fola’s presence in midfield has enabled us to shift some players around in the formation, which I think has been a slight improvement. Bashiru Alimi and Simon Huckle in the last two games have not been in advanced positions, we’re not relying on them at all to get attacks moving. As a result, both have played well in the two games and unexpectedly been the source of some excellent attacking play.

Up front is proving to be an issue, though. Bobby Traynor was replaced by Stuart Duff late in the Tooting game, a surprise move exacerbated in a way by Duff scoring the winner late in the piece. That enabled Stuart to retain his place for the Harrow match, which understandably caused some eyebrow raising.

Our attempts at trying to get a cohesive midfield has resulted in a five-man midfield, therefore a lone striker has been utilised, even in home games. The lone striker doesn’t work for us, Bobby has been running and running and running and running, but it’s been easy to mark him out of the game in recent weeks, and hasn’t looked like getting a clear shot on goal apart from those goals he did manage to get when we beat a young Welling United team in the London Senior Cup. So, it wasn’t a surprise to me when he didn’t start at Harrow, but I wish we’d give him a chance when he’s playing alongside someone who will supply him with quality possession.

The Harrow game was a case of two equal teams cancelling each other out, which made for a fairly tepid contest. Harrow had much of the possession in the second half, but Kingstonian had more of the glaring chances, one from Tom Hutchinson forcing a wonderful save from he who looked like Boris Johnson’s son. Hutch was also involved in another major incident which turned out to be a regrettable one, when his fierce tackle left Evandro Delgado with a broken leg and suspected dislocated ankle. For such an appalling injury, the lad was very calm about it and I desperately hope that he is able to play again soon.

It was an amazing irony that after 92 minutes of effort without result, a supersub did indeed score the winning goal. And given how this season is going, it had to be Gary MacDonald who won the points with a bullet drive through a crowd. Gary Mac, not in the side because Aaron Goode was outstanding in Gary’s absence at Tooting and didn’t deserve to lose his place, is a tremendous team man (joint player of the year for me so far) and has been a superb signing since his debut at the beginning of last season. It’s such an irony that he only became a Ks man because of the sudden unavailability of (and subsequent recommendation by) Jon Boardman.

Anyway, Bobby is still the best we’ve got, he’s very unfortunate to be a substitute because his loss of form isn’t entirely his fault, maybe some kind of kicking or jolt from the management can be the catalyst to a return to the Bobby we’ve watched for just over five years.

Ks Under 18s drew last night with Carshalton Athletic, who were resplendent in a deep all-purple strip, hence the Ribena reference in the title. One of the things a team secretary has to do is mark the referee out of one hundred. It’s a deeply unfair and unjust system which relies effectively on the word of two biased people. It usually follows that if you win, the referee wins – if you lose, the referee doesn’t quite lose because the losing team can’t be bothered to mark the referee so low that a report needs to be written (and even then specific incidents need to be described in some detail and I can never remember them...).

I don’t particular want to do that part of the team secretary’s job after last night’s game – it just felt as if we hardly got anything all night. Carshalton’s goal came from what I believed to be a poor decision about a free kick, although it wasn’t the best of defending either. And, just as the injustice was elevating into frenzy mode, the ref made another poor decision (a non-decision this time as one of our defenders gave a Carshalton player a clobbering that wasn’t penalised), we went forward and scored the equaliser. That felt like the tip of the iceberg. I won’t give the ref a mark lower than sixty (which triggers the need for a written report), but it shouldn’t be up to me to mark a referee as I’m not qualified and I’m way too biased.

Anyway, I thought we produced a good performance on the night, we deserved to score much earlier than the scrambled effort in the 83rd minute that got us the draw, but Carshalton defended well and were unfortunate to concede in the manner that they did. On our part, I wish we’d have equalised a little earlier because then I believe that we would have gone on to claim all three points. C’est la vie.

A New Year's Wish List

2011-12-29T11:54:00.002Z

Well...the timing's wrong because I've only just thought of it...a random list of things I'd like to see happen in 2012. Some of these things I admit have a zero chance of happening, but what the heck...here goes...

I suppose the big one when it comes to me and football is for my appetite for the game to return. I know I'd be lost without it and my involvement with Ks, so there's no plans to stop at the end of the season, but I don't want to have to stop in order to start again, so to speak. I won't deny that it's not being thought about, but I know I would lose far more than the amount I would gain.
Kingstonian to have a midfield that can dominate games and support both the back line and the forward line. We've suffered from that for too long.
Kingstonian to have a midfield that can score goals, or if our centre backs have to be the ones to continue to rescue us, Kingstonian to have a midfield that can cover the quick counter attacks when Gary Mac and Tommy H can't be in two places at once.
Bobby Traynor to have some service from midfield (that M-word again) and a target man to help him. We've not replaced Carl Wilson-Denis to be brutally honest, and when Paul Vines was in the team, Bobby stopped scoring. Arguably, he hasn't started scoring again yet this season.
Liverpool FC to grow some backbone and put away teams and to stop blaming the referee for their own failings. I've never seen a referee shoot the ball wide when there's an open goal...
Andy Carroll and Jordan Henderson to justify their transfer fee, neither have done so yet, strange how the player that arrived with the least fanfare in the last transfer window, Jose Enrique, has been the best signing of the lot (though Charlie Adam and Craig Bellamy are both doing a decent job).
Me to get down to the blinkin' gym more often than I have. No excuses...it's just around the corner from my flat.
AFC Wimbledon to turn their season around and climb the League 2 table. Yes, there's an ulterior motive - if continued success for Wimbledon means outgrowing the Kingsmeadow (both of which are eminently possible) and allowing Ks the chance to buy back the ground in a couple of years, then I want Christian Jolley & co to improve their fortunes again. Other ulterior motive - Christian Jolley's a bloody good person and thoroughly deserves to be successful, Wimbledon have brought him on in a way that we couldn't.
Lancashire to wait far less than 77 years to win the County Championship again. How we defend our title remains to be seen but I hope we're able to give ourselves a chance. If not, then a one-day competition (back to our 70s/80s/90s roots) would be lovely.
My appetite for watching rugby league to return - I used to be a season ticket holder for the London Broncos, went to that classic semi-final at Leeds against Castleford, went to the final at Wembley, visited such cathedrals as Central Park (rest in peace), Knowsley Road (rest in peace), Watersheddings (rest in peace), Derwent Park. Now that the club has reverted to the Broncos name it feels as if my club has been re-born, nothing against Harlequins mind you but it always felt wrong. We must try and go to games whenever Ks commitments allow.
Me to actually go and see Lancashire play. No excuses this time - we've got Surrey and Middlesex back in Division One (though our away game against Surrey is at Guildford, curses...), Middlesex are in our 40-over group as are Holland...I wonder if I can persuade the wife to have a short holiday in Rotterdam, "oh, by the way, I'm off to the cricket...".
Kingstonian Reserves to win a match. Yes, I know, they have to be re-formed first but I have ambitions...
Yorkshire to win promotion back to Division One. It won't be the same next season without the Roses match.
If we're to have another holiday in France then to find a hotel that actually has French television...
English booze-cruisers to visit Calais and Boulogne and see something other than a hypermarket, Boulogne is a lovely town, Calais has improved immeasurably since my last visit, the coastal road between the two is an epic win of a drive.
To be able to watch an Indycar race not crapping myself at the thought that I might be about to watch a driver die. For twelve and a half laps of the last race at Las Vegas I had that thought that it might happen. In the thirteenth lap it did. As a result, we lost a wonderful racer by the name of Dan Wheldon.
The British media to get off the backs of the Olympics organisers. It's been obvious that the media (bafflingly including the BBC, who will be showing the Games ad nauseam during the two weeks' plus of Olympicking) has been against the idea of the Games being in London from the start and have been picking the organisers apart for the last seven years. As long as we don't get lumbered like the people of Montreal did in 1976 with special Olympics taxes after the event, it will be a success...
Heavy metal music to make a comeback with some relevant new bands that are actually good. The best albums I got this year were from supergroups made up of already established stars like Chickenfoot and Black Country Communion. A lot of heavy metal I see and hear these days have guys (and gals) that perform using what I think is called "death vocals", or something like that. Basically, grunting into the microphone with as low or as screamy a noise as you can. Painful to listen to. No wonder the Darkness have reformed to save rock and roll once again. Good on 'em!
The Darkness to actually get off their backsides and release a new album, though I've heard rumblings that it may happen in March.
The Washington Redskins and New York Mets to haul their asses into the 21st century and stop performing like headless chickens like they've been doing the last few years.
The Redskins to draft a franchise QB in this year's draft - I'm not convinced that we've had an A-grade QB since that tackle by Lawrence Taylor on Joe Theismann all those years ago.
Bradley Wiggins to wear yellow in France, Mark Cavendish gold in London.
Kingstonian to have Kingsmeadow as a fortress and not a place that inspires the opposition.
Kingstonian to actually make a sustained effort with marketing the club in Kingston and Surbiton which means...
Kingstonian to actually have someone with either the talent or the intestinal fortitude (or preferably both) to do the sustained effort with marketing the club in Kingston and Surbiton and not give up after the first attempt that fails which means...
Kingstonian to actually support someone who wants to make the sustained effort and at least try to market the club in Kingston and Surbiton which means...see the point two points ago...
Ks to retain their two trophies that they won in 2011 and have good runs in both the London Senior and the Surrey U18s cups.

Well, just a few. Some are realistic, some are fanciful, some downright silly (not fancying my chances of the New York Mets one coming true for example), but anyway, that'll do from this blog for 2011, let's hope I have the energy to do more stuff in 2012.

Oh, so quiet...

2011-12-28T12:52:00.001Z

Despite not having posted anything since the beginning of November, I haven't totally forgotten about this 'ere blog. There's been a lot going on, not a lot of it good, to be honest, but there just hasn't been the energy to type stuff recently.

When it comes to Kingstonian football, a year that has been a little bit rubbish finally ended with a late equaliser at home to Hastings in another game that has seen us huff and puff and not blow a defence down. Once again we have to rely on our central defence to get us out of trouble as this time Tom Hutchinson's last minute header gave us a point. It was a deserved point, but only in the sense that it should have been 0-0 instead of 1-1 - we were better than a disappointing Hastings team, but not by very much.

At least conditions in the press area have improved immensely - thanks to the efforts of both John Fenwick and Erik Samuelson, it is becoming a comfortable place to operate in. A bit cold, mind you, but I won't complain about that (well, not until next week, probably...).

I don't know what to make of our chances for the rest of the 2011-12 season. I haven't even worked out what our chances are of... Sometimes our performances are so anaemic that after the game I look to the results from the likes of Aveley, East Thurrock, etc., to see if the bottom four are catching up with us; other times we win a match either through determination or through a darn good performance that the mood swings violently and suddenly I'm looking at the play-off zone to see how close we are.

Realistically, though, what's the goal? Is there one? Does there have to be one, a goal for where we want to be at the end of April? It is difficult to be massively positive at the moment because the squad doesn't look as if it has enough quality to put on a consistently good long run to haul ourselves up the table into the play-off zone. We are ten points behind Metropolitan Police who are 5th (the top four are showing signs that they may clear off at the top, so there may be only one play-off spot to aim at), we are ten points ahead of East Thurrock United who are 19th, however most of the division have games in hand on us, some of them are decent teams capable of getting the wins they need.

So, I suspect that the goal is to try and attain mid-table obscurity, which isn't a positive goal I grant you, but given that I really don't think we're good enough with this current squad to challenge the likes of Met Police, playing Premier Division football next season has to the goal. It's thoroughly frustrating as I feel as if we've been navel gazing ever since that second half at Margate, we've been feeling sorry for ourselves rather than still feeling angry, and as a result we're finding ourselves pushed over at times, which is something we've somehow got to get over and start getting meaner during games. How to do that in mid-season, though, is something about which I have no clue. Someone to take the pressure off Bobby (whose form is severely worrying) would be a start, but I suspect most clubs are in desperate need for decent forwards...

Another goal is not one that ideally should be an ultimate goal when a season begins (with due respect to the London FA), and that is to try and win the London Senior Cup, or at least go very deep into the competition as they say across the pond. Our cup performances have been appalling this season, we got our first win in the Fifth Round of this competition against a very young Welling United side about two weeks ago (after four losses, three of which against lower league opposition) and have a home quarter-final coming up and potentially a home semi-final as well - though neither game will be against easy opposition at all - and then you never know what could happen. It would be very nice to lift that silverware, to tell the truth, and I hope we as a club take it very seriously indeed.

Even though Kingstonian actually won two trophies in 2011 - the Isthmian Veterans Cup and Ryman Youth League Central Division (and believe me, they are treasured) - clubs are ultimately measured on the success of the first team, so the year about to end has to be classed as "disappointing" for us. Let's hope that 2012 proves to be more memorable for Kingstonian FC for good reasons.

A strange combination...

2011-11-07T16:33:00.002Z

Last week I went to my first committee meeting at Kingstonian for many years – there used to be a time temporarily when I was invited to these things, but there was little point me being there so I excused myself from them. This time was different, though, and quite unusually for any meeting it felt like something actually got done. I can’t go into much detail at all, as memory lapses and privacy reasons conveniently get in the way, but I do remember feeling ok straight after it. Although, given what was written in this blog a little while ago, I seem to have accidentally committed myself to the club for another season as we talked about a feature that used to be in the programme (player profiles) and isn’t anymore, but we worked out a way of getting it in for the 2012-13 season. I was going to give the idea of staying or not staying some serious thought towards the end of the season, but it looks like I accidentally made up my mind last week or temporarily went out of it... Another thing that was discussed at length, and will be again on Sunday when we play Carshalton Athletic is the subject of the press area, it has been officially brought up and we’ll have to find some way around it. What that is, I don’t know, but we’ll have a good look at it from Sunday.

I mentioned in the previous blog about our appalling record at Harrow Borough, well wouldn’t you believe it as we went there and won 3-1 with quite an excellent performance. It’s never easy at Earlsmead for some reason, whether Harrow are 1st, 22nd or anywhere in between in the league table, yet this was as comfortable a win as I could have hoped for. It helped that early in the piece Tom Hutchinson scored from a set piece, and then when Harrow looked like they may get back into the game Ali Chaaban doubled the lead. A poor refereeing decision led to some poor defending which led to Harrow getting a goal back late in the game, and for a little while it really did look like we’d throw it away before Ali and Bobby Traynor forced a defender to score an own goal and that was that.

It looked like it was going horribly wrong at the Kingsmeadow once again when Wingate and Finchley were 2-0 up at half time. To be honest, it was a head scratching half as we had much of the possession, missed a lot of chances just like we did against Godalming, and paid dearly for it as W&F scored from two of their chances. But then Sam Clayton blasted a goal from heaven and two minutes later Tom Bird a free kick from similar ridiculous distance, we were level. In between the goals there was time for our visitors to go down to ten men, but despite the players’ efforts, we just couldn’t get the third goal that frankly we deserved. It was very difficult to work out whether to be pleased that we came from two goals down or frustrated at not winning the game despite the relative domination. Both, probably.

Concord Rangers turned us over quite easily last season as they came close to reaching the Premier Division play-offs at the first attempt, but this time around they’re near the bottom of the division. On their performance against us at Thames Road last week, it is hard to see why. Quite how we went in 2-0 up at half time after being outplayed by a good footballing side is one of life’s mysteries. It’s not like we were rubbish on the day, Concord at times played some lovely football, but were unfortunate or profligate with their finishing (sounds familiar). Sam Clayton had another long shot midway through the half, this time the goalkeeper practically threw it in, and once again within a minute or so we doubled the lead, this time Romone McCrae finishing off a lovely set piece. Romone made it an unlikely 3-0 lead for us early in the second half and only then did we start dominating the game as the result seemed to be set. But with this being Kingstonian, there was a twist or two ensuring that nothing is ever easy for Ks supporters as the Beach Boys scored twice in injury time. It was with a sigh of relief that the final whistle went, giving us a 3-2 win. I would be amazed if Concord Rangers stay at the wrong end of the table for too long, but it was another win for us and another example of good things happening to both player and team when Sam Clayton gets brave enough to shoot.

The main event for me came last Thursday for the U18s visit to Aldershot Town. I left the EBB Stadium (as it apparently must be called) filled with so many differing emotions, I still can’t quite fully comprehend the evening. There have been times when I have felt that the club (what the definition of “club” is can be unclear sometimes) has not so much turned its back as refused to admit the existence of the U18s or viewed them as irritants for some reason. I doubt if either has ever been the case, and in fact this season the support we’ve had has been exceedingly gratifying. I do wish we could have bigger attendances but as a non-driver I do understand the awkwardness of Merland Rise for bus and train users, especially in midweek when the buses stop running at an early time, preventing bus users from going home without use of a lift or a taxi. When we played at Cobham, it was a similar situation, however at Aldershot we had a large number of supporters, Alan Dowson and Martin Tyler came to watch along with a large number of first team players. The support was vocal, it was numerous, it was massively welcome and supremely appreciated.

Anyway, I felt that the lads were magnificent at Aldershot. 1-0 up and 2-1 up, we were flying at half time. Ben Cheklit scored both the goals, the first a smart shot from outside the area finishing off a good team move, the second a goal straight out of the top drawer for individual brilliance. The Shots were obviously better than anyone we’d played up to this point this season and there were times in which the most optimistic of Ks supporters were expecting their team to finish their Football League opponents off. It didn’t happen, and the Shots got themselves back into the game and in the second half were massively on top. The equaliser came as no surprise, but hopes were raised big time when we suddenly started testing the Aldershot goalkeeper in the last five minutes. Three minutes went up on the fourth officials’ board, three minutes of manic football was played by two teams not wanting to play extra time, and then as the third minute ended Aldershot swept forward on the attack and scored the winner. An absolute heartbreaker. We had time to kick off, and that was it. The dressing room was very quiet afterwards, there was nothing that could be said to pick up the players, there was nothing to be said in the way of criticism, constructive or otherwise. Dowse came into the dressing room and spoke brilliantly, he very nearly had me in tears to be honest.

It took me a long time to leave the ground that night. I kept looking around to try and memorise the ground, to make sure that I had memories of this particular evening, to remember how close we came, how much this meant and how much it hurt. Yet there is an overpowering sense of pride as well, proud of the team and all of their performances so far this season, proud of the fact that it took a Football League team to end our winning run, proud that it took them until the last kick of the game to do it. Pride and despondency, a strange combination...

Typical Kingstonian U18s

2011-10-25T12:15:00.000+01:00

One reason I started going to reserve team and youth team football in my distant days as a Carshalton Athletic supporter (when Billy Smith and then John Rains managed the club) was that if the previous first team result was depressing, then the reserve or young Robins would (win, lose or draw) almost immediately play a Suburban League or Southern Youth League match to gladden the heart.

All these years later, Kingstonian's Ryman Youth League team does the same, and quite frankly has done so ever since the team was re-formed. Yesterday's blog was as negative as I've written in a while and I desperately needed something to at least temporarily lift my personal gloom. Kingstonian U18s did just that last night, and currently I am feeling tired but slightly uplifted.

Camberley Town were a decent team, but Kingstonian were outstanding last night and gave Camberley next to no chance in this Surrey Cup game. We eventually won 4-0, partly due to an outstanding goalkeeping display by Camberley's custodian, and thankfully I believe we didn't incur any major injuries before next week's big 'un. I think the main disappointment was that it wasn't a dirty game whatsoever, played in a really good spirit, and the referee still saw fit to book five or six Camberley players and send one off, which felt wrong, to be honest. But overall, the way we played last night does wonders for the depression.

The Cup Draw Gods, having a warped sense of humour, has given us yet another trip to Chipstead in the Second Round of the County Cup, our third visit already this season. The previous two games were battles, which in the end we managed to win 3-0 and 3-1aet.

But this morning it's finally dawned on me what we've done in the FA Youth Cup, as I had a phone call from Aldershot Town to partly arrange our First Round tie. We have the venue sorted, which is the Recreation Ground, we just need to sort the date out - understandably Aldershot people are a little excited about their match tonight against Manchester United so nothing concrete can be sorted until tomorrow. I'm suddenly a little excited about visiting Aldershot next week and our players are really up for it and massively looking forward to playing at a Football League ground. If they play to the best of their ability, you never know what could happen.

The first team, some of whom have been letting the manager down again (here's me trundling out the old "I'd rather have less talented players who give a damn and give 100% than more talented players who don't care" phrase that I'm so fond of), are away to Harrow Borough tonight. Traditionally we've been useless at Earlsmead, actually not even as good as that, so after the bad defeat against Godalming on Sunday I think the sky blue shirts tonight owe the manager and the supporters a big performance.

And then when they've done the big performance, they need to stop wasting everybody's time by thinking that they've been there, done that, and produce a big performance every game, not when they damn well feel like it. There are some undeserving players being tarred with that brush, but sadly that comes with the territory.

I was debating whether to stay at home tonight rather than go to Harrow, but Earlsmead here I come, get the burgers ready.

Time to do some working out...in more ways than one

2011-10-24T15:55:00.001+01:00

More ways than one is right...for to begin with I am going to try and become a regular at the gym at the Phoenix Centre in Roundshaw, not far from home. I am awaiting a letter from the company who runs it, as my diabetes nurse has referred me there - this way it's slightly cheaper than just turning up and joining. I have always had a major problem with going to the gym, the obvious being that it's hard, physical work, something I'm not a fan of. Also there is the self-consciousness problem of looking aside, seeing this thin thing dancing and jogging on level 20 of whatever their machine is, whilst I wonder where the next breath is coming from slogging my way at level 1, whilst I'm perceiving the person the other side of me is looking at me with utter disdain and contempt. It's rubbish, I know that, but I'm far too eager to accept the lie that it's not. I don't know whether I'm looking forward to it or not, but it might be a good excuse to blast my ears past bleeding point with an mp3 player armed with Metallica, Rammstein, Black Country Communion, Chickenfoot, Queensryche, etc., etc, which won't be a bad thing.

So, that's one change of lifestyle that will be attempted as soon as the referral letter arrives. Some more are being considered, but not decided upon. In fact, I don't really know how to decide upon it.

Whether to stay at Kingstonian is one of the big ones - I am really quite unhappy at Ks at the moment for quite a lot of reasons. My motivation is not there currently, it is difficult to compile the programme because I don't want to do it, it is difficult to go to home games because I detest what's happened with the press box, it is difficult to go to away games because I'm tired of travelling. I am finding most things stressful, whether it's work here at the newspaper (which I'd love to leave, but feel trapped), whether it's trying to start earning some money on e-bay or my own website (which I feel I'm appalling at), or to do with Kingstonian, coping is not high on my abilities at the moment.

There are some specifics that are causing my motivational slide into oblivion - the atmosphere at the Kingsmeadow, when there is one (which ain't often these days), feels quite poisonous - win or lose. There is too large a small percentage of people that claim to support us, but in reality they don't. They travel the south-east of the country taking a lot of happiness out of Ks getting beat. Unfortunately, the un-silent minority always turn out to be quite loud, and sometimes they hail from parts of the stadium that ought to know better (talking prawn sandwiches here), and a lot of time the un-silent minority have a breathtaking lack of understanding of football. Unforgivably, I am beginning to feel more comfortable at Merland Rise than I do at the Kingsmeadow Stadium.

Doing the microphone, quite unbelievably, is uncomfortable, sometimes quite painful. Are journalists dwarves or something? There's no leg room, no stomach room, when I'm sat down I feel as if I need to be surgically removed from the bench. I have slightly dodgy knees, at times I need to stretch them out to avoid being in a lot of pain, and I can't do that at the Kingsmeadow any more. Yesterday it was windy, which made it ridiculous trying to stay organised. I am seriously mourning (and now constantly whingeing about) the loss of the press box now, despite it's scratched windows.
I think it was obvious yesterday that I wasn't a happy bunny - I thought at the time when I found out and I still think it now, whoever asked for a midday kick-off on Sunday needs to be forced to watch the Liverpool-Norwich game again and again and again (what a pile of crap that was). I'd love to know why this was decided, if it was avoid the Manchester derby then we may as well go home and forget it, give up, never bother again.
Actually, I partly take that back, next midweek home game we have, I'm going to recommend kicking off at 8.05pm to avoid clashing with EastEnders (does that get shown on Mondays?) or maybe I'll bring forward Saturday's game with Wingate and Finchley to 1pm so I can get home in time for the college American football. Good idea, that.
I don't think we lost because of a midday kick-off, by the way, I think we lost because we decided to practice Gaelic football all afternoon and smash shots way over the bar.
I was also in a terrible mood because I had just seen somebody die in a motorcycle race - the second violent fatal motor sports accident I'd seen live on television in eight days, even though potentially this can happen in any event where human beings are moving quickly, it was still very upsetting indeed and has left me wondering why the heck I watch these things in the first place. Dan Wheldon and Marco Simoncelli, race in peace my friends.
Well, even the U18s are a bit stressful at times, and the Vets team games are more trouble than they're worth but look...I think the main thing that is going wrong is that I feel dreadfully tired and beaten up, both mentally and physically. I just don't know how to solve that at the moment...
Off to Merland Rise again for another U18s game...they're not a bad team, y'know.

A blank weekend

2011-09-30T11:01:00.002+01:00

Well, Friday has come around and instead of being joyful that it’s the weekend, jealousy will probably kick in as football clubs all over the country begin preparations for their match tomorrow. Alas, for Kingstonian, it’s not match preparations that are happening, although in all probability socks are still being worked off, both in training sessions and outside of them, getting ready for the upcoming game on Tuesday.

We have this blank weekend because it’s FA Cup day, and we went out of it before getting a foothold in it, having been summarily dispatched by Poole Town on a sunny and rainy day (very much a case of both) on the Dorset coast. Harrow Borough, our scheduled opponents for tomorrow, won their FA Cup tie so obviously our meeting has had to be called off. It’s been re-arranged for later in October, but it means either looking for a game to watch purely as a neutral (not my style) or sitting at home doing not very much apart from watch the telly (definitely my style). I do have an U18s programme to write for what will be a very unusual game on Monday.

In these days of no replays, we have an FA Youth Cup First Qualifying Round match in which for the second time in three weeks we will play South Park. This isn’t actually technically a replay, as, thanks to a decision by the FA, the game on 19th September never took place. That previous sentence sounds like a moan at the FA, but it’s far from it, in fact I’m extraordinarily grateful to them to giving us a second chance. Due to a bit of miscommunication behind the scenes, we didn’t pay an affiliation fee to the Surrey FA by the deadline, which apparently was 5pm on 19th September. This meant that all Kingstonian youth teams were suspended from playing until such time as this fee was paid. None of us at Merland Rise knew of this, so we played the game, won 5-1 and began to prepare for the next round.

I was made aware on Friday what had happened – I was frankly distraught, we were a suspended team, we played a match, surely that would be instant dismissal from the competition. Our case was made to the FA, who made their decision on Wednesday morning – that we would have to replay the South Park game. South Park absolutely deserve a second chance, after all they were beaten by a suspended team, none of this is their fault, so they don’t deserve to be out of the competition. Whether we deserve a second chance is another matter – the boys certainly do, they did nothing wrong, it’s us adults that need a kick up the behind for being so badly disorganised. This is something that a few of us have their hearts set on to rectify.

Whilst we will be favourites to win this match on Monday, it is safe to say that we will need to be more consistent during the game than we were for the annulled one. South Park were better than us in the first half, and could easily have led by more than the 1-0 scoreline they had at the break. We underestimated them in the first half and deserved to pay the price, but the character shown by our players in the second half was tremendous. We will need the second half attitude to progress to the next round and a trip to Chipstead. The winners of that tie, which will take place next week (probably on Wednesday 10th, given that the Chips’ home midweek date is usually Wednesday), go into the final qualifying round with an away tie against either Didcot Town or Bracknell Town, both grounds I’ve never been to. I’m getting ahead of myself, which I shouldn’t.

I am just pleased to still be part of an FA Youth Cup run, and I am thoroughly looking forward to seeing our team play on Monday.

And, for the first time in seemingly ages, I am looking forward to seeing the first team play, I hope Concord Rangers can get a result against Wroxham in the FA Cup tomorrow, which will allow us to make the journey on Tuesday night. If we have the same attitude over there that we did at home to Hendon and Lewes, then we stand a good chance of getting a good result.

Rooks and Swans beaten in bad night for birds

2011-09-27T21:45:00.001+01:00

A successful Monday night for Kingstonian - the first team defeated Lewes 1-0 and the increasingly impressive U18s defeated Walton and Hersham 3-0.

I went to the first team match, and it's been a long time since I've witnessed a quicker game of football - looking at various reactions to the game I think several Lewes people are being extremely harsh on their players, they looked a very good side last night, given our ordinary start to the season we had to step up our game significantly from our win two days earlier against Hendon to get the three points.

Once again the Ks team was unrecognisable from the Poole Town defeat. I am now getting the feeling that maybe that game in Dorset has ultimately done us a favour - not only did the management change the team around again but some players who previously were playing their way out through the exit door suddenly became the players we knew from last season.

During his interview on the Ks Web, Mark Hams has given two cases in point in Gary MacDonald and Tom Hutchinson - those guys looked, well..., gone, finito, especially after the Billericay and Poole games, yet against Hendon and Lewes they were the defensive giants that they were last season. I've mentioned Mo Harkin in my previous blog and until he twanged a troublesome hamstring late in the first half it was same again from him, Bashiru Alimi looked as up for a game as I've seen this season when he replaced Mo.

Whilst it's right that Alan Dowson is getting some credit for this, the players deserve credit as well. They must have been embarrassed after that run of defeats and the way they have reacted in the last two games is heartening. And we played some bloody good football during those games, we still lack confidence in front of goal but that will come.

I asked the question before as to whether we had turned the corner or not, I still don't know the answer to that, I suppose it's something to analyse halfway through a season or immediately after it - after all the way football is we are just as likely to go another demoralising losing streak as we are to continue in our winning ways.

Obviously, I'd much rather the latter scenario happened and we carried on up the table. My initial thoughts that we would challenge for the title do look rather foolish now, so no predictions in this particular blog will be forthcoming, well at least in this entry...!

The Under 18s played at home last night as well - if I had my way, we wouldn't have chosen Mondays for our home Under 18s night because it just causes stupid unnecessary problems (the management shouldn't have to waste their effort filling out the admin just because the secretary can't be there because he's needed with the first team). I don't have my way in this matter so we just get on with it.

Speaking with Mark Dunne tonight he said that we didn't actually play very well against Walton and Hersham, which given the 3-0 scoreline leaves me scratching my head a little. But anyway, three league games, three wins, three clean sheets. Not a bad start to the season at all. We have a bit of an issue regarding the FA Youth Cup which will determine whether we carry on in that or not, hopefully either way it will be sorted out soon as the next round is next week.

I've just realised that I haven't mentioned Liverpool in a few blogs - well, they're not doing too bad, but they're not yet in the class of Manchester United or Chelsea yet. That will have to wait a little longer (we've waited 21 years, another one won't hurt too much), but I did cringe when I read that director of football (still never worked out what the hell one of those is) Damien Comolli said that our squad was complete. An emphatic non from moi to toi, Monsieur Comolli. I look forward to you retracting that comment with mutterings of "lost in translation". A squad is never complete, especially one that needs to mature like Liverpool's.

There are still too many question marks as to the worthiness of some of the transfer fees, but for the most part Liverpool are moving along quite nicely with probably there being two main targets, a finish in the top four (eminently attainable) and a win or two at Wembley Stadium, though the League Cup draw hasn't been kind to us. Stoke City away has been a bad hunting ground already for the Reds this season, we will have to improve in order to go further in a competition that we seem to be taking very very seriously indeed, which is refreshing.

No game for Kingstonian this Saturday, wins for Poole Town and Harrow Borough saw to that, so it's feet up, watch as much rugby as possible, watch the Merseyside derby (by the way, how good a manager is David Moyes? Unbelievably good in my opinion, he gets no backing at all from his inept board, if it wasn't for him Everton would have sunk into the Championship and beyond years ago), and watch as much college American football as possible. Not a bad couch potato armchair sportsman type of Saturday...

A big effort brings a big win

2011-09-26T15:00:00.003+01:00

Saturday was the first time this season that we actually played well. As is usual in the scheme of things, it was against Hendon, who always seem to bear the brunt of any positive comeback from a Kingstonian poor spell.

As was usual, the changes were rung - disappearing out of the squad altogether on this day were Lynvall Duncan, Michael Gordon and Rocky Baptiste, with Dewayne Clarke dropping to the bench. Whether it was because he allowed himself to be interviewed by the Surrey Comet straight after the Poole game and said some honest things, I don't know.

Mo Harkin came into the squad and surprisingly was a starter, whilst Romone McCrae made his debut on loan from Sutton United and Ali Chaaban finally made his debut for the Ks - Dowse has been wanting to sign Ali for a long, long time now.

What we got was a good Kingstonian performance. For the most part we were solid at the back, solid in midfield (yes, folks, we actually had a midfield), and decent up front. The two forwards even got some service and even got some help from midfielders coming forward. In defence, for the first time this season we got to see the real MacDonald-Hutchinson partnership, whilst Neil Jenkins was superb (it will be a great shame to see him go back to Sutton when his loan ends) and Chris Page formed an excellent partnership with Mo Harkin.

The latter combination was what pleased me the most, as at least one of Poole's goals was the direct result of Chris Page getting hung out to dry by the laziness and tactical lack of awareness of the winger in front of him. You can read previous reports on the Ks website for his identity... Mo was a breath of fresh air, and whilst Sam Clayton deservedly earned lots of plaudits, Mo was massive in the midfield, in fact it was a Mo that we haven't seen since the play-off semi-final against Sutton United.

Sam Clayton has actually been consistently one of our best players all season, I'd personally like to see him start more games as he's an honest guy with a bit of pace (not masses of it, but enough) and a decent shot. I just wish we could see him shoot some more.

Ali Chaaban and Bobby Traynor were having competitions to see who could work the harder - at one stage after a corner from our guys broke down, who was the last defender snuffing out the Hendon threat? Ali Chaaban.

Probably the one down side to the game was the finishing of the Ks players, which to be honest is understandable. We've had four games of not scoring, for much of those games not even threatening to score, and there must have been some anxiety whenever the chance came to shoot, too often we passed up a shooting chance in order for another pass. What we needed a bit more often was taking a chance, just in case the ball bounced off a defender's bum and into the net. That's all you need.

And our winner was in that category, as a Hendon player was adjudged (one of those words only ever used in sport) to have handled in the box. Bobby Traynor looked calm when he took the spot kick, I doubt he or anyone else was, but the job was done and we managed to hold on for an important win.

So, have we turned a corner? I hope so, but you can't tell. We thought we had when we defeated Tooting 4-1 at the Imperial Fields, but then we went into a four-game hell spell, so to speak. It's a tough task we face tonight when Lewes are the visitors but if we can match Saturday's attitude and work rate, we can get a positive result. No way is it going to be easy, but we can do it.

It's a good feeling to feel able to applaud the team off the pitch, it must be a good feeling to be applauded off the pitch, so hopefully our guys can remember that feeling and do their best to get it again (and again, yes I'm greedy).

Struck dumb by Poole defeat

2011-09-19T15:51:00.001+01:00

We've had some bad times this season, Saturday was possibly the worst as Poole Town brushed Kingstonian aside with some ease in the FA Cup, letting the Ks off with just a 3-0 win. The script was the same as for the previous three games - decent start, let in a goal, confidence goes bang, we don't score ourselves and the game is surrendered.

This time there wasn't the outburst of anger from the travelling faithful, although one would have understood if it had happened. It was a group of supporters, myself included, just practically struck dumb by what had happened. I didn't know how to react, to be honest I still don't, and I'm not particularly looking forward to scrawling my next editor's notes for the forthcoming Hendon game.

I don't see the point of slamming everyone and everything, I do think there are certain players in the squad that I don't think are fit to wear the Ks shirt but ultimately we have a group of reasonably talented players continually going to pieces on the football field, and I don't think me ripping them to shreds in my next notes will solve very much at all.

And I can't rip them to shreds in this piece either, because I don't know where to begin. Two days later and I am still (almost) dumbfounded by what I saw during my first visit to a football ground in Dorset.

All this moaning does Poole Town a severe disservice - they are so obviously a club on the up and once the first goal went in, they played us off the park and the club has oodles of potential waiting to be fulfilled. On the evidence of the short visit there on Saturday, they deserve to continue in their vein of success.

It's FA Youth Cup night tonight, home to South Park at Merland Rise. Kick-off can't come soon enough for me.

A wild and crazy week

2011-09-16T16:20:00.002+01:00

And it’s not over yet.
A week that began with disappointment in Hastings has ended with immense pride and overjoyousness in Whyteleafe, with much of my heart and soul celebrating in my body’s absence in Taunton.

Tuesday was the trip to Hastings United. I love the Pilot Field as a ground, I have no idea why as I’ve never actually won a match there (I missed last season’s last gasp victory), but if I had to sit down and think up a list of favourite grounds, the Pilot Field would be very high indeed (strangely enough the Kingsmeadow wouldn’t rank very high…but that’s something for another blog sometime).

After the really bad games against Billericay and Wealdstone, it was with a little trepidation that I set down in the cavernous main stand for the Hastings match. For 42 and a bit minutes, it was going remarkably well. The much-changed-again team, minus some players who have been released, put some fantastic effort into the game and could quite easily have put the hosts away. Sadly for us, though, we didn’t manage to score and, as luck would have it, Hastings zoomed down the other end and scored what turned out to be the winning goal. It was definitely a blow, not shattering as I felt we got a little self-respect creeping back in, but it was a blow hard enough for heads to drop and not until the closing stages of the second half did we look like threatening the Hastings goal again.

All in all, a disappointing defeat but I’m hoping that a corner of sorts has been turned as the attitude of the team was very much different from the previous two games – it was the reaction we needed to see at the Wealdstone game but didn’t. Saturday sees us visit Poole Town, who although a division below us, will not be afraid of playing us. In fact, we may be seen as an opponent there for the taking, and Poole may even go into this game as favourites. That’s fine by me if that’s the case.

The week has been immensely stressful, and most of it has undoubtedly been because of putting myself in a world of fret following Lancashire’s last match of the season. For most of the season, the Red Rose has been there or thereabouts in the County Championship race, and dreams came alive once again that so many years of hurt could finally be extinguished and the title could be claimed at last. However, Warwickshire had hit the front at precisely the right time for them and led by a small margin going into the last game. A spine-tingling win for Lancashire in the last home game at Aigburth against Hampshire kept us in touch, but a trip to Taunton was always going to be difficult.

When Warwickshire went ballistic on Hampshire in their first innings and then forced the follow-on, things looked bleak. We had battled to a 100-run lead in the first innings in our match, so we had put ourselves in a position to win our particular match but when Warwickshire took three quick Hampshire wickets in the second innings, it was inevitable that the Bears would win their match and thence the title. Cue one of the most remarkable days of county cricket – Hampshire batted and batted and batted and batted, Lancashire messed about trying to get Somerset’s tail to stop wagging. In the end, shortly before tea, Gary Keedy, an all-time Lancashire hero, he will certainly be inducted into a Lancashire Hall of Fame if there was one, somehow ran out Somerset’s number eleven. Astonishingly, it was the first run out that Keeds had enacted in his 17 year Lancashire career. Amazingly, Hampshire were still batting and even had a lead.

Lancashire needed 211 in about 28 overs to win the match. An awkward total, definitely room for panic stations and a potential quick skittling. It didn’t happen. As Hampshire carried on batting, reality dawned. This wasn’t a chase to win the match and hope for the best, this was a chase to win the title. And, incredibly, the result was never in doubt, a century opening partnership paving the way for the ultimate Lancastrian cricketing dream to become, at about 5.15pm on Thursday 15th September 2011, very real reality. A few minutes earlier, Warwickshire shook hands with Hampshire on a draw, and then Karl Brown and Steven Croft finished off the job that Paul Horton and Stephen Moore started, and 77 years after last winning the title outright, Lancashire were at last County Champions.

It can’t be underestimated the importance of the County Championship to Lancashire supporters. It became a millstone around our necks, something that we cherished yet, until yesterday, could not touch. All those Lord’s finals in the 70s, 80s and 90s were lovely, especially the ones we won, but I could swap them all for one County Championship. It’s ironic that it’s come in a season in which we didn’t expect too much. I asked the cricket correspondent of the Manchester Evening News on Twitter what our chances would be, and he replied that we wouldn’t have the batting to challenge strongly in the Championship but we would do well in the one-day competitions. In the event, we were semi-finalists in the Twenty20 (losing in a replay!) and didn’t do too well in the Forty40 or whatever the heck it’s called these days.

It’s also ironic that the Championship has been won when no games have been played at Old Trafford, with all home County Championship games being farmed out to the so-called out-grounds, such as Blackpool, Southport and (most ironic of all considering the rivalry between Manchester and Liverpool) Aigburth.

It is still a shock that Lancashire did indeed win the County Championship, I am still expecting Warwickshire to pull through a day after the event and I am still looking at the BBC and the Cricinfo websites just to check that it did actually happen – knowing my luck some kid from St Elsewhere will shake up a snow globe and it will all be somebody’s extraordinarily vivid fantasy…(firstly fantasising about cricket is frankly worrying and secondly look up St Elsewhere on Wikipedia to help understand that last obscure sentence). I hope it’s less than 77 years before the next one.

It has taken a while to calm down, not only the excitement of fulfilling a life’s ambition – to be alive when Lancashire win the County Championship, seriously that was an ambition of mine that I thought might never be fulfilled – but the Kingstonian U18s followed it up with a 5-0 win away to Whyteleafe in the Ryman Youth League.

Last season, Ks lost just two U18s games, away to Chipstead and away to Whyteleafe. As fate would have it, they were our first two matches this season, and the results ended up being very different. Chipstead were beaten 3-0 in our opening match, I still think the scoreline flattered us slightly, but last night at Church Road we put five past Whyteleafe without reply in what at times was a bad tempered affair. I’m trying to calm down about the U18s team but we’ve played three times now and three times we’ve produced some wonderful passing football which has given the opposition little chance. Chipstead were by far the closest so far to scoring against us, Eastbourne Borough and Whyteleafe were given very little opportunity.

However, there’s a lot of quality in our division, it’s probably stronger that last year – it has to be with Woking and Tooting being added to the mix – but we’re going to at least be a match for anyone if we carry on in this way. The lads have set a high standard in the first three games, it will be a job to keep it up as the season goes on but this is a very confident set of players (almost to the point of arrogance, I’m undecided as to whether we should try to keep a lid on that), they know they can play, as long as they stay solid at the back and don’t get over-confident then we can have a fun season.

We have an FA Youth Cup match with South Park on Monday – if the first team draw at Poole tomorrow I will not be at the Kingsmeadow for the replay as I’m needed more at Merland Rise – it’s one of those games that you would think we would win, but football has a habit of biting people in the backside. If we play to the best of our ability then we stand a good chance of advancing one more round.

So, the FA Cup looms tomorrow, a difficult match beckons. We’re going into it with our eyes wide open, we can definitely win the game, we can certainly lose the game, as long as we give it everything.

Ohhhhhhhh Lanky Lanky – Lanky Lanky Lanky Lanky Lankyshire!!!

Where do we go from here?

2011-09-12T16:56:00.003+01:00

Simple answer is Hastings, as that’s where our next game is, tomorrow night. It follows on from another desperately disappointing afternoon in which we had the floor wiped with us, this time by a Wealdstone team ever eager to record a big win without having to hit third gear or above. This time it was slightly better than the Billericay game in the sense that we competed for about twenty minutes, then the Stones scored and that was that. In terms of who was going to win the game, it was over, the remaining minutes dedicated to how many Wealdstone would win by. They seemed happy enough with three. Wealdstone didn’t play fantastically well themselves, but in the Stones’ defence they didn’t have to play well to be too good for us and on the day I suspect that they will have been able to up the ante should it have been deemed necessary.

Once again there were Ks players not trying, and once again there were so many not trying that it was difficult to differentiate between the ones who weren’t from the ones who were and were being dragged down (I think we can leave Neil Jenkins out of any analysis as this was his first game of the season after a long injury and his debut on loan from Sutton, I shudder to comprehend what he must have been thinking…).

There were a number of changes to the Kingstonian side from the one that rolled over against Billericay, but it seemed like same again – Bobby worked damn hard as usual, but was given no support at all. Rocky Baptiste made his debut for us, well, in theory the only way is up. Chris Page came back into the team and I thought did ok, Jerome Maledon came back as well but was as anonymous as the rest of the midfield, who might as well have worn hula hoops as our opposition ran rings around them for the second game running. The line-up was pretty much what could have been expected before the season started, except we had no clue who would partner Bobby and Neil Jenkins came in for the suspended (and now recently operated on) Tom Bird, so in very many ways the Wealdstone defeat was much more depressing than the Billericay one, even more so if you add in the factors of being at home and being safe in the knowledge that a positive reaction was desperately needed in order to steady the ship. Instead, some more holes were drilled in the hull.

Inevitably, at the final whistle, there were a few cat-calls and demands for resignation, I understand that, people are paying out a lot of money and not getting any product in return at the moment. Happily, though, those making demands for managerial blood will continue to be disappointed and no doubt will continue to attend Kingstonian games to moan, which is their right, just as it is my right to criticise them for what I perceive to be over-moaning. Whilst it’s justified right now, it will still continue if and when we start winning games again. Yes, Dowse is guilty of bringing in some bad players (name me a manager who hasn’t), or good players who haven’t fit for whatever reason, but he is still the best man for the job and he is the hardest working man I have ever seen in football (Hamsey’s the second hardest working man I have ever seen in football).

And I can guarantee one…actually two things…one, Dowse will work his absolute hardest to turn this mess around and two, the board will give him the longest time and biggest encouragement possible to turn it around. It won’t be for the want of trying.

The day before the game after the debacle

2011-09-09T11:30:00.002+01:00

Debacle...very tabloid-y word...and I don't read any newspapers...

Well, no I'm still not over what happened in Billericay, and it was difficult to scrawl something in the editor's notes for tomorrow's programme without slamming the players so completely that they would either lynch me or go even further into a hole that Wealdstone would be favoured to outscore the All Blacks.

The reaction to Saturday's game will be fascinating to view. It will be with a sense of trepidation as, despite having only won one game themselves, Wealdstone are a good team and have won three games in a row against us.

Quite who will be wearing the hooped shirts tomorrow is a complete mystery to me, sadly no-one excelled themselves at Billericay, some even told me that they're not even worthy of wearing the shirt. Hopefully I'm wrong about the latter category but the most damaging thing to me on Saturday was the lack of heart in the team. OK, the team was slightly weaker because of injury, suspension and weddings, but we can't blame either the defeat or the manner of the defeat on them.

We can put a lot of blame on Billericay, who buzzed us to distraction like a swarm of blue bees, they were outstanding on the day and could quite easily have scored more than the six that they did. I think we need to give Craig Edwards and his team quite a lot of credit.

The U18s have, as usual, been a life-saver for the morale. A massively important 3-0 win away to Chipstead, a place in which we traditionally lose at U18s level, was followed by a comprehensive win in the FA Youth Cup against Eastbourne Borough on Monday night. The only surprise was that we won 2-0, thanks to a penalty by goalkeeper Joe White in the first half and then a nice finish by Matthew Rose-Hazel in the second half. I had kittens when I saw Joe running up to take the penalty, but I didn't know that he's our regular penalty taker...if there's one thing Joe doesn't lack, it's confidence.

And speaking of confidence, I absolutely loved Ben Cheklit's comments last night on the Ks Web. He addressed the old chestnut of whether our U18s could make the jump into the first team squad, well, he not only addressed it, but he franked and stamped it as well saying that he and a lot of his team mates could do a better job than those in the first team. The challenge for him and his mates now is to carry on proving it for the U18s, back up those words with performances and results and force Dowse to give them a chance. (The same goes for any player appearing in the Ks Academy.)

If they carry on in the way that they've shown in their first two games, I'll be clamouring for their inclusion, don't worry about that...four or five of them have already shown me something in their standard of play and in their attitude. I don't know them well enough just yet but for the second consecutive season I'm bloody excited about the prospects for our U18s, can't wait for the visit to Whyteleafe (the other place our U18s lost at last season in the league).

A considered reaction to the Billericay game

2011-09-04T09:34:00.002+01:00

My God, Kingstonian were ****.

Sorry, that's as eloquent as I can get at the moment...

I get forced into these rants, you know...

2011-08-28T16:30:00.000+01:00

I haven't seen the league table, but I understand from a Kingstonian point of view, it looks bad. One point from nine is all I need to know, and that by any standards is not good.

I have seen plenty of positives from our first three games, but certainly some negatives as well. The quick negatives to point out (apart from losing twice at home) is that we're missing way too many chances, and into the bargain not forcing the goalkeeper to make enough saves, thirdly we're making too many individual mistakes that have led to several soft goals.

Both Canvey Island's goals, albeit well taken by the Canvey forwards, were softer than eider duck feathers. The first came was a fine shot but should have been defended easily. Their second was the direct result of an experienced player in midfield making a mistake that if it was made by one of the U18s then I would be going ballistic.

The effort was there yesterday, no problems with that, once again we played some lovely football, once again I thought we did enough to win, but once again we got done over by a team with more determination in front of goal.

I hear the moans from certain people that we need another striker, but not many clubs have two quality strikers. At the end of last season we had two of the very best at Ryman League level, but we lost one through no fault of our (or his) own.

Quality strikers do not grow on trees, in my time at Ks until Bobby Traynor came along we hadn't actually had one - Tim Sills was very good but didn't have the support he deserved from the rest of the time (in retrospect it's no surprise he did so well later in his career), other guys did their best but not close to Traynor standard.

Another concern I have at the moment is that I am feeling that too many people are putting too much pressure on the shoulders of Dewayne Clarke, who is available to make his debut for us at the Imperial Fields tomorrow afternoon. I very much hope that Dewayne is what we've been missing, as the little we saw of him in Kingstonian's injury-blighted pre-season (the number of injured players we've had since start of play in July has been nonsensical) was excellent, I think he's the type of player who makes his team-mates better players, but I can't expect too much from him tomorrow, it's not fair on him.

Having said all this, I am getting severely appalled by some of the comments I am hearing and reading from some people. Some people are making a career of cricitising us at every turn, whether we win, lose or draw.

It is the same at every club, I remember visiting Anfield once and all I could hear from somone sitting behind me was "fuck off Barnes" for 80 minutes until John scored a wonder goal and then this same moron was so in love with John Barnes the next level up would have been to offer to have his babies. Two-faced bastard.

Similar at Kingsmeadow - except the modern way of supporting football is by telling your own players and managers to fuck off, to get the hell out of the Kingsmeadow, to never dare to breathe the same air as I, the most eminent football expert on God's green earth. And then to spend the rest of the week moping in silence when the team this person's allegedly "supports" actually wins a football match. I hate these people. I would actually like them to go out of the exit door and not come back. They exist to see "their" team lose, and they exist to verbally or scribally (sorry, forgotten the word) abuse "their" players, "their" managers, as if it's ok to do so. It isn't, so please leave, go away, don't go to another club either because I wouldn't wish other clubs to have you as "supporters", they don't deserve you either.

Some of the trash comes from people who are either supporters of other clubs, to whom I offer my sincere thanks because obviously we're still important enough to write idiotic abuse about, so that's a victory for us; or maybe they're former (sometimes maybe even current) players whose attitudes stink and blame everyone else but themselves for actually not being very good.

And no, persuading these people to do something more useful, like chasing after butterflies, will not mean that our attendances will go down. There are reasons why our attendances are not good, in my opinion it doesn't come down to allegedly poor standard of play and it certainly doesn't come down to the existence of AFC Wimbledon. That might be for a future blog, though, but having said that I'd rather any thoughts came out in a face to face meeting, which is something I have the opportunity to do in the near future (something I'm very grateful for).

As you can see from my comments above, I have questions about the team and team performance myself. Alan Dowson is a good friend of mine but our friendship doesn't mean that I think AD does everything perfectly, and I'm quite sure that Alan reads some of my stuff and wonders what the bloody hell I'm on about.

But just as I'm probably the best man for the job of programme editor (I must be ok if this is my 11th season as editor for this brilliant football club that I never supported until they asked me to join them), Alan Dowson is the best, most inspirational manager I have worked with. I have been with some duffers, but I've also worked with Billy Smith, John Rains, Tommy Warrilow, Steve Sedgley and Ian McDonald, all brilliant men and football managers, Alan Dowson easily joins that list, and together with his outstanding management team, they will get it right, I think things will have to change, they will change, we will start to climb that table soon and win games on a regular basis - as long as we stop doing stupid things on the field...

Another thing to rant about, I get constantly tired with some people's attitudes towards other clubs. I'll keep this one shorter, but I have read several supremely ill-informed comments about a league or a club being "tinpot" just because they get small crowds.

What a magnificently snobbish comment that is, absoloutely breathtaking in its arrogance as well.

I have friends at bigger clubs than us, at so-called smaller clubs than us, and at clubs definitely smaller than us. They all have one thing in common, which is their love of football - what people need to realise is that it takes just as much work, sometimes so much more work, to run a CCL1 club than it does to run a Conference South team.

Just because a club can only attract 50, 100, 150, whatever numbers of spectators to a game, it does not mean that the club is poorly run (and frankly a Kingstonian supporter cannot take the higher ground on a silly argument like this), lots of times a club like this is actually quite brilliantly run and is worth looking at by the so-called bigger club in order to learn something. So, get off your high horse and concentrate on supporting your own team.

Here's to a more positive day tomorrow away to Tooting and Mitcham and then a good start to the season for my under 18s at Chipstead. Bring 'em both on.

An indifferent start

2011-08-23T13:18:00.000+01:00

An indifferent pre-season has been rapidly followed by an indifferent start to the regular season, and whilst I cannot fault the players so far for their heart, questions have to already be asked as to the credibility of claims (some of them mine) that we will challenge for honours. Whilst I am currently unshakable in my belief that we can do just that, things will have to improve rapidly before the large pack of other realistic title contenders fly off into the distance.

We had mitigating circumstances to not winning at Aveley, having played for 70 minutes with ten men after Tom Bird's unfortunate but correct sending off for a badly mistimed two-footed tackle. I was more relieved that the Aveley man got up than our plight to be honest because whilst the tackle wasn't malicious, it was very dangerous indeed. A goalless draw in a match of many chances was a decent reward for our efforts.

Last night at Horsham was a crazy game. Firstly, I have to be honest and say that I'm not fond of what's been done with the seating arrangements that have been done to replace the press box, it means I am stuck in a seat all afternoon with not much leg room instead of having a small yet valuable space to do a minor amount of pacing up and down if necessary. This is something I'm going to have to get used to however. Sitting outside instead of inside a press box is, having said all that, not a problem, but of course it won't be in the relative warmth of the latter days of August.

We got beat 4-3 last night thanks to a hat-trick by Tony Nwachukwu, who was magnificent on the night. Having said that, though, at least three of the four Horsham goals were poor defensively, thinking about it Nwachukwu's brilliant first was caused by our inability to tackle him in the first place. You can't let in four goals, home or away, and expect to get away with it. So, despite the utter dejection caused by the winner being scored in the 92nd minute, we did get what we deserved, which was nothing.

So, our defence, excellent on paper, has to improve quickly as a unit, Tom H and Gary Mac were their usual massive selves but three of the Horsham goals were breakaways, they need more help than they received last night.

And Bobby Traynor desperately needs more help up front - he got it from Tom Hutchinson and Simon Huckle last night with their goals (Simon's was a sublime finish) but Bobby needs better than the ice hockey tactic of dumping the ball into the corners and expecting Bobby to win every cause, most of which are lost from the outset using this tactic. Bobby was very rarely fed the ball in a dangerous area last night and that has to be changed for the visit of Canvey Island on Saturday, unless the people around him pick up their games we are in mortal danger of becoming what we've been (in my rose-tinted eyes falsely) accused of for five years - easy to defend against if you mark Bobby out of the game.

No problems at all with the character of the team last night, we fought hard, created plentiful chances, it was a bit of a war sometimes in midfield, but four goals conceded at home is a painful thing to witness, especially when we're supposed to be promotion candidates and especially when our defence is supposed to be rock solid. But we'll get it right, I'm confident of that, we have some damn good players, one or two I'm not sure about, but I know it'll come good very soon. Saturday against Canvey Island would be very nice.

Pre-season in full flow

2011-07-31T16:49:00.000+01:00

The last few weeks have been busy, football has started again. And not before time, as the wait for it to start again has been difficult.

My health issues are improving slightly, I've even started to take a new medication which involves injecting myself, which was a worry beforehand but now it's like falling off a bike (having never learned to ride one...), it's that easy. One of the side effects of the medication is apparently to lose weight through changes in brain patterns demanding food, it might be a placebo effect but so far the urge and desire to eat all day is receding at the moment.

My depression is manageable in the last week or so, there was a release of emotional tension a while back caused by reading a children's book that hit a heart string or hundred that made me feel so much better for a variety of reasons. Rosey didn't intend that reaction when she handed me the book (I can't remember the title but it had something to do with a velveteen rabbit), but it had what I'd like to think was a positive effect. The temporary blog about the black dog, I've just decided it's temporary, did its job as well in articulating some thoughts that needed to come out in the open.

Work has improved from my point of view, the workload has increased unbelievably, though in the back of my mind I wonder whether it will be a temporary thing. "Enjoy" it while it lasts.

The major down is that my dad is not well at all, he's in the early throes of dementia (or something like it), which was not good to see when I visited him last week, and he's in hospital having broken his hip and had to have a replacement fitted. The hip (hopefully) can fix, but seeing him in that mental state was actually a bit of a wake-up call for me. It's desperately sad to see my dad, an intelligent, caring man, sometimes looking like he's in another world. Just desperately sad.

Thankfully, the home pre-season campaign for Kingstonian is over. We get three pre-season home games, and I think we chose well with our opposition, as Sutton United, the Glenn Hoddle Academy and Woking were all terrifically hard opponents, all better than us but we I think we did well in all the games.

Sutton ended up thumping us 5-1, it really was a game of two halves as we held our own in the first half and got stuffed comprehensively in the second half when Sutton's superior bench dominated ours. Sutton were definitely better than us in that first half, deserved their 1-0 lead, but we competed well and I was happy with that.

The Glenn Hoddle Academy game was outstanding, but the refereeing was mystifying. The GHA, as I expected, proved to be a raw and highly skilled team and they were very pleasing to watch. We held in there, though the closest we came to scoring in the first 89 minutes was probably from their goalkeeper doing a near Gary Sprake impression in chucking the ball into his own net, this effort scraped the post. We equalised in the last minute from the penalty spot, and even now I am mystified as to what the penalty was for. Good job it was a "friendly"...

Woking yesterday were far and away the best team we've faced in pre-season. They were outstanding, they played superb football and deserved to win the Trevor Jones Memorial Trophy thanks to two goals from Moses Ademola. However, in places during this game we played well, in fact for most of these three games we played well, and pre-season has done nothing to dissuade me from my original opinion that we will challenge for the title.

I admit that there are several clubs with realistic ambitions of winning the Ryman Premier, but we are most certainly one of them. The bookies make us third or fourth favourites but looking at the table of odds, I'm not convinced they know that much about football at our level as some teams have odds that even tempt me to put an each way on them.

The one thing that does concern me is not so much that we're desperately in need of a second striker. We were spoiled when we had the Traynor-Vines partnership and it would have been nice to have them together this season, but it's not going to happen unfortunately. I think the cries for the second striker are a little disrespectful to the guys we already have, however not so disrespectful that I dismiss those comments completely. As Isthmian Veterans Cup winners' medallist Rex said last season, where we fell down was that Bobby was not getting help. If Bobby doesn't score, Kingstonian don't score, it's been said by several opposition managers that you can defend Bobby Traynor and that gives you a fantastic chance of winning.

Whilst I like Mo Harkin, to take an example, I think he's a good player, he's fun to watch when he's on form, but one goal from his efforts in midfield is woeful. Matt Gray didn't score enough, Simon Huckle's goalscoring ratio fell, I think you know my views about another former Ks player who's run off to Colston Avenue, basically the bottom line is that Bobby Traynor did not get enough support in the goalscoring stakes from our midfield, and it's no coincidence that it's in midfield where we have seen the most recruitment.

Hopefully the new recruits, the vast majority of whom have been mightily impressive so far, will take some of the pressure off Bobby, and if that happens, we get an even better Bobby. As I've said before, I like our chances, I have one or two reservations, I am respectful of all our opponents but afraid of none of them, we are going to be strong this time out. Whether it's strong enough, time will tell, but (to re-quote once again an old Liverpool FC stock phrase) if we play every game to the best of our ability, then we stand a good chance.

With a tinge of regret...

2011-06-17T11:43:00.002+01:00

I have no problem at all with what Paul Vines has done. I am just disappointed that he won’t be a Kingstonian player next season as I know he would have done very good things for us. Instead, thanks to Carshalton Athletic offering terms we could not hope to match (don’t get me wrong, I’m not offering out the begging bowl here, it’s just that the Robins’ offer is jaw dropping), it will be Colston Avenue that will be graced by Paul’s unquestionably high skill rate. With them signing Laurent Hamici as well, you can automatically put Carshalton high in the list of potential champions (though the manager and his “politics” provide a massive question mark). I wish Paul well…but only in 40 games of the season.

My problem with the Paul Vines situation is possibly with me. Not me individually but with me, with Dowse, with Ali, with the way we do things sometimes. With Ali being on holiday, Dowse phoned me up and asked me to mention that we had six players to agree to return to the Ks in a pseudo press release on the Ks Web. He also asked me to mention that we were talking with Paul Vines and we were hoping for some good news soon, so I did.

We have an unwritten policy about releasing news at Kingstonian – we think that we are very forthcoming with issuing bits of news, but we recognise the need to be careful. Where we do go wrong sometimes is that we react to some Kingstonian supporters and rush things out just because they are impatient, Ali and I go to Dowse (sometimes it’s the other way round but not as likely) and ask for information for the website to appease the impatient people.

I do get unnecessarily wound up when people go on the website, put stuff on there and people react to it as if it’s fact (and one person thinks it’s brilliant to say this news is confirmed, when I seriously don’t have a clue myself…). Even when we explain why we’ve delayed publicising something, in my case it’s in the probably forlorn task that someone will read what we’re saying and understand why we’re saying what we’re saying when we’re saying that we’re not saying anything…

With my announcement that we had not yet signed Paul Vines, that gave other clubs the green light to say that we had possibly dropped the ball and one of our prized assets was not yet secured, so let’s try and get him. I’m not saying that’s what happened, but it could have happened. Maybe Carshalton would have found out another way, the probability is that they will have done, but the episode certainly has me pondering whether our policy about releasing news is actually correct.

We try to be honest, but this episode leaves me wondering whether that should be our policy…to leave everyone wondering… Something to ponder, methinks…

On the road again...soon...+ announcing a new blog

2011-06-15T17:03:00.000+01:00

First things first, a couple of apologies – I have been away on holiday and as you can tell from some previous posts, I haven’t been the happiest person in the world in recent weeks. So, sorry for not updating the blog, and sorry also for dragging the blog down on stuff that seems to have deviated from the spirit of the blog’s remit.

Unfortunately, that kinda continued in Berlin during the holiday. Anyway…what I have decided to do is start another blog, because I have decided that it’s wrong of me to clog this particular blog with tales of the black dog. I’m a poet and I don’t know it… If you’re interested enough in my unending battle (it’s a bit one sided currently) with the black dog (who is winning), please tune in to http://blackdogandme.blogspot.com/ - there’s a couple of things there at the moment, but in general stuff like that will be, well, not so much consigned as re-allocated to my black dog blog.

Several books I have read and am currently reading are united in recommending writing lists about moods, feelings, etc. I think I’m happier doing that on a blog rather than a day-to-a-page diary, which I’d lose very quickly amongst the flotsam and jetsam at the flat, so that is what I will do, and leave the Kingstonian Scouser to the football and other sports.

There’s a threat that the football season is on the verge of thinking about getting under way. About time too, as I’m in a desperate need to get on that particular proverbial bicycle once again. There is still an anger in me (yes, it is still that strong) when I think about that second half away to Margate. I’d like to think that I am not the only one, and that there will be this desperation for the Ks to use that hurt and disappointment as a fuel to get us motoring next season.

I am not usually one to set lofty targets, two seasons ago it was that we “did something positive”, I seriously can’t remember what the target I set was for last season (whatever it was, we didn’t attain it), this season I may not be realistic, but I frankly couldn’t care less.

The target for this season is to win the league. Cue gales of laughter from Suffolk, Essex, Kent, Surrey and London. But, bothered I am not.

We certainly didn’t have a squad good enough to finish above Sutton United, but we were as good as the likes of those that got into those play-offs. However, we committed a heinous crime. We didn’t want it enough and sometimes we didn’t give it everything. And that’s not acceptable. Too many times we lost or drew a match because we did something unintelligent or succumbed to the superior will of the opposition. I do hate that from a football team, I’d rather be part of an inferior team that gives everything every game than a supposedly good one that likes to coast.

Anyway, I want us to use that anger and take it out as much as possible on the rest of the Premier Division. Once again it will be a tight division with over half the teams having a realistic opportunity to at least get into the play-offs, with a couple that not many would think of staying in the race on merit as well (who’d have thought, for example, Harrow Borough being so good for the entire season? Apart from their manager, David Howell, that is…).

I don’t know yet about any ins and outs, I have heard a couple of rumours and was told by Dowse about one or two but I seriously can’t remember. I know what I think we need (a bit of steel in midfield being priority number one for me), but Dowse and Hamsey are the experts and they will get it right. They are good at learning from their experiences (good or bad) and I am sure that they will assemble a powerful squad with (I hope) an exhausting work ethic brimming with determination and no over-confidence at all (a common fault of Ks teams, look at our stunningly bad record against relegation threatened teams).

Tomorrow will be the first visit back to the Kingsmeadow since April. Work has apparently started on the ground in preparation for Wimbledon’s debut in the Football League, including the demolition of my home for Ks matches for the last ten years, the press box. It will be replaced by two rows of journalists’ spaces complete with internet access and electricity access, one of which will be taken up by the microphone man. I just hope I can fit. It’s ironic that the website I’m working on (in order to sell stuff that I make) is called Press Box Books…more of which in the future if I stick to working at it…

A nice way to finish the season

2011-05-27T12:23:00.002+01:00

It was an outstanding night at Craven Cottage at the final of the Women’s Champions League, yet it very nearly didn’t happen for us. When I walked down the Sutton High Street to meet Rosey outside her office, the heavens opened for the umpteenth time that day, but this time it was rain with a capital R-A-I-N. Rosey came out of the office, we looked at the weather and debated for a long time whether we should bother going. Rosey worried about whether the game would go ahead (with it being a UEFA organised event, I think only Craven Cottage sliding into the Thames would have stopped the game), I worried about, well…everything as usual.

Suddenly, the rain relented slightly, we decided to see how it went, we caught the bus which very very very slowly made its way to Morden before another one made its way with equal haste to Wimbledon, and then the District Line to Putney Bridge and a walk through Bishop’s Park and to the ground. We got there with about half an hour to spare, so there was no problem.

It had been thirty years since my last visit to Craven Cottage, and obviously it had almost completely changed. For a start, someone took out the rugby league posts and replaced them with football goals, which was convenient… Some of it was the same, I saw the cottage itself, thankfully (I believe) a protected building, I didn’t see the Michael Jackson statue so that was a bonus, some of the steps at the top of the Johnny Haynes Stand were so large I wanted to call out for mountaineering gear after the game…, but overall Craven Cottage was a ground I thoroughly enjoyed visiting.

Our view of the pitch was excellent, in fact apart from one group who decided to arrive just before half time, the view was uninterrupted for virtually the whole evening. The Fulham PA system left a lot to be desired, it was certainly clearer to listen to in the pissoir I visited than it was actually in the stadium itself, they needed to turn the sound up a touch and it would have been fine. Pre-match entertainment was someone I didn’t recognise singing a strange version of Fleetwood Mac’s Big Love (what I could hear of it, which wasn’t a lot) and also (like it was at half time) people waving a lot of flags. Rosey made the excellent comment that there would be a complaint filed against Fulham because a semaphore speaker just got accidentally sworn at by the flag wavers.

The game itself was outstanding. Olympique Lyonnais were the better team all night and deserved to win 2-0, though Turbine Potsdam will have regretted missing several easy chances to score at least one. As I had expected, the game was skilful and quick, the lack of power of the players (I say “lack of” but that’s just in comparison to the top male players) amply compensated for by the high skill levels and mostly slick passing moves. The Lyonnais were the more exciting team, though, and the celebrations at the full time whistle were very heartening indeed, even if it was unfortunate to have to see the distraught Potsdam players with heads in hands and wanting very much to get away.

If that’s the best that Europe can offer when it comes to women’s football, then it’s in a very healthy condition indeed.

14,303 went to the game, which was great reward for UEFA and its pricing policy of tickets for a fiver (yikes, praising UEFA for ticket pricing…I must be unwell…), the programme for £2 was outstanding value as well, but please someone contact the local council and tell them to put some lighting in Bishop’s Park, as a walk through that in pitch darkness was not a pleasant experience at all. There seems to be some renovations going on in and around the park, I did see a couple of signs protesting the existence of some kind of “super sewer”, but it was definitely something different sharing a walk in a park in the darkness with several hundred other football fans…

We managed to get home at about midnight, which wasn’t too bad (I do recommend the KFC boneless banquet, especially with the gravy), overall it was a really good way to end the 2010-11 season. Pre-season friendlies are being arranged as I type, so hopefully the 2011-12 diary will begin to fill up soon, even more so when the FA draws and the league fixtures come out.

An attempt at trying to be slightly more positive...

2011-05-26T16:58:00.002+01:00

Right…try to be positive…try to be positive…

At least I’m a bit more positive about my up and coming holiday, due to start on Saturday. I have always wanted to go to Germany, never been, so Rosey and I will be spending a week in Berlin, staying at a self-catering place not far from the Fernsehturm, I’m guessing that we’re actually staying in what used to be the mysterious (to us Westerners) East Berlin. I am hoping that our studio flat will have a view of said television tower. I’ve been worrying about this blinkin’ ash cloud that has been shooting out from one of the Icelandic volcanoes glaciers – I’m getting ever more convinced that it’s the Icelandic secret service switching on a mechanism designed to punish the British and the Dutch for demanding the Icelandic people pay for something they had nothing to do with. That’s another story, though…

Anyway, Berlin Tegel airport was temporarily closed yesterday, but all seems to be good at the moment, hopefully the ash will disperse and we won’t spend all week at Heathrow. I haven’t done as much homework for a holiday as I usually do (spending too long in that “low place”), so I haven’t got a list of “places I need to visit”. I don’t think one will be necessary, though.

In July we’re off to Liverpool on a trip that will coincide with our 14th wedding anniversary. And still no regrets, can you believe that? Whaddya mean, no?

Isn’t it ironic that the season Lancashire are forced to leave Old Trafford for County Championship games and mainly use Aigburth as their home that they have the best start to a season in my lifetime? Five wins from six games, and that sixth game was drawn because of the bravery of Sussex’s last pair. Lancashire have not won the County Championship outright since 1934, the year my late mother was born and my dad was two years old at the time. We shared it with Surrey in 1950 but for some reason the Wooldridge clan have always let Surrey claim that one by themselves. There are some good teams in that County Championship, we haven’t played Durham yet, I don’t think we’ve played champions Nottinghamshire, we have to play Yorkshire away (always a phenomenal challenge), we may have a decent lead at the top of the table (definitely a new experience for me) but the season sadly isn’t even half finished yet… But I’d gladly trade all those one-day trophies that Lancs have won over the years (though it’s been too long since the last of them) for one County Championship. However I think the RSPCA would be very annoyed at me for displacing some very rare moths if I went to the ground and raided the trophy cabinet…

As I bake unhappily in this featureless, graceless, happinessless nonentity of an office building (sorry Mike for slagging you off, but I’ve decided having seen it from the inside that it’s crap, therefore you were more right than me, I think), I am watching the clock tick over so I leave the building and zoom off to Craven Cottage for the Women’s Champions League Final. I’ve got a lot of time for women’s football, and it’s got nothing to do with them swapping shirts after the game (damn, I’m in Keys and Gray territory here). Because the players generally lack the speed and strength of the male players, the style of play by its very nature has to be completely different, there is much more emphasis on skill and more honesty (though I did see the odd Brazilian chuck herself floor-wards in the last World Cup Final in 2007). Quite fittingly, I’m off to watch a German side – Turbine Potsdam, a club from just outside Berlin and who won the title, and they will play Olympique Lyon in a repeat of last year’s final. I’m hoping it will be exciting stuff, and I get to see a statue of that lifelong Fulham supporter Michael Jackson as well…

Well, this was a bit more positive…

tear down the wall...tear down the wall...

2011-05-26T12:58:00.002+01:00

There are times when I think I should be putting on a very dodgy Irish accent, shave my eyebrows off and raise my hand whenever some fat cat asks “oh by the way, which one’s Pink?” No, I’m definitely not showing national socialist tendencies (bad idea when two days away from a holiday in Berlin…), it feels like sometimes there’s a wall closing around me. And whilst I’m nowhere near as willing to be behind this wall as Pink was in that film/album, it’s certainly there. It doesn’t surround me, per se, it has this mechanism whereby it “looks after” my self belief, self confidence, self esteem, usually positive things beginning with “self” and then it throws the rest of me into the world and shouts “get on with it, you fat f****r!!!!” before dancing a rather strange jig and then settling down to watch me fumble around and live my life somehow – that noise you sometimes here is whatever is in this wall having a major burp and opening another tinnie before settling back down in its armchair for another laugh. Jeez, all this analysis yet no energy or perhaps willingness to do anything about it.

I think there’s two main reasons for this “low place” that I’m in. One I can’t do anything about, I’m seriously already missing the football. I need a date to look forward to for pre-season to begin, 20th August is too blinkin’ far away and I’m desperate to get back on the proverbial bike after the bitter disappointment of last month’s failure to get into the play-offs. The second thing I can, but I’m too scared to do it at the moment (fear, even if there’s no need for it, is a paralysing feeling that’s very difficult to shake off). Looking for a job is going to have to wait until the trip to Berlin is done and dusted (see, putting it off again), but a change is needed. I may not have much choice soon, I’ve never seen an axe swinge before, but some vicious bastard is swingeing it with venom here at the Guardian and Comet papers. Sadly it’s being swinged at the wrong people, but in a strange sense I wouldn’t object to being in its path, it might force me to do something positive for once.

I think I’ll change tack for the next blog, which I’ll start in a minute or so, try not to be so negative about life. It’s difficult but I’ll try.

Black thoughts of a depressed diabetic...

2011-05-19T17:06:00.002+01:00

This is rapidly becoming rather a bad week. It’s a week in which certain personal standards, already quite low, are beginning to sharpen up their scrapers in preparation for meeting the bottom of the barrel. Self worth and self belief are strangers to me, and I’m not sure how long it’s been since I’ve had contact with them. I know what I want to do, well, some of what I want to do anyway, but I feel as if I’m pulling myself back, almost as if I want to maintain my current humdrum existence, almost as if I believe that I deserve this current humdrum existence.

I’m trying to do things, but there are barriers in the way. I’ve either put them there myself or they’re always there, on the lookout, waiting to pounce in case I begin to feel a semblance of knowing what I am doing. I know I can do things, one of them however is not being able to tell people about it. Or if I do, I can’t bring myself to tell the right people about it. When the time perceivably arrives, I clam up, I worry about what other people think, I analyse things simplistically (usually “this ain’t gonna work” or “I can’t do this”), I convince myself of the failings of both the work and the author and I end up not doing anything.

“Get your name out there” or “get your work out there” is frequently mentioned to me, shyness and being convinced of my work’s inadequacy wins over, it becomes a paralysis and it is next to impossible to battle. I end up wallowing – it’s not muddy, it’s not dirty but it sure is unaccaptable. The wallowing becomes inactivity, it becomes finding something to eat and once that’s eaten, it becomes finding something to eat, or nodding off and not quite sleeping (that happens every night it seems anyway), it becomes watching nondescript crap on the television or worse still, playing some silly games on the computer whilst pretending to watch something monumental to watch on television.

I have these plans, you see, but I always ask myself either whether they’re realistic or whether they’re any good. I want one of three things out of my career, I don’t mind which at the moment – firstly the goal is to leave my current employment. It is winning the race for things that are driving me to the edge of whatever it is I am approaching the edge of. I have to leave, absolutely have to leave, but I lack the gumption to get off my behind and do it. It was nice to get back into work after not having any for twenty seven months, but to a large extent I regret coming back to my former company. I lead a very Jerkyll and Hyde existence professionally, at Kingstonian FC I have responsibilities, I have things to do and I believe that I am good at most of them, I am a somebody, I feel like a somebody, I am made to feel like a somebody. Yet take me out of that existence, I feel like a nobody, I feel largely irrelevant and I feel incredibly tired and completely missing the energy to switch to being somebody again. In my job, I am nothing, I am wasted, I am in the doldrums, prospects for a happy ending do not appear to exist.

Thing number two in my career is to try and make a living out of selling stuff that I create. I have some good stuff, it’s not normal stuff, I grant you, it’s sports stats e-books, it’s “decorative” team sheets, it’s “on this day” certificate things, it’s other things I can think of, but again my shyness gets in the way and I can’t do anything with it. I lack the ability to stick with it, I am very easily discouraged when either nothing is sold or very little. And of course nothing is going to be sold because I lack the balls to tell people about them. And then I lack the belief in what I am doing, I quickly switch to something else and end up in the same old hole. Thing number three to be honest is my ideal job, the thing I want to do most in my life, and that is to work on a permanent basis for a football club, to do what I’m already doing for a football club but a shed load more. The likelihood of that happening whilst the club I have in mind remains in the Ryman League is slim indeed…but at least I can dream.

That is one thing I can do.

End of season "awards" and "rants"

2011-05-18T11:57:00.000+01:00

At the end of every season, some silly sods do their own awards things, be it blogs, television programmes, columns in a newspaper, radio telecasts, etc., etc. It’s time for me to jump on the bandwagon, I think. And to create a bit of personal danger for me, I’m going to limit these awards to Kingstonian, ending with, for what it’s worth, my player of the year. Just don’t expect me to buy him a trophy, the bugger’s got enough of them as it is.

Weirdest request on the tannoy: Undoubtedly the time when I was asked to read out a notice requesting that the owner of a poodle please return to his or her dog. The owner had apparently tied the dog to a lamppost or a pipe outside the ground and gone in to watch the game.

Most ridiculous reason for choosing a holiday destination: Yes, very Kingstonian-related, as Rosey wanted to see a partial eclipse of the sun in January, but I demanded that we flew out to wherever it was after having been to the Kingstonian-Horsham game. That narrowed down the choices to Copenhagen, Nice or Istanbul. The capital of Denmark won out, Kingstonian were appalling against Horsham, and the clouds descended on Copenhagen, ensuring that we didn’t see the eclipse anyway.

Game of the season: Without a shadow of a doubt, the U18s home win over Hayes and Yeading United in the League Cup. We went down to ten men after half an hour and 0-2 down at half time thanks to two (sadly nailed on) penalty decisions. Hayes and Yeading are a very good team at U18s level, and the chances of coming back were remote. However, we went on to completely dominate the second half, and we deserved to equalise in the last minute to draw 3-3. Extra time could have gone either way, but goalkeeper Matt Amis saved a couple and scored one in the penalty shoot-out, and we had an unlikely and very memorable win.

First team game of the season: This is the unfortunate thing, our games tended to be low scoring affairs and there was quite a lot of difficulty choosing a candidate. I think my choice has to be the FA Cup replay against Margate that we won on penalties. Jamie Turner in the Margate goal proved to be a nemesis later in the season, but he was a difference maker in this game as well. It was largely down to him that the game went to penalties, but Rob Tolfrey’s three saves in the shoot-out gave us a breathless 3-2 win and a visit to St Albans City, speaking of which…

Major disappointment of the season…equal 1st: The replay at home to St Albans City jointly takes this dubious award – we had the chance to play away to Luton Town in the Fourth Qualifying Round and largely failed to turn up. St Albans weren’t that much better than us but we produced a vanilla like performance and limped quietly out of a competition that for the tenth season running has provided a sense of underachievement.

Most disappointing player of the season: You could point at quite a few from the Margate match in April, but sadly for me there was an easy winner in the shape of former Millwall man Joe Dolan. He seemed like an excellent signing for us, he was well regarded at Millwall, he certainly spoke very eloquently and determinedly at the Christmas do, but his time on the pitch for Kingstonian was severely disappointing. It wasn’t without coincidence that much of our defensive frailty disappeared when Tom Hutchinson was recruited, effectively taking Joe’s place in the team. There is actually a close second, but at the time of writing he’s a) a crowd favourite and b) still with the club, so I’ll leave it to you to guess who I’m rambling about.

The “we should have had them all season” award: Jointly won by three men – football uses the phrase “if only” far too much, but this award could easily be the “if only” award for Ks. If only Gary MacDonald had avoided injury all season, and if only we had managed to sign Tom Hutchinson and Paul Vines earlier. If only…

Most stressful journey: Away to Lowestoft Town on a Tuesday night. It rained for the whole journey, and given Lowestoft’s record in those recent weeks of having matches rained off, especially at home, meant that I was convinced that we were travelling to the easternmost town in England but weren’t going to see any football. My worries were for naught, as the Crown Meadow was in fine condition and we produced one of our best performances of the season to draw 1-1 after being battered for the first fifteen minutes.

Best burger: And that evening reminded me of the burger van at Lowestoft – providers of the finest burger I’ve ever had at a football ground. Unfortunately, that same van wins the award for worst chips.

Major disappointment of the season…equal 1st: Quite what possessed some Kingstonian players when we blew a 3-0 lead in the last game of the season at Margate will always perplex and infuriate me. As it happened, a win would have given us 5th place and a trip to Tonbridge, the result we got (and Margate deserved to win, let alone draw…) meant that we finished 7th and looked on enviously from the outside. I might forgive that second half performance in the years to come, but I will never forget it.

Best joke in the programme: For sanity’s sake, that category will not awarded this season.

Most stressful game of the season: Away to Margate was a doddle compared to the Isthmian Veterans’ Cup Final. Trying to get a team of eleven men down to Bognor on a Sunday afternoon proved almost impossible, even with the help of Mark Dunne and Pete Bowers. Even though it was not going to be my fault, as secretary of this team I felt as if I was about to let the club down, and it hurt like hell to think that. Even with five minutes to go before the scheduled handing in of team sheets, we had two players. I felt under a little pressure that afternoon (and in the few days before) to actually pull us out of the game, but I refused. I’m glad I did, as 13 people arrived and did themselves and us and me proud, winning 2-0 in a tough match.

Silliest decision of the season: I seem to have agreed that we will be defending the Vets trophy next season, and that I will be helping out again. Stupid, mad bastard.

Goal of the season: This is an award that tends to go late in the season as most people have trouble remembering anything before Christmas. This particular award is no exception, as the best goal of the season for me was Ali Dewar’s rocket of a right foot volley for the U18s at home to Whyteleafe. This was the fifth goal of the match for us, giving us a 5-2 win, it ultimately didn’t mean anything as we’d already won the league, but wow, that was a goal.

First team goal of the season: Again this didn’t prove to mean very much as it was purely a consolation goal after a pretty tepid Kingstonian performance. Paul Vines’ overhead corker in the last minute at Concord Rangers was a beautiful thing to behold.

U18s Player of the Year: All of them. I was asked for my opinion about who should get the official U18s player of the year award and I said in all seriousness that I couldn’t pick one. I could seriously pick twelve, thirteen, maybe even fourteen. We won the league as a team, the squad can have my nomination for Player of the Year collectively as a team.

Best thing ever to happen whilst watching Masterchef: Hearing that Sutton United’s U18s had done a major number on their Leatherhead counterparts, therefore that made us the RYL Central Champions.

Most thrilling personal Liverpool moment of the season: Meeting Jimmy Case and watching him play for Kingstonian in that Chelsea Legends match. He is a thoroughly nice guy, one of the reasons why I love football and Liverpool FC in particular. I hope Phil Babb understands that meeting him is a close second in this category.

Daftest Game of the season: That “Legends” match was slightly horrific. Dowse nearly had a nervous breakdown trying to get players for this game (I can now completely empathise with him), but there were so many no-shows and broken promises that this game proved to be something I would hesitate to re-create in the future. This was definitely well intentioned by Dowse, but he got let down by a lot of people for that night.

Surreal “You Don’t See That Every Day” award: Goes to the small female pheasant for its dust bath in the middle of the pitch at Colliers Wood United a fortnight ago. An absolute delight to watch, you just expect to see that kind of thing on a football pitch…

Pleasant Surprise of the Season: Another U18s one, I’m afraid, as I think I saw Matt Amis grow up as a goalkeeper this season. Last season we had two goalkeepers, Matt and Adam Faith, and with both it felt as if we didn’t know which Matt or Adam was turning up, the confident Matt / Adam was a good one, the short on confidence versions were guaranteed to make at least one stupendous howler. Adam went up to the Academy team, so I didn’t get to see him play apart from a comfortable 45 minutes in a friendly at Walton Casuals during the season, but Matt was a different goalkeeper and in a different class to any others that I saw in the RYL Central this season. He’s too old I think for next season, he will be very difficult to replace.

Most useless directive from the FA: Apart from the arrogance of how the FA dealt with our appeal against the Boreham Wood incidents, which felt like a “how dare you darken our doors” reply, the winner is, for the umpteenth season running, the FA’s Respect campaign. It’s fine in theory, it really is, though for the FA to be running a campaign based on respect sounds as hollow as me telling you to lose weight (see also: FIFA Fair Play). There’s two other things wrong with this: one is that for something to work at grass roots level, it needs to be rigidly and militarily enforced at top level. Give the referees the backing and confidence to send off most of a team for foul and abusive language, if that means half the day’s Premier League matches are abandoned and English football embarrasses itself, so be it. But I don’t think the FA would be brave enough. The second thing wrong is that respect has to go both ways. Sometimes, and I notice this more at Ryman League level than anything (because that’s what I see most, so it’s what I know), referees turn up at games and think that they’re it. We are here for their benefit, we should be lucky to have such a wonderful referee officiating at our game, talking to the likes of us and our managers and our players is just beneath them and we should be proud as punch that he’s gone and shown his colourful cards to our people and that we’re paying his travel expenses and officiating fees for the privilege. Respect goes both ways. OK?

Which brings me to another rant…which isn’t an award at all…: We get referees’ assessors visit games quite often. I have no problem most of the time with that, but you can always tell when an assessor has gone to visit the referee before the game. The result is that you get a rather staccato game of football peppered with free kicks, yellow and red cards and the referee beining finicky to the point of driving spectators to madness. Basically, what you get is a referee who officiates the game in a manner that he thinks the assessor will like and consequently give him high marks, in other words you do not get the referee playing his natural game.

Which brings me to yet another rant…and this isn’t an award either…: One of the silliest things a club secretary has to do is mark the referee’s performance out of 100. If you mark the referee with a score lower than 61, then there has to be a report written by the secretary to back up the low mark. (Slight aside, I do remember having it demanded of me that I give the referee zero marks, which I immediately said that I couldn’t. When asked why, it was because 10 marks go to the referee if he simply turns up…). I would imagine that there will be a lot of reports with a mark of 61. Club secretaries should not have to do this particular task, there is too much room for bias (usually negative bias), and a lot of the time if you want to mark the referee lower than 61, you deem the [expetive deleted] not worthy of having a report written about him, just too much effort. If we’re going to have assessors, then let them be at as many games as possible (and stop them from saying hello to the referee before the game, so that the ref can referee naturally).

Player of the Year: Ok, having failed to think of any more awards or rants for the time being, it’s my Player of the Year time. It’s possibly an obvious choice, but thankfully the advent of Paul Vines into the team means that we are not 100% relying on him to score the goals. Bobby Traynor is my choice of player of the year – he was once again our top scorer, and for the third time in succession he has won a golden boot for top scorer in his division. It is largely down to him that we got as close to the play-offs as we did – when the going got tough in the winter, and some of our performances were very undesirable indeed, we managed to eke out results thanks to his goals. With Carl Wilson-Denis completely off form and then leaving the club, and there being no adequate replacement (it wasn't until later in the season that there was enough trust to allow Sam Clayton more than a small cameo each game), Bobby’s performances during the season may not have been as spectacular in previous seasons, but we cannot underestimate their value. Traynor and Vines will be one heck of a partnership next season.

The Reds lose a caretaker but regain a King

2011-05-13T19:35:00.000+01:00

I have to admit, I was actually genuinely surprised when the announcement echoed out of Merseyside yesterday that Liverpool had given Kenny Dalglish the manager’s job permanently. Despite my bullish comments in recent blogs regarding Liverpool’s form and style of play and how it’s made a believer out of me lately, I was waiting for the moment when the club made a colossal mistake. It’s been the way Liverpool have done things over the last twenty years, promise so much and make a mistake of epic proportions.

Rumours sloshed around the interweb of alternative targets for the Liverpool job, some guy currently at FC Porto for example, Owen Coyle was mentioned in January, rumours of Mourinho never seem to go away (his nonsensical behaviour during all those matches against Barcelona has put the lid permanently on that one), there just always seemed to be an undercurrent that some at Liverpool wanted someone other than Kenny Dalglish. Not because of any dislike of Kenny Dalglish, but that he’s been out of the game too long, he’s too old, he’s out of touch, he doesn’t know the modern game, excuses like that. I was worried about the first excuse, truth be told, right up until Dagger appointed Steve Clarke as his assistant. In the end, all the excuses or fears were unfounded, as Dalglish and Clarke were handed three year contracts. A smell of fear was immediately noticed coming from thirty or so miles east of Merseyside.

The problem for Kenny is that, as you will notice even from my rantings, expectation is so high that it overlooks the Himalayan mountains. I don’t see that being a problem for Kenny per se, or his assistant, but whether his players can cope with it. If, as I expect, Liverpool do challenge for title number 19 in twelve months, will the Liverpool players take it into their stride or shrink like Lochgelly Violets? Spot the subtle Billy Liddell reference, there…? That can’t be answered, but I will hope that their desire to win number 19 is almost as much as the Liverpool faithful’s unhealthy obsession with it (I plead guilty on that one).

I am stunned that the Liverpool vs Tottenham match is not live on television – if Liverpool win, they guarantee 5^th place and a qualifying spot for the Europa League, any other result could allow Tottenham back into that place next week. So yes, it’s a big game, but neither Sky nor ESPN have seen fit to broadcast it. It’s even bigger seeing that it’s the first game since 1991 with a certain Dalglish person as permanent manager…oh well, grind teeth…bring on the Spurs…

A whirlwind hits Craven Cottage

2011-05-10T12:26:00.000+01:00

If anyone predicted that Liverpool would be three-up last night away to Fulham after a quarter of an hour, then either we have a scandal on our hands or their mystical powers are remarkably strong. Liverpool’s renaissance continued apace at Craven Cottage, with a good Fulham team finding itself overwhelmed at times and ultimately thrashed 5-2 by a club who doesn’t want the season to end.

Liverpool had a lot of help in the first half, as Fulham’s goalkeeper Mark Schwarzer was definitely culpable for the first and third goals, whilst their defence was guilty of kicking off an hour after the rest of the players. The Cottagers started the second half with menacing intent and got one back, leaving this naturally nervous writer fearing the worst if the home side got a second goal. Tremendous goals from Maxi Rodriguez and Luis Suarez ended the game as a contest, Steve Sidwell’s remarkable strike being nothing more than a hollow consolation.

At times, Fulham were spectators, watching helplessly as they were blown away by this red whirlwind made up of a Uruguayan, an Argentine, a Dutchman, some Hispanics, several Scousers, all led by a genius of a Glaswegian. It’s not too different from the team led by Roy Hodgson, but it’s unrecognisable. It’s not a team devoid of tactics, players still have a system to adhere to, but there is fluidity, a freedom to Liverpool’s play in recent weeks. The Liverpool teams under Gerard Houiller and Rafael Benitez were capable of brilliance going forward but they stuck to the Herbert Chapman principle, which meant that defence came first; a team that let in zero goals always claimed one point at least.

The Kenny Dalglish principle, a slightly superior version to the Kevin Keegan principle, is to go for it, to start as quickly as possible and tear a team apart if the opportunity arises. The difference between Dalglish’s Liverpool and Keegan’s Newcastle is that this Liverpool can defend. The difference between Dalglish’s Liverpool and Hodgson’s Liverpool is that this Liverpool is not afraid to attack – for some reason, and I seriously have no idea of the reason, Hodgson’s Liverpool was under so much pressure and intense scrutinies that fear ruled the roost. Blame it on the inept previous owners, blame it on Hodgson inheriting an unhappy squad and not being able to cope with managing an iconic club, blame it on certain senior players who thought they were bigger than the manager, I don’t care any more.

Roy Hodgson is still a good man, and he is still a good manager who has done a super job at West Bromwich Albion, and I’m pleased for him. I’m pleased that he has successfully moved on, but so have Liverpool, so rapidly that expectations, in the last twenty years always too high, are reaching levels that some Liverpool supporters (including myself) are even expecting a title challenge next season. In four months we’ve gone from looking at the map to see where the Falmer Stadium is to potentially looking forward to another crack at the Europa League next season to go along with a real attempt to win what would now be a record equalling 19th championship.

It is with a tinge of regret that it seems that Manchester United will overtake Liverpool on Saturday for the most championships ever, but it will only be a tinge. This event has been on the cards for ten years at least, and it is only the most one-eyed Liverpool supporter that will not accept that Manchester United thoroughly deserve their accolade, and only the most one-eyed Liverpool supporter will not accept that Liverpool have never come that close to breaking Manchester United’s stride. Point to the 2009 title “race” all you like, yes Liverpool finished second not far from United but I always had the feeling that United had Liverpool at arm’s length quite comfortably and I never really got excited during that season.

No, it has been up to Arsenal and Chelsea in the last decade, Arsenal and sometimes Blackburn, sometimes Newcastle in the previous decade to do most of the chasing. Liverpool have, on several occasions, most notably in 2001 after the Cup treble and 2005 after the Champions League win, got themselves into a position to launch themselves into the upper echelons but always found a way to mess it up. However, with the sudden threat at Anfield of there being some stability, I can’t remember there being so many of the right ingredients readily available to the club, that it cannot help but launch a major assault into the Salfordian stratosphere.

Some of these ingredients, in fact a lot of the ingredients were already there – Rafa Benitez put them in place. It’s just that the ownership situation amply succeeded in shrouding those achievements. Kenny Dalglish couldn’t have found these fabulous young players overnight – Rafa would have been largely responsible for Jay Spearing, Martin Kelly, Jack Robinson, he bought Jonjo Shelvey from Charlton, Martin Flanagan – I even heard a mention during last night’s coverage of there being a “Liverpool conveyor belt” of young talent. I’ve never heard any reference of that kind of thing in my life.

Other ingredients, well as I’ve said before we can thank Roy Hodgson for the magnificent acquisition of Raul Meireles, a signing so cunning that we have finally been able to replace Xavi Alonso. Kenny Dalglish’s first signing was Steve Clarke, a fabulous piece of thinking, as the man who helped Mourinho at Chelsea has picked Liverpool up by the throat and shaken it so violently that the crap has almost literally fallen out. Lucas Leiva and Maxi Rodriguez have suddenly become outstanding players. Dirk Kuyt has changed from being valuable workhorse to almost irreplaceable.

The new American owners have so far backed up their promises, admittedly they made very small promises (none of this “spade in the ground in six weeks” BS, which we’re still waiting for), but the way they have conducted themselves, and backed the caretaker manager with money to spend in January – ok most of the Suarez-Carroll money was gained from selling Torres to Chelsea (fantastic business) but they still opened up their wallets, and could have spent even more if deadline day deals could have been done. I just hope now that they give Kenny Dalglish the manager’s job on a permanent basis.

Am I over excited? Probably, yes. But for the first time in twenty years Liverpool are actually making the right noises. Manchester United getting their 19th title is not the end of the race, it’s just the beginning.

The season ends with a trophy

2011-05-09T15:32:00.002+01:00

For much of last week, I was worried and feeling very tense indeed. The reason was quite simple – the Isthmian Veterans Cup Final was looming and Kingstonian didn’t have a team. There were two likely scenarios on the horizon, either pull out of the final or turn up at Bognor Regis’ ground with not enough players and have to forfeit that way. We were missing so many players, who either couldn’t or wouldn’t make their way to the South Coast for this game. Appeals for help came out from me as manager Eddie Akuamoah ran out of leads and Ali Kazemi was forced to concentrate on getting ready for his upcoming holiday. This included handing over the kit to me. There was a danger of me having to be physio as well as secretary, assistant manager and kit boy, but Jamie Street was thankfully able to make it to Nyewood Lane.

After a difficult journey to Bognor, which included the blocking of the A29 at Bury Hill, forcing traffic on to a ridiculous diversion down a dusty country lane that barely could cope with cars, bicycles and motor bikes chugging down it in one direction, even less so in two directions simultaneously, Rosey and I arrived after the scheduled meeting time at about 12.35pm. Jamie and Paul Horsecroft were already there – Rosey and I got the kit ready, Rosey then went away to get some lunch. With kick-off arriving at 2pm, the players needed to arrive a bit pronto. Player number one was a guy that Pete Bowers had persuaded at short notice to make an appearance – Leatherhead fitness coach Mark Norman. After the Tanners’ dramatic 4-3 win over Dulwich Hamlet on Saturday sealed promotion to the Premier Division for the first time in 28 years, one could have been forgiven if a tired, nervous wreck had appeared. Nothing of the kind, Mark was ready and itching to go. Matt Elverson arrived, then Julian Sills.

Frustratingly, at the time when the team sheets were supposed to be exchanged with opponents and match officials, we had three players. Humiliation loomed. At the same time as I persuaded Richard Exworthy to don the Ks hoops for the second time in his illustrious career, Eddie Akuamoah arrived with Scott Corbett (who I thought had pulled out…!). And in dribs and drabs, we managed to get a team. And when Conrad Kane arrived just after Tony Reid, we were set. Mark Dunne had persuaded a friend of his with Whyteleafe experience, Dave Graham, to play for us – Eddie pulled off a stupendous coup by recruiting Jimmy Glass to go in goal, Jeremy Jones arrived with Simon Mitchell (why were they calling him Marcel? Doesn’t matter.), and we had a squad. I had hoped the main battle had been won. We managed to get kick-off delayed by fifteen minutes because of the traffic issues on the A29, so we even got the chance to do a warm-up of sorts. (Subsequently, I found out that Bury Hill had been closed because of a violent fatal accident that happened on Thursday, which necessitated resurfacing of the road, repainting and replacing of the cats’ eyes…a nasty sounding occurrence.)

When Bognor had the ball for the first three minutes or so, I feared the worst, but when we managed to gain possession, the mood quickly shifted in the other direction. Soon we started pressing the goal, and soon it was becoming an exercise in patience, how long would it be before we scored the opener. It finally came on the half hour, when someone prodded the ball past the Bognor goalkeeper, the keeper lunged to save the ball, Bognor tried to play on, Kingstonian claimed the goal, referee tried to wave play on, his assistant gave the goal. The goal stood. Darn, the first goal and I couldn’t celebrate wildly. The someone that prodded the ball home proved to be Eddie Akuamoah.

Both sides passed the ball around very nicely indeed, but Ks did it with a determination to score. Bognor produced the nice little triangles, but Jimmy Glass had very little to do. It wasn’t a surprise when Conrad Kane lashed the ball home shortly before the break, I was able to celebrate wildly. Half time arrived, with a major worry arriving in the shape of Scott Corbett’s back, which was basically gone. Jamie got to work on Scott’s back during the half time break, and persuaded him to carry on, in quite an amount of pain, Scott lasted another 37 minutes. It was heroic stuff. The second half was much closer than the first, the heat was quite oppressive for the players as the game slowed almost to a crawl. There was always the fear in my mind that if we let in one goal, then it would be game on. Jimmy Glass had to make two, maybe three saves, there was maybe only one very nervy moment.

It didn’t stop me from pacing up and down very nervously, the second half crawled along and seemed to last for an hour and a half. Jamie and I started making substitutions of our own backs as at one stage we felt as if we needed to bolster the midfield, especially at the end when Scott was forced off.

Eventually the final whistle went, and it was a relief. The relief justified all the angst before the game, all that worry about whether we’d field a team, all the bad feelings of potentially letting the club and the league down were gone, and it was with a nonsensical amount of pride that I received a medal from Ryman League Company Secretary Nick Robinson, and driving home with a rather large trophy sitting on the back seat was very nice, even if it is now taking up a lot of space in the living room!

All of that is now worth it. I can update the club’s honours list once again, and now (at least for a bit) I can rest. Oh hang on, no I can’t – I’ve got the end of season Kingstonian Youth programme to compile…

Ah well, no such thing as a “close season”. Bring on the new season, I want it now.

Play-offs should have a public health warning

2011-05-05T17:14:00.003+01:00

All I know is that play-offs are hazardous to the health. Yet I would have been delighted to have been involved in them on Tuesday as four rival teams slugged it out for a place in this Saturday’s final. My feelings about the play-off system vary depending on Kingstonian’s situation. In 2009, I would have hated the idea of Ks being in the play-offs, and was over the moon to miss out on them. This meant that we had won the league that year. In 2010 and 2011, with winning the league firmly out of sight, I was a great advocator of the play-offs, had we been fighting over a theoretical second automatic spot behind Sutton United, I would have been a vocal detractor. So, the play-offs can’t win.

There are currently debates flying around about the validity of play-offs, mainly because of Bognor Regis Town’s unlikely defeat at home to Dulwich Hamlet on Tuesday in the Division One South play-offs, the culmination of a traumatic few days for the Rocks, having lost the title to Metropolitan Police by one goal’s worth of goal difference, to be swiftly following by their reverse by the Hamlet, who finished 31 points behind their vanquished prey. Needham Market’s defeat against Brentwood Town, 18 points behind them after 42 games, also raised some eyebrows. Unfortunately, these debates fly about on an annual basis and for me are usually without basis on the grounds of “clubs know at the beginning of the season what the rules are, so get on with it.” It doesn’t mean that I don’t have some sympathy for Bognor Regis Town and Needham Market, but both were in a healthy position very late in the season to gain automatic promotion, and both did something wrong to deny them that honour. I don’t know Needham Market at all (I admit to not knowing where it was until the beginning of this season), but I do know that Bognor has the wherewithal to get the job done automatically next season.

It was off to Colliers Wood United last night for a friendly against Corinthian-Casuals, unsurprisingly none of those featured at Margate on Saturday were on show. Arguably the highlight in a way was the beautiful sight of what I believe was a small female pheasant taking an extensive dust bath in the middle of the pitch about an hour before kick-off, it was a beautiful sight and made me wish I knew more about bird-watching. Maybe another trip to the WWT in Arundel is called for.

As for the game itself, we fielded five U18s, some Academy players and a few others. I’m biased as blinkin’ ‘eck, but I was impressed with how Carl Downs played, and I thought that, despite the game being lost 0-3, our young central defenders Jamie Summers (England Captain) – note his strange new treble barrelled name – and Tom Siefers did very well indeed. Matt Robinson and Ali Dewar ran around a lot, but didn’t get enough of the ball. As for the other players, I’d love to see some more of Jordan Cheadle, as I think he’s a decent player.

The game proved to be rather cathartic for me, whilst I’m still annoyed about what happened on Saturday, I’ve now stopped being monosyllabic and am now able to cease answering questions like a teenager (ie: only with a grunt). Also, I am now looking forward to Saturday and Tuesday, in which I hope to be watching to my former club Leatherhead win promotion and then the Surrey Senior Cup. The Tanners deserve all the success they’ve been getting over the last couple of years, it is no coincidence at all that it’s been since the appointment of Mick Sullivan as manager that this success has been flying in the direction of Fetcham Grove. Even though I think they will be formidable opposition for the Ks in the Premier Division should they defeat Dulwich on Saturday, I am really hoping that they can get the job done. After Saturday will be the Surrey Senior Cup Final against Corinthian-Casuals on Tuesday, which will be a huge test for the Tanners, as from what I’ve heard about the games against Whitehawk in the last week, they could be forgiven for being mentally and physically shattered by their efforts, but I would suggest that Leatherhead supporters needn’t worry about that.

I am still on the verge of a slight breakdown when it comes to the Veterans Cup Final. As it stands at the moment, we have 11 players promising to make the short trip to Bognor (and believe me, it is a short trip..., you’d think it was on the other side of the world the way things have gone, thank the gods that we’re not away to Lowestoft…), I don’t think I will have to name myself as reserve goalkeeper (anyway I don’t have a pair of football boots), although I am going to have to be kit man and maybe physio on Sunday… My method of physio is probably “get up, you swine, or I’ll kick you harder than he did…”, or “you’ve got a sore leg? I’ll stamp you in the arm, that’ll make you forget about the leg…”

I think it’ll be alright on the night, and I’m hopeful that we can get the job done and bring the trophy home. It’ll all be because of the mysterious figure in the tatty black coat in the technical area, by the way…he’s the talisman…and if you believe that…!

Edit: Dammit, the Surrey Senior Cup Final clashes with the first semifinal of the Eurovision Song Contest. No football next Tuesday after all...!

After "The Event"

2011-05-03T16:07:00.000+01:00

David Mitchell and Robert Webb are a marvellous comedy duo – one of the few that can actually get me laughing out loud – though I’ve seen nowhere near enough of their stuff, and none of what is apparently the very funny Peep Show. Anyway, on That Mitchell and Webb Thing (or whatever it’s called, sorry my brain doesn’t want to do this blog at the moment and do something as tiring as “think”.), they have a frequent sketch about a quiz show based in an underground bunker after what is assumed to have been a nuclear holocaust. This event is called “The Event” and is never referred to in any detail at all, we’re all to assume that it was a nuclear event but knowing those two it was probably simply the result of a red sock going into the same washing machine as a white sock…

In order to adhere to traditional hyperbolic football type journo writing rules (and the dodgiest of dodgy segues), Saturday away to Margate was “The Event”, a meltdown unlike anything I’ve encountered in my ten seasons at Kingstonian. And it is still extremely painful. It will get even worse when I switch on the interweb and see that Bury Town are playing Lowestoft and Tonbridge are playing Harrow, and the jealousy level will hit eleven without too much trouble at all.

The problem psychologically with losing the last game of the season is quite simple, there is no tomorrow. Or tomorrow is about three months away. There’s no “we’ll get ‘em next week” as next week is in three months. In that case, there then comes this incredible impatience, when are the constitutions of the leagues for next season out, when is the FA Cup draw, get those blinkin’ fixtures out, I need to know them yesterday so hurry up…! Oh sod, the play-offs don’t end until Saturday…

Thinking about it, the impatience appears anyway eventually, regardless of final result in April/May, I remember two years ago it was a childlike excitement having just won a championship, though today it’s an angry impatience to try and sweep Saturday’s second half under the carpet.

The strange desire to just get on with it is showing in different ways – when it was announced last night that we would play a friendly with Corinthian-Casuals, a game designed apparently to keep the Cor-Cas players in playing shape before their Surrey Senior Cup Final next week against Leatherhead, I had no hesitation in deciding to go. I desperately need to go to a Kingstonian game devoid of stress, so this game has come in very handy indeed.

What about the Vets Final, I hear you ask? You wouldn’t believe how stressful that has become, the U18s secretary job is a piece of cake in comparison. Instead of looking forward to the final and the possibility of another piece of silverware, I’m almost just looking forward to Sunday simply to get the blinkin’ game out of the way… Don’t let it get me down, said my friend Pete Bowers in an e-mail to me…too late, Pete…it’s too late.

I had even started on designing next season’s programme, which is in fact quite a stupid thing to do. I put something together, got right to the end, though that this wasn’t bad and then worked out that I’d forgotten some things. It’s either a) go for a stupidly large programme, b) take out stuff that I’d worked hard on but only in the previous couple of days or c) stop it and start again in a few weeks when the hunger for the new season is real. It’s going to be the last option, by the way, but some work did get done that will be in next season’s programme regardless of how much I swing the axe. Getting into design mode was definitely a mistake, May is not the time to be worrying about programmes for the following July/August onwards.

I definitely do have one more game after Sunday to go to, as I visit Craven Cottage for the first time since 1981, and witness the ladies’ Champions League Final between reigning champions Turbine Potsdam and last year’s finalists Olympique de Lyon, conquerors of Arsenal in the semi-final. At a fiver a ticket, this has to be one heck of a bargain and will probably be a better game than the game two evenings later at Wembley between what should be Manchester United and Barcelona. It will be my first football match at the Cottage, as my visit thirty years ago was for Fulham against Wakefield Trinity in the Rugby League Challenge Cup. Apparently it is still Fulham/Crusaders/Broncos/Harlequins’ record attendance. I am still tempted to go to the Surrey Senior Cup Final next Tuesday at Gander Green Lane, though…in olde worlde Keegan-fashion, I’d love it if my old club Leatherhead could win t’old pot.

A post of negative emotions

2011-05-01T14:41:00.003+01:00

Yesterday was one of the angriest, saddest, most despondent, most murderous days I've ever encountered in football.

Never in my life have I wanted to grab half of the Kingstonian game and beat the living daylights out of them, or strangle them, or do some other kind of nasty violence to them. We started the game away to Margate clear in what we needed to do - win the game, hope one of four teams above us didn't.

For the first thirty minutes, we did our job. With a strong wind at our backs, we cruised into a 3-0 lead. Margate got one back shortly before half-time and finished the half strongly. Nevertheless, for fifteen glorious minutes of half time, we were in third place, I was mentally getting ready for some programme compiling for a semi-final against Bury Town on Bank Holiday Monday. Everything was going right, though I did have a feeling that Margate would be able to put some pressure on us with that wind behind their backs.

The 'Gate did just that, and more. In fact, 3-3 was a result they didn't deserve, they deserved to win 4-3 or even 5-3. I always said that teams never have "nothing to play for", it's a cliche quoted by desperate people wanting their team to have as easy a game as possible, but 99% of the time they will be disappointed.

Margate destroyed a Kingstonian team bereft of desire and belief, a midfield where everybody effectively hid for the last hour and a defence that was frankly (and I hate mentioning individuals) working overtime to make sure that they could compensate for one of the most incompetent and ill disciplined performances by a right-back that you could ever wish to see, something that not even MacDonald, Hutchinson and Bird could do. Traynor and Vines as a result were disbelieving spectators for most of the second half, only being allowed to get even slightly involved once Sam Clayton and Allan Tait came on as substitutes, maybe Antonio Gonnella should have come on earlier as he didn't get enough time to do his thing.

I am one of those people who will always try to point at results earlier in the season rather than blame a bad result in the final game as reasons for not finishing where you want to be at the end of the campaign, this time is different. To a large extent it is true, but the scale of what happened yesterday gives things a whole new twist - we had played ourselves into those play-offs, as it turned out Harrow Borough did indeed mess up, but we messed up so badly in that second half that we played ourselves right out of the play-offs again.

We've got the Veterans Cup Final next Sunday away to Bognor Regis Town, but frankly that's causing me so many headaches as well, the thought of this game is causing me to get angry as well. If you're over 35, by the way, and you haven't played in a previous round this season, bring yer boots, you might have a chance of playing for Kingstonian...

To finish, and believe me on this one - we will be strong next season, we will not let yesterday happen again, we will not have quitters playing in our team, we have some damn good players at the club, we will get some more for our squad, more high quality and mentally strong and very hungry players and we will fight.

And we will have an improved programme as well. More blogging when I calm down...

PS: Liverpool have at least temporarily cheered me up, what a remarkable season it still is for the Reds, I am so excited about their chances next season.

The Meaning of Life

2011-04-27T17:06:00.002+01:00

And so it comes down to one afternoon, the last Saturday afternoon in April. League game number forty-two; is there any coincidence that this number is the answer to the meaning of life?

Kingstonian can finish as high as second, and as low as (counting on his other hand) ninth depending on how results go on Saturday 30th April. The Ks have the eminently winnable task of going to Hartsdown Park to get three points against Margate, but this game can just as easily be drawn or lost. Margate is a tough place to visit, well, it has been for the last two Kingstonian visits there. Last season we lost to a last minute goal in a stinker of a match, earlier this season our FA Cup encounter wasn’t too clever either and was quite deservedly drawn. Margate may currently be 16th in the table, but we are taking nothing for granted.

Our 4-2 win against Tooting and Mitcham United was anything but routine. We started like a house on fire, Paul Vines’ first goal of the afternoon was of the highest quality under the severest of pressure from a defence shorn of one member because the referee refused to allow him back on the field after an equipment alteration. A lucky break for us, I will admit to not seeing former Ks U18s man Matt Drage waiting to come back on to the field, but the protestations from the Tooting players made it clear that the referee had done something wrong. The usual Lodge falling over and Traynor scoring the penalty doubled the advantage for us before Tooting started to play some excellent football. Then again, with Geoff Pitcher on the field, of course they played some good football – Pitch can still pass an opposition to death and his passing is still a pleasure to watch. One goal back was more than deserved for our opponents and it was with a sense of relief that we went into half time 2-1 up.

Tom Hutchinson made it 3-1 with another superb header (what a fabulous signing he has been) before a clumsy challenge in the area led to Geoff Pitcher making it 3-2 from the penalty spot. It was a very nervy time watching both the game and the vidiprinter, working out all the time where the heck we were in the table. I shouldn’t do it, but I can’t help it. I seriously can’t remember our fourth goal and Paul Vines’ second, I’ll take that as a sign of Playoffitis, which is an affliction that only arrives under certain circumstance and usually only in April and the first week of May – it is something that makes a sufferer very nervous and sometimes forgetful. Cupfinalitis is very similar indeed and just as annoying.

So, Kingstonian sit in sixth position, two points behind Tonbridge Angels who are second. If we win at Margate, and one of Bury Town, Lowestoft Town and Harrow Borough draw, or Tonbridge Angels lose, then into the play-offs we go. Ideally, three of those four things will happen because I still think a home draw in the semi-final is very important indeed, especially if it means forcing Bury or Lowestoft to come down south in midweek (though we didn’t do so bad at Lowestoft on a Tuesday night earlier on this season). And don’t rule Canvey Island out of the mix either, they will be very dangerous if results go their way on Saturday and they get into the zone.

Whatever happens, it will have been a decent season. It has to have been a decent season, it’s not often that we go into league game 42 still with promotion a real possibility. If we fail, yes we can point at several games this season where we have messed up, home to Maidstone, home and away to Concord and Harrow, home to Horsham, away to Folkestone all spring to mind a bit easily, but every other club can produce a list of where things went wrong, and they all matter for very little right now.

Rosey and I are staying in the Whitstable / Herne Bay area on Friday, partly in my case to avoid having to watch some wedding on television (sorry, I’m just not interested), I am hoping that sitting down and staring at the sea for a while will calm the nerves. Having said that, thanks to the U18s they’ve been shot since late February…!

Even in Essex...

2011-04-23T14:13:00.000+01:00

What the 'eck was wrong with the M25 on Good Friday? Don't people know the rules? Stop having traffic jams when we're about, will you? Infuriating.

Oh well, it wasn't too onerous a journey to the Hornchurch Stadium, though the M25 was a pain the behind just before and after the Dartford Tunnel.

I was firmly of the belief that we needed nine points out of nine to get into the play-offs. Now we can get only seven out of nine at the most, and whilst I still think we have a shot at those play-offs, I don't feel so hopeful, though you just never know.

AFC Hornchurch began the match at 3.00pm, Kingstonian started at 3.01pm with a goal deficit, attacking wise it was a good goal, defensively it was awful, no-one to blame except the whole team for that one. In the fifteenth minute we equalised from the spot, an awful refereeing decision from where I was sat. A shot came in, hit a defender somewhere on his body, it seemed to be very close to where the shot was taken, no appeals that I could hear, I could only hear gasps as the referee pointed to the spot. Bobby Traynor did his usual.

The rest of the game was of a very low quality, if someone scouting for the likes of Tonbridge or Canvey or the Suffolk duo visited this game, they'd report back and tell their managers not to worry too much about either the Urchins or the Ks should they meet in the play-offs.

AFC Hornchurch very nearly won the game in second half stoppage time, but Gary MacDonald came out of nowhere to keep Kingstonian's season alive and cleared off the line. It would have been harsh on the Ks, who had a lot of second half possession, however they did very little with it so they didn't deserve to win either.

It was far too hot yesterday, this was the perfect weather for a pre-season friendly not a massive match at the end of the season between two desperate football teams and the heat must have had an effect on both teams, as I write this it feels even hotter today so I don't envy those teams who have to do battle this afternoon.

We have to be disappointed with that result, but then again you never know, all the play-off rivals below us lost, whilst Cray Wanderers gave themselves an outside chance once again with an excellent stomping of Concord Rangers. Teams at the top have to play each other, so maybe Dowse was right, seven points out of nine may well be good enough. The swine is that we did our points dropping in game one of those last three games, meaning that instead of little room to maneouvre, we now have no room for leeway...

Victory for the Kingstonian Vets

2011-04-19T15:26:00.000+01:00

It was with an immense feeling of trepidation that the semi-final for the Isthmian Veterans Cup came along. I received a text from Ali Kazemi asking if I knew any goalkeepers over the age of 35 as Chuck Martini had done his back in. I did, but I didn’t know how to contact any of them. Just another thing to worry about, it had felt very worrisome finding a home ground at such short notice, and now this. Trouble was, I didn’t have the chance to do anything about it because of a sudden doctor’s appointment (nothing to worry about there, which was a boost), though it was just another annoying and worrying thing for Ali to have to cope with.

I arrived at the ground with Rosey to find that we didn’t find a goalkeeper. For some reason, though, gloom did not descend, there was seriously enough confidence in the rest of our squad that we could cover for Chuck’s absence, though there was a certain irony that Mark Thomas, our shortest player, was chosen to go in goal… And when we’d heard that Bromley’s goalkeeper was unavailable...the disbelief that here we were about to kick-off a semi-final and neither team had a recognised goalkeeper…

The game couldn’t have gone too much better. Despite the loss of Chuck, we had a stronger team than in the quarter-final – we were able to call upon Matt Elverson, Stafford Browne and even our U18s coach Mark Dunne, and believe me all three of them can still produce the goods, as did all of our squad.

It started brilliantly when Tony Reid scored in the fifth minute. Scott Corbett’s long range punt was somehow missed by the Bromley keeper and he doubled the score, substitute Stafford Browne capped a sparkling first half after coming on as a substitute for Phil Wingfield in the 10th minute (he apparently hurt himself in the first minute and refused to come off out of embarrassment…) and made the score an eye-popping 3-0. Bromley got themselves back into the game temporarily with a Steve McKimm goal just before the break, if they had managed to score a second goal then the second half may have made for uncomfortable viewing. We got to the break 3-1, the message from the management (myself, Ali and Eddie Akuamoah) was same again, but stop getting caught offside so much.

There is an almighty irony about the set-up we’ve managed to get ourselves, it feels wrong that Isthmian League and FA Trophy winning players are getting bawled and shouted at by someone whose major honour is Programme Editor of the Year for Division One South, albeit two years in a row! I think they ignore me and just get on with it, which is how it should be!

The half time team talk obviously didn’t work immediately as we were a little bit sluggish to begin with, but then fitness told. Gaps began to appear all over the place and eventually we managed to put the game away with two pieces of genius from Tony Reid, although not many were convinced that he completely meant his second when he nutmegged the goalkeeper and walked the ball into the net, but his third, a chip from distance, was glorious. Steve McKimm doubled his own personal tally to make the score 5-2, but finally Julian Sills clubbed the ball home from six inches out to finish the scoring.

It was a pleasant surprise to have won so convincingly, and I can’t wait for the Final next Wednesday. Quite who the game will be against and where it will be played will be sorted later. I said in a previous blog that we would be away to either Bognor or Whyteleafe but it seems that’s not necessarily the case. With due respect to Bognor, I am hoping that should the Rocks win on Thursday the final is played on a neutral venue somewhere halfway between (Godalming possibly?) because it may be difficult for our guys to get time off work to play a football match on the south coast at such short notice. I booked the day off just in case sometime last week, but I’m not normal. Just bring on the Rocks or the ‘Leafe.

No good for the nerves...Liverpool version

2011-04-18T15:40:00.000+01:00

No play-offs upcoming for Liverpool, thankfully the Reds’ upturn in form has meant that Liverpool supporters don’t need to work out where Brighton’s new ground is (not for a League game anyway), and they’re still in with an outside shot at qualifying for Europe. It’s unlikely, but the turnaround at the club has been astonishing.

Yesterday’s game with Arsenal was not good for the health either. Injuries meant that Liverpool’s team got younger and younger as the game went on, but once again John Flanagan was outstanding (especially after knocking out Jamie Carragher with an attempted head at the ball) and Jack Robinson was magnificent when he replaced Fabio Aurelio after the Brazilian ended his season in his own traditional way, with an injury. Jay Spearing was once again a revelation, as was Jonjo Shelvey when he replaced the injured Andy Carroll. Spearing probably made only one big mistake all game, and that came in the 98th minute when a tired challenge gave Arsenal their penalty, which was duly converted. No-one could have envisioned Liverpool going straight down the other end and getting a penalty of their own thanks to one of the most bone-headed tackles I think I’ve seen when Emmanuel Eboue fouled Lucas as he was running away from goal. Dirk Kuyt duly scored his penalty in what was the 12th minute of added time.

The Arsenal manager predictably did his nut and made his Manchester United counterpart look positively sporting. Screaming about it not being a penalty (laughable) and where did the extra minutes come from, refusing to shake Kenny Dalglish’s hand, who in typical Dalglish style didn’t give a damn.

What Wenger has forgotten, yet again, is that when the board is shown telling the world how much injury time remains, it is an indication of the minimum amount of time. If there are pieces of play during that minimum amount of time, the referee is within his rights to add more time, hence the board indicating a minimum. I’ve heard too many tannoy people in the Ryman League getting this wrong, one place (thankfully I forget where) even announced a couple of years ago that it was a maximum. I sighed.

Anyway, when the board went up it showed eight minutes. Rightly so, Jamie Carragher’s head injury took that long to stabilise so that he could be carried off. During those eight minutes, Jay Spearing fouled Francesco Fabregas. Obvious furore, these things take time, sadly for Liverpool the referee made precisely the right call. Robin van Persie scored the penalty, Arsenal celebrated wildly.

Liverpool threw everything at Arsenal in the seconds that remained, the eight minutes became ten, then eleven, then…penalty for Liverpool. The laws of the game stipulate that time has to be added on specifically for a penalty kick. Dirk Kuyt scores the penalty in what was minute number twelve, the final whistle blows, Liverpool celebrated wildly. Admittedly a very brave call indeed, the referee made a second correct decision. Well, a third really (equally brave) as the Arsenal penalty will have taken up a minute or two during those eight minimum minutes, which the referee bravely decided to cater for. Hence the announcement always that it’s a minimum amount of time.

Of course, Wenger blamed the referee. He conveniently forgot about the 97 minutes before his side took the lead when they huffed and puffed and basically played lots and lots of beautiful football in the wrong area of the pitch. He conveniently forgot that his team, apparently brimming full of creative talent, dillied and dallied and, despite far more possession, could not break down a Liverpool team that boasted two teenagers, the scary looking Martin Skrtel and a hairy Greek man who is so slow that bees fly into the back of him.

Wenger blames everyone but himself, and he is boring. Yes, Ferguson does the same, but he gets away with it because he provides the silverware, he gets the results that back up his bravado. I will go as far to say that if Arsenal want to have pretensions of winning a trophy in the near future, they need to change the man at the helm and bring in a set of players that sometimes are so much like prima donnas that some of Chelsea’s finest would blush.

It may only have been a draw, it probably doesn’t help Liverpool’s chances of qualifying for Europe, but I did celebrate wildly, it was the least Liverpool deserved. Allegedly director of football (whatever that is) Damien Comolli has said that Liverpool have a set plan for summer transfer spending. I wonder if the likes of Flanagan, Robinson, Shelvey, Spearing, Martin Kelly, etc., (not forgetting the rave reports I’ve been hearing about Raheem Sterling and Suso) are making his job easier or harder?

Anfield is a good place to be, suddenly, and even though Manchester United will overtake us and win their record-setting 19th League title this season, there will be no bitterness from me, for I know that Liverpool’s future is so bright, I’ve got to wear shades.

No good for the nerves...Kingstonian version

2011-04-18T15:39:00.002+01:00

Supporting one football club is at times a perilous situation, supporting two as I do (I’m big enough, there’s enough room in my heart for two…) is downright careless. I had just begun to settle down from Kingstonian’s win against Folkestone on Saturday, when Liverpool play their part in one of the most remarkable finishes to a match that I can remember.

I thought that the Folkestone game would be difficult, and so it proved as Kingstonian made hard work of their relegation-haunted opponents. Folkestone themselves were in equal need of the three points and they made life very awkward, and I thought that they were slightly the better team in the first half. Whilst they didn’t look as if they could create that many chances themselves, there was always the danger of our opponents capitalising on a defensive error. We got to the break level but very nervous. It was a game that had nil-nil written all over it, a result that would have arguably sunk morale down to the ground. Up stepped Tom Bird, and his piece of magic, a majestic 25 yard free kick curled around the wall and past the goalkeeper, would have raised the roof off the Kingsmeadow had there been one. You may have heard immense relief in my voice as I announced the goal.

The nerves, however, got worse. A one goal lead against a team with equal desperation in a situation where a point here or there won or lost means so much is awful for the butterflies. And so we continued to suffer. Folkestone had plenty of possession; we were a little too careless at times but Gary MacDonald and Tom Hutchinson had huge matches in the centre of defence. I do wonder how much closer to champions Sutton United we would have been had Gary Mac stayed fit all season and we’d have signed Hutch earlier than we did. But Gary Mac didn’t stay fit all season and we didn’t sign Hutch before we tried some others, so the U’s became deserving champions yesterday.

Five minutes of added time went up on the board, it was not a pleasant feeling making that announcement on the tannoy. That time ticked very slowly indeed, but then Dean Lodge brilliantly walked the ball around the goalkeeper and tapped it home in the 95th minute, finally confirming the win.

The result sadly relegated Folkestone Invicta, a football club that I have loads and loads of time for, and I am disappointed to see them relegated only a year after their promotion from Division One South. However, football is a brutal business at the best of times, and we needed those points as well. So into 7th place we went, two points away from the play-offs, three points away from 2nd and 3rd place, which would give those who finish there home advantage in the semi-final. I would say that home advantage in the semi would be of absolute importance but last season both away teams were victorious, however with two of the current play-off contenders hailing from Suffolk, I think if Lowestoft and/or Bury Town are involved come May then home advantage may mean more than it did last season.

The closer to game day it gets, the more tricky the trip to AFC Hornchurch is looking. Defeat for the Urchins left their play-off hopes hanging by a thread, we must be at our best to get the three points we need to take the race to the last two games. On one hand, I detest the play-offs, they are hazardous to the health, but on the other hand, they’ve meant that we have meaningful games in late April for the fourth season in a row and fifth season out of six, so I suppose they do work.

Thoughts on...Liverpool

2011-04-15T12:31:00.002+01:00

It’s very easy to get carried away about one result, but Monday’s game against Manchester City was the best Liverpool performance that I’ve witnessed in years, certainly the first half, in which City were left devastated by three goals. It was the type of performance that rolled back the years, it reminded me somewhat of that famous performance in 1988 in which Liverpool pulverized a very good Nottingham Forest team 5-0. That was a game in which marketing people got so excited, you could buy a video of the whole game within a couple of weeks. I doubt if that sold well in Nottingham. Whilst Monday didn’t reach those heights, it was joyful to watch, and raised a few questions.

The decision to sell Fernando Torres and buy both Andy Carroll and Luis Suarez is looking better by the game, regardless of ability Liverpool sold an unhappy player and brought in two eager players who at the moment look so obviously as if they want to make it at Anfield. Suarez has a Peter Beardsley quality to him, his work rate is enormous, his desire is infectious, and the guy can play. Carroll is a battering ram with a work rate that is high (though sluggish compared to Suarez…), I can see why hopes are so very high for him.

But for me the star of the Manchester City game was right-back John Flanagan. I had never heard of him until I read the team line-up, and whilst Manchester City were so poor on the night and barely attacked down the left, you would not have guessed that this was an 18 year old making his debut. He played without fear, as if he belonged, as if he’d been there for a number of games and with an immense amount of confidence.

There is always this fear that sticking promising youngsters into a first team can go one of two ways, and it can’t be predicted which until it’s too late – either the lad performs as John Flanagan did, or he struggles so badly that his confidence is forever dented and that’s his career done and dusted. With the overrated Glen Johnson out for the season as well as the forever-injured Daniel Agger, Flanagan may well get more opportunities. The team sheet for Sunday’s visit to Arsenal will make for fascinating reading.

And with Steven Gerrard done for the season as well, another youngster Jay Spearing is beginning to cement a place in the starting line-up. He had his best game for Liverpool’s first team against Manchester City as well, he seemed to complement the excellent Raul Meireles throughout the night. Jay has been on the verge of something good for a long time, though I will admit to being slightly disappointed that he hasn’t progressed as much as he has.

I wonder how many people have twigged that Liverpool’s best performance for ages occurred with the apparent soul and driving force of the team sitting on the sidelines? More to the point, how many Liverpool players have twigged that? Too often over the last ten years it has looked like that the feeling amongst the players themselves has been that for Liverpool to tick, Gerrard must be the one driving them on. If he has an off day or an injured day then Liverpool struggle. If the players believe that, then it has to be true. It’s put too much pressure on Gerrard, and his fitness and form this season has suffered terribly. The guy has had to carry most of Liverpool on his shoulders for ten years, no wonder he’s struggling now. Critics have been rightly saying this for the best part of a decade, Liverpool must learn to step up and get the job done when Gerrard is off form or out of the team, the sooner that can happen, the quicker next season Gerrard will hit form.

The summer will be absolutely fasincating, Anfield will be a rotating door with players being offloaded and replacements brought in. I do wish Liverpool would make an announcement about the manager soon, Kenny Dalglish has been such a breath of fresh air that I can’t see what the delay is in giving him the job on a permanent basis. If he isn’t the one to lead the club next season for what will be a vital campaign in which challenging for the title will be an expectation rather than a hope, then his replacement will have to be absolutely brilliant.

Twenty two years ago today the Hillsborough disaster occurred – I remember vividly attending the Liverpool game before that day. It was at the old Den, a 2-1 win away to Millwall. It was a happy day, I remember Millwall piping through radio coverage of Arsenal getting beat as we waited to be allowed to leave the stadium (a classy gesture that I have never forgotten). I still remember looking around the terracing behind the goal that evening, confident Liverpool supporters happy to have beaten Millwall and looking forward to play Nottingham Forest in a second consecutive FA Cup Semi-Final, merely a stepping stone on the way to our second double in three years (though Michael Thomas famously saw to that the following month).

I still vividly remember the day of the disaster and the disbelief more than anything else that it caused to me (though I did develop a deep dislike walking in big crowds after this which actually continues to this day, though it is a miniscule phobia compared to those that still suffer real nightmares from this day), and also the wondering. I wonder how many of those people that I celebrated with at the Den went to Hillsborough later that week and never came home. This afternoon I think that I will be thinking of little else. You’ll Never Walk Alone.

Thoughts on...Kingstonian's first team

2011-04-13T17:16:00.002+01:00

There is a reluctant positivity around the Kingsmeadow at the moment. The team have begun to eke out results, we have won four out of the last five (and in that one we deserved better). Performances have been ranging from “meh” to “wow” and all things in between. However, our elongated blip after Christmas has meant that we still have an uphill climb to get into the play-offs.

The Carshalton game was satisfactory. We started well, let the Robins come back into the contest and then killed them off with goals either side of the break. Paul Vines and Sam Clayton don’t score tap-ins (or should that be taps-in??), whilst Tom Hutchinson’s goal was stunning in its simplistic brilliance – whipped in near post corner by Clayton, headed home by Hutchinson. You don’t defend those. Carshalton’s goal immediately after that was no more than an irritant. It was a good afternoon, but the atmosphere currently at Colston Avenue I find immensely sad.

Our game at home to Cray Wanderers was always going to be difficult. It proved to be that way. Tom Hutchinson scored another brilliant header to give us the lead, but Cray deserved their equaliser when it came. There has not been a Cray side that has ever given up in the six or so consecutive seasons that we’ve play them, and this Cray team was no different. We had to up our game in the second half, and so we did. Simon Huckle’s goal couldn’t have been scored by anyone else, sticking a leg out and still walloping the ball home from around the penalty spot. We saw glimpses of the real Dean Lodge for the first time since his sojourn at Bromley, he was millimetres away from one of the goals of the season after a wonderful run and lob of the keeper.

We might have finished off Cray’s play-off chances with that win (though the Wands will definitely contend again next season, I would think), but our chances are still there. It was an improbable set of results that saw only Bury Town of the teams above us losing, and that was to champions-elect Sutton United. So, rather improbably, we remained ninth in the division. Tonbridge’s big win on Tuesday at Hendon has made things even harder, but we have to be realistic in a number of ways.

We have to only look after our own results. Difficult to do, I know, in fact it’s a near impossibility, but if we look after ourselves then everything will sort itself out. If we get into those play-offs, I actually like our chances of winning them. If we don’t get into those play-offs, I know that we will be challenging next season. In many ways we don’t deserve to be in those play-offs, but if we do win our last four games (instinct tells me that we need to win the lot just to have a chance), anything can happen and we will be afraid of no-one.

I’ve seen a couple of comments that it’s good to have some games against teams “with nothing to play for” but it’s something I…not so much fear as feel nervous about. I’d rather be playing teams around us for all four matches (or teams in the relegation fight), as then we’d be playing teams who need to win themselves, who need to go forward and attack, who hopefully would leave some gaps themselves for our guys to exploit. I don’t believe that Tooting and Margate have nothing to play for anyway, they would love to defeat us regardless of all of our situations. And, don’t you think that Mark Beard and Geoff Pitcher wouldn’t like to put one over their old team? And I know that Margate would like to exact some revenge for their FA Cup exit. So there’s all to play for. And that’s how I like it.

Thoughts on...Kingstonian's Vets team

2011-04-13T17:15:00.002+01:00

Nothing has run smoothly this season when it comes to the Kingstonian Veterans’ team. We were drawn away to Molesey in the first round, only to find out that Molesey never even entered. Then we were drawn away to either Walton Casuals or Metropolitan Police, who would battle it out at Imber Court in February. Then it was delayed by four weeks. Walton Casuals were victorious, denying us the chance to take it to Metropolitan Police once again. Last season we lost 2-5 to them in extra time, but there was the mitigating circumstance that we only had eight men. One more man in our team, Met Police would have been severely embarrassed; I am convinced of that, albeit very biased.

We finally took the field at Walton Casuals last Wednesday. We had a full eleven, named four subs (though only two were fit to play), so we felt confident. For some reason (and I put it down to the insane desire of people to watch Chelsea play Manchester United on television) the game was made into a 40min each way match. Everyone hoped that there would be no extra time or penalties, me because of my nerves, everyone else because they would miss the second half of the televised game…

The first half was terrible. We looked as if not enough of us took the game seriously; player-manager Eddie Akuamoah was having kittens next to me in the dugout watching our guys struggle. Tony Reid won us a penalty, but Chuck Martini stepped up to take it, slipped, decided to carry on his run and comically spooned the ball about ten yards wide of the right hand post. Except it wasn’t comical. I fumed.

The second half was much better. We won us a penalty, I pleaded with Julian Sills to prevent Chuck from walking up field to take it, I asked that he be glued to the posts. Tony Reid took the penalty, he scored. Walton Casuals’ reaction was to launch into an appalling set of brutal tackles. At one stage there was genuine fear that one of our guys would end up in hospital, and when Eddie was carried off, some of us thought that he was going to have to go to hospital. Thankfully it wasn’t the case, and thankfully most of our hosts calmed down when someone was sent off for the vicious foul on Eddie.

Quite why Walton Casuals decided to be so unnecessary with their style of tackling is beyond me, it wasn’t even “just because you’re losing” syndrome as there was some nasty stuff in the first half, but once we took the lead, attempts at retribution were to be had. It was to our guys’ eternal credit that the only they reacted was to score more goals, a second by Tony Reid and a lovely individual goal by Richard Thompson. Our hosts got one back immediately after the third goal, but into the semi-finals we eventually moved, the game left a minor bad taste in the mouth but not too much. Home to Bromley, with Bognor at home to Whyteleafe in the other semi-final.

It became a panic to try and organise a home venue. Our players wanted to play the semi on Monday 18th, so I was duty bound to stick to that at all costs. Several grounds were unavailable, one club frankly tried to rip us off but we refused to be taken in, I got Ali Kazemi into the search, Pete Bowers (despite his voice being on the wane, get well soon mate), Mark Dunne and others into the mad scramble, and it was turning rather stressful. I felt that the game needed to be organised very quickly indeed, I didn’t want Bromley to have less than a week’s notice, I didn’t want either team to have less than a week’s rest before the final, which will be on Wednesday 27th April.

So we are grateful to Colliers Wood United, who will host the match with a 7.30pm kick-off. The final, if I’ve read the bulletin right, will be at the home ground of whoever wins the other semi-final, so I’ve already had to book Wednesday 27th off work in case we win and we have to visit Bognor (being realistic I’ve reserved the right to cancel the day off…).

I understand Bromley are traditionally one of the strong teams in Vets football around here, so I think we can look forward to an almighty contest. I’ve already won one trophy this season with the U18s and I’m greedy for more…

The end of my season...well, the U18s season.

2011-04-01T13:45:00.002+01:00

And so the U18s season is over, the Academy’s season will be finishing in the next few hours, and it’s been a successful season for Kingstonian at these levels.

It was good news when I heard that the Academy had defeated Tooting and Mitcham United 1-0 in their final home match of the season. Despite being currently bottom of the league, I still think the season has been a success. To set up the Academy in such a short time, get accepted into the Football Conference Youth Alliance and then produce a competitive team is definitely a success. OK, they are bottom of the league, but wins over established Academy teams like Woking and Tooting as the season began to draw to a close gives tremendous encouragement for the future. I think everyone involved with Kingstonian Academy should be pleased with their progress in Year 1.

It’s the end effectively of Year 5 for the U18s, the end of the fifth season since we re-formed the team after a previous regime ensured that we got ourselves expelled from the Southern Youth League about 7 or 8 years ago. And at last I think we’ve fulfilled some potential.

Having already won our division, it was important to us to finish the season with a victory, to confirm that we did deserve the championship. After a whirlwind start to the game, we led 3-0 against Whyteleafe, who then fought back to trail 3-2. The second half was beginning to be dominated by our Church Road opponents and it wouldn’t have surprised me if they had equalised and then gone on to victory, but they were stopped in their tracks by an extraordinary goal from Ali Dewar. If we had a goal of the season competition, Ali would have won it for that. We added a fifth goal in the closing minutes, a sending off for Matt Robinson (let’s face it, as I said to him after the game, it’s been coming…) in injury time didn’t take any gloss off the win or indeed the season’s achievement. We’re all going to give it another go next season to see if we can do even better, it will be hard work, there will be plenty of very good opposition, but we’re going to try our best.

Tomorrow the first team visits Carshalton Athletic for a Premier League game. Quite how strong the Carshalton squad will be is pure guesswork as there has been, even for non-league standards, a strong influx and exodus of players since the surprise “mutual consent” departure of the excellent Mark Butler as manager.

The Robins were the first club that I was programme editor for, and whilst the product that I came up with was not of the highest quality (not completely my fault…), I enjoyed my time at Colston Avenue. Not only was there usually some good football on show when the team was managed by Billy Smith and then John Rains, but the Robins had an excellent reserve team and U18s, it was at the War Memorial Sports Ground that my passion for 2nd XI and U18s football began, it was where my belief that a football club can’t function properly without either began.

Yet despite those happy times, it was a frustrating place to be, plenty of potential, a set of very good teams, good friends, excellent supporters, but whilst most of us had the foot on the accelerator to allow the club to progress, others had their feet on the brakes and Carshalton never did fulfil its potential. John Rains left for Sutton, my patience with the general manager wore thin and I left, and I wasn’t the last one. I eventually went to Leatherhead and thence to Kingstonian, the rest is part of my personal history…

I still have tremendous fondness for Carshalton Athletic, a lot of my friends are still there. Sadly, far too many have passed away. The ground obviously isn’t the same, since the incident one dark night when effectively the ground exploded. The main bar was gone, lots of memories there. The rickety wooden stand that probably needed condemning was gone. The old boardroom was gone. It’s probably fair to say that my favourite bits of Colston Avenue were gone.

Yet apart from the obvious things thanks to the explosion/fire/whatever you decide it was, Carshalton Athletic has changed. Whilst things do change, it’s the natural passing of time that causes that, Carshalton has changed a lot. They’ve had boom, they’ve had bust, they’ve had boom again, etc., etc., ups and downs much like any other club, but I look at the club now and quietly shake my head in disbelief, and desperately hope that Carshalton’s outstanding bunch of long suffering and loyal supporters get the good things they deserve (including maroon shirts).

Unfortunately, if it’s OK, let’s leave it until after tomorrow’s game, as I need Kingstonian to get all three points at around 4.45pm. Whatever strength of team Carshalton put out, and I get the feeling it won’t be a bad one, we need to perform well and get a bit more luck (as Lady Luck got stuck at Marylebone last week and didn’t have the wit to take another train to Earlsmead) if we are to continue believing that we can make those play-offs. A defeat won’t be the end of the world, but we are coming perilously close to the end of the season, it’s too close to call and I don’t particularly want to have to rely on winning at Margate on the last day to have to get the job done.

Visit 1 of 2 to the Waterside Stadium

2011-03-30T17:06:00.000+01:00

Actually, to stay at home wouldn’t have been a bad idea – switch on the England game, almost instantaneous thud of head against pillow, and as if by magic, I’m fast asleep by 8.10pm, if not even earlier. England friendlies – sorry, you can keep them. All they usually do is ensure a Liverpool player gets injured – it seemed as if we waited half of Jamie Redknapp’s career for him to get fit after hurting himself playing for England in daft silly pointless friendly matches. Anyway, I did the right thing by sticking to Plan A.

Plan A was to visit Walton Casuals for the first time this season for a friendly against Kingstonian, for me it carried far more interest, after all I know some of the players, it’s nice to see guys try their hardest to get themselves signed up and I ended the night raving about the performances of two or three of our players. If it were me, I would definitely sign up some of the guys on first team forms, basically because the closing date for signing players is tomorrow night and it never hurts to have fit players on standby in the case of an emergency.

For example the appearance of Luke I’Anson against Sutton United last season in the play-offs was part of the reason as to how Ks turned it around after the half time break. Luke had played once for us earlier in the campaign in a dramatic game at Wealdstone and wasn’t seen again in a Ks shirt until those play-offs and he was a revelation in the second half at Gander Green Lane. Maybe we could have a similar ace in the pack should we reach this year’s edition of the play-offs.

Ks started like a house of fire, and led after 42 seconds thanks to a goal from Tejan Jalloh, apologies if the name is spelt incorrectly. The outstanding Jordan Cheadle scored the second with a blast from distance and Antonio Gonnella made it three in the 15th minute, he deserved a goal from another immensely hard-working performance. In the second half Malaki Lumsden, who plays for the Ks Academy scored with a lovely finish in the 51st minute and that was that as far as the scoring was concerned. A nice relaxing evening watching Ks win a match. You don’t get many of those…

Visit 2 to the Waterside Stadium will take place seven days from today, as we finally participate in the Isthmian Veterans Cup, and a quarter-final match with Walton Casuals. I don’t mind saying that we ideally wanted a re-match with Metropolitan Police, as with just eight men turning up, we nearly beat them and would have done had their goalkeeper not made a marvellous last minute save and then we got done by an appalling assistant refereeing decision – Mark Harris and Matt Crossley in tandem produced the best performance from any back four that I have seen, it was magnificent to watch and they didn’t deserve to lose at all. But the Met Police weren’t good enough this time around and we’re eagerly awaiting the day when we play Walton Casuals.

Eddie Akuamoah is organising the team once again, and we hope that we can have a full team out this time. I don’t know all the names of the people who will be turning up to play but I do like what I’ve heard so far. Apparently there’s a Chelsea-Manchester United match on the television that night, but frankly I don’t care, I’d be racing to watch this even if Liverpool were playing a Cup Final.

I am ridiculously proud of my lovely wife Rosey. I am exceedingly proud of her anyway, how anyone can put up with me for over 14 years and actually seem to like being with me as well is beyond belief. Last Sunday she did something that I couldn’t do, or at least I don’t think I could do it. Not only did she walk five miles from somewhere in North Cheam to the Royal Marsden Hospital in Sutton, but she has raised over £1,500 in the process. An unbelievable achievement, sorry two achievements. I was there at the start and at the finish, I took a photo of the “before” and “after” and I don’t think that there was much difference, she did so very well.

I will be off to Merland Rise in a few minutes to witness the final U18s game of the season, hoping to cap off an unbelievable season with a victory over Whyteleafe. It won’t be easy. On Saturday we face the long trip to Colston Avenue to play Carshalton Athletic, I have a few thoughts about my first club, I’ll have a think and make some comments when I get some time, sufficient for now to say that I don’t recognise my old club any more.

A rambling type of blog

2011-03-29T16:57:00.000+01:00

Before I go and make any descriptions of the trip to Harrow Borough and the rest of the weekend, I must go back and type recklessly about the U18s team, a squad of management and players that I am ridiculously proud to be part of. Thanks to an incredible result at Merland Rise, where Sutton defeated Leatherhead 8-0, we were pushed across the finishing line without having to stride across it ourselves. It is highly unlikely that ever again will I be part of a championship team where the league title is won whilst I am watching an episode of Masterchef.

When the season began I was not sure at all how well we would do. I felt that we had underperformed during the previous season, and as always with the necessary influx of players, there was a slight trepidation for the opening day trip to Leatherhead. That night was beginning of the best U18s season of my football career. We played some lovely football that night on an excellent pitch at River Lane and beat what looked like a decent Leatherhead side 2-0.

Going out of the FA Youth Cup to Molesey was a tremendous disappointment the following week, but in retrospect it became something of a blessing in disguise as it allowed us to play League matches every week, whilst our opponents were having fun in the FA Youth Cup. It certainly wasn’t by my design that we played so many games before everyone else, it was fortune that played that part, and our players backed it up by racking up the points.

Thanks to this team, I got my first ever win at Stompond Lane – never in my fifteen or so years watching non-league football had I managed to see a team that I support win away to Walton and Hersham. An extraordinary 5-0 win saw to that, the Swans were a good team but had no answer to how we played. The win away to Sutton United was our first U18s win over the Us since we re-formed, and the win over Woking in the League Cup was glorious.

The trip to Thamesmead Town was an adventure, somewhere I’d never been before but it was well worth the visit. A point there felt like a point gained against a good opponent, it was a very late night that evening as Thamesmead is not the easiest place in the world to find but also we had a delayed kick-off thanks to traffic (go figure) and the fact that the lines of the pitch had to be repainted. It was the first team manager who turned up to do the painting! Outstanding work on a memorable night.

As realisation dawned on me that we could actually win this title, the games got more and more pressurised for me. I have heard a couple of people mention that sometimes it is more entertaining to see me pacing up and down than to watch the actual football. The game away to Metropolitan Police and then the home match against Carshalton Athletic were terrifying to watch at times, and don’t even mention that epic cup tie with Hayes and Yeading United, that game nearly finished me off for good.

And so to tomorrow, we face Whyteleafe at our adoptive home of Merland Rise for our final U18s game of the season. There is nothing riding on the game, but we do want to win. Some of our lads won’t be able to play for us next season and they will want to sign off having beaten Whyteleafe. The ‘Leafe beat us in a crazy match earlier in the season at Church Road, so we won’t underestimate them, but we definitely want to end the season on a high. We’ll try our best.

Harrow Borough away, always a difficult trip, and last Saturday was no different. Travelling to Earlsmead was a breeze until I got to Marylebone and found out that my planned trip from there to Northolt Park had been cancelled, as had every single bloody train journey from Marylebone that day. I used to do my research about these trips, I’m really slacking. In a way, it turned out to be a slight blessing because as a result I’ve found what felt like a quicker way, via Baker Street, Harrow-on-the-Hill, Harrow Bus Station and an H10 bus, which stops reasonably close to Earlsmead.

As for the game, I still feel cheated, but judging by the remarks of both Alan Dowson during his interview and the regulars on the Ks Forum, I might be in a minority of one. I’m still convinced that Harrow’s goal should have been disallowed for climbing, but I’ve heard or read precisely zero other insistences of that perceived fact. I must have been seeing things. I still think that the referee had an absolute shocker of a game, and I still think we deserved at least a point. However, some bad finishing and disappointing midfield play basically did for us and despite a large advantage in the possession stakes, Harrow held on for a win. I was so annoyed by the result (and the referee) that I refused to accompany Rosey in the evening to the Fairfield Hall in Croydon for a concert featuring T-Rex and David Bowie tribute bands. Rosey said she had a good time and I would have hated it. Mainly because the seats at the Fairfield Hall are for midgets only.

It’s not the end of the world, however. We have six games to go, all difficult, all against opposition who either need something, have beaten us already this season or both. Carshalton away is the next game, my first stomping ground, however Colston Avenue has literally and figuratively never been the same since that fire a few years ago. Recent events that have involved the third surprising managerial departure from the War Memorial Sports Ground in two seasons mean that any scouting we will have done on the Robins may well have been a waste of time.

I do get annoyed reading the Ks Forum quite often, the number of times I have typed a stinging rebuke to somebody and then decided it wasn’t worth it. The latest annoyances are about some people’s attitudes towards our possible non-qualification for the play-offs, as if it’s the end of civilisation as we know it. Some of these people have short memories, so short that the days of Khosla are forgotten. I tell you what, people, those days will never be forgotten. Those were days in which to be a club official was to be talked to face-to-face whilst being stabbed in the heart or the back all the time, when you doubted even what the colour of the sky was because someone said it was blue, when you just didn’t want to try and help any more, when you didn’t know whether this was either your last match with the club or even the last match of the club, full stop. Relegation was a piece of piss compared to that, missing the play-offs will be even easier to bear, believe me.

And anyway, I have a trophy already…!

Champion.

2011-03-23T22:31:00.000Z

Tonight, Sutton United's U18s beat Leatherhead 8-0. A stunning result, I'm anxious to read the report of what on earth happened.

Anyway, as far as Kingstonian are concerned, it means we've won the RYL Central Division for the 2010-11 season. A beautiful feeling.

Going to bed now. It's good to be a champion.

I missed a cracker!

2011-03-23T19:28:00.001Z

It was with some annoyance that I didn’t get to go to Hastings last night. A combination of a couple of things, including a rather large and thankfully unusual heavy depression attack hit, which basically meant that I just couldn’t face the journey. It’s not a pleasant feeling when this type of thing happens, any desire to do anything just disappears and all you can do is seriously try and find a darkened room and have a quiet whimper. It was handy that yesterday Rosey was immediately available to be a shoulder to lean on and talk to. The feeling disappeared after a couple of hours and after that I felt fine, possibly the quickest passing of this that I have encountered…

It is hugely frustrating to follow a Kingstonian match on the interweb. I worked out right at the end that if a game is boring, you don’t find out much in the way of updates, however if the game has some exciting bits there’s sometimes a delay whilst the correspondent on the terraces catches his/her breath. But if something completely mental happens, the delay can be minutes, even hours, because our correspondent is going mental themselves, and judging by what happened last night, it’s completely understandable. I now wish I was there.

The main result, 2-1 for the Ks, means that we're now in 6th place in the division, one place away from the play-off zone. Seven games to go, and it's time to break out all the cliches. Every game a cup final, etc., etc.

I was very surprised to see that we don't actually have an opponent left in the fixture list who is above us in the table. I think it speaks more for the tightness of the division than anything else. We have a tough away game coming up - Harrow Borough have tonked us the last three times we've played them, they put Bury Town away last night, I haven't quite figured out how they're behind us in the table... I like going to Harrow, but I can't say I'm looking forward to the 1pm kick-off...

I decided that I wouldn't go to the Sutton-Leatherhead U18s game as I had previously threatened, I know that Sutton's Twitter feed person is excellent, so I will be able to find out the score reasonably quickly.

Time to cook some jacket potatoes with tinned spaghetti and meatballs. Nothing but the best...

Cricket is not a fair test these days...

2011-03-22T12:38:00.003Z

50 over cricket polarises opinion these days. Not as much as 20 over cricket which is either wonderful entertainment or just a bit of hit and giggle (depends if England or Lancashire are winning). 50 over cricket is either thrilling or fantastically boring. Even the thrillers have exceedingly dull periods of play, usually in the middle of each innings.

If I had a child, and he or she wanted to become a cricketer, my advice would be to practice batting, forget about being a bowler. Cricket administrators detest bowlers, the rules of the sport are usually designed to help the batsman. Bowlers are restricted as to how they bowl, where they bowl, what they bowl, in one-day games how much they bowl, but batsmen are allowed to do practically what they like for almost as long as they like on wickets that are usually batsman-friendly. Apparently it’s more fun to see a ball whacked out of the ground than it is to see a batsman having his reflexes tested as he dodges a ball which flies past his nose. I disagree completely, and it’s not fair.

The two times that I can think of off the top of my head that bowlers had the upper hand, the authorities changed the rules to prevent it from happening.

The first occasion was the notorious and infamous Bodyline series in the 1930s, whereupon Harold Larwood and Bill Voce would bowl at top speed at the bodies of the Australian batsman, usually with fast rising “bumpers”, giving the batsman the choice of nicking a dolly of a catch to one of many leg slips or getting hit.

Bodyline as a theory was devised to basically get Donald Bradman out, the main reason it succeeded was because of the brilliance of Larwood and Voce, the main reason it was derided and outlawed was because England captain Douglas Jardine used it on every Australian batsman, and I’m not actually sure whether Bradman was ever dismissed as a direct cause of a head-high bumper. The authorities later stopped the use of more than two fielders behind square on the leg side, limiting greatly the number of leg slips and blunting Bodyline or “leg-theory” as Jardine preferred to call it. English cricket administrators seeing prostrate batsmen on their own hallowed grounds instead of dismissing Australian “whingeing” via cable helped the rush to change the laws.

Leg theory when done properly was indeed not entertaining, there is no fun either seeing batsmen knocked unconscious nor flicking a ball harmlessly to leg slip.

The second time was during the 1970s and 1980s when the West Indies had an assembly line of super-fast, super-quick and super-accurate bowlers who dominated Test and Limited Overs cricket for years. They were ably assisted, mind you, by an assembly line of fantastic batsmen oozing with flair, ability, quickness and power. No other country could come close to matching the West Indies with bat and ball (and the wicketkeepers weren’t too bad, either!).

The focus, inevitably, fell on the bowlers, who sometimes invariably peppered batsmen with six head high bouncers per over. Sometimes it was the same situation as in the 1930s, either pop up an easy catch or get hit. Unless you were West Indian, again it stopped being an entertainment.

So the authorities placed limits on the number of bouncers per over, and the West Indian bowling attack was blunted forever, though the effects weren’t truly made known until the great Courtney Walsh and Curtly Ambrose both retired.

I’m not asking for a return to Bodyline and six bouncers an over. The main two reasons why they became so potent were a) the skill levels of those bowlers involved were just so high and b) captains from both eras were reluctant to use any other tactic. But with the ball being so on top, cricket became tedious, the only excitement seemingly coming from counting the stitches on the foreheads of batsmen not quick enough to evade a bumper and finding out how many colours Brian Close’s bruises amounted to.

Cricket has now gone too far the other way. In one day cricket a bowler can’t bowl even a centimetre wide of leg stump, in all cricket there is a limit on the number of bouncers, cricket bats look much bigger than they used to (perhaps that’s just a flawed perception), boundary ropes are pulled inwards to make it easier to hit sixes, cricket balls are made in such a way that seam bowling and swing bowling is almost impossible after a short number of overs (except in England, who use a different make of ball than anyone else), increasingly batsmen get out due to lack of concentration more than anything else.

In most games now, the bat is so on top, tedium is appearing in the same way as it did when the ball was so on top 25 or so years ago. In fact, it seems that the only way to guarantee excitement is to make sure England are playing…

Cricket needs to be a fair test between bat and ball, this is why it is called Test Cricket. Bring it back, please?

And so to another week...

2011-03-21T15:05:00.003Z

A big week of football ends…another one begins. Does it ever end? Actually, no.

The weekend just gone was one for the referees, as both my teams benefitted from some strange match officiating. The Kingstonian game I have gone through in my previous scribbling, but the decision for Liverpool’s first goal against Sunderland yesterday left me befuddled.

First of all, it was a foul by the Sunderland man on Jay Spearing, it was definitely outside the box. The referee did the right thing by awarding a free-kick, but then a group of Liverpool players did themselves no favours by surrounding the referee demanding a penalty. Well, obviously they did do themselves a favour when the referee second guessed himself and asked his assistant who will have had a poor view of the incident. Referee changes his mind, Dirk Kuyt scores the penalty and the game is changed.

Referees do make mistakes. Not as many as players, mind you, that’s conveniently forgotten every time there’s a refereeing debate. I can understand the referee making a mistake if he had pointed to the spot instead of awarding a free-kick. The incident happened so fast, it started outside the area and ended well inside the area. A mistake would have been understandable.

What I didn’t like was the way Liverpool players surrounded the referee and demanded that he change his mind. Incredibly, he did, consulting with an assistant who was in a far inferior position whilst he did so. I have always detested it when Manchester United and Chelsea players treat match officials like dirt, thinking (rather naively, it turns out) that Liverpool players would never do that kind of thing. I have lost that moral high ground now, and I’m annoyed about that.

And to show what a two-faced cretin I really am, I raised my arms in joy when Dirk Kuyt did indeed score that penalty. After all, Liverpool were suddenly leading an important game in which they were second best for the first half hour. In the end, it was a comfortable win, especially after that dream goal from Luis Suarez in the second half from a ridiculous angle, and at least we can start believing that we can put pressure on Tottenham Hotspur, etc., for that fifth place and a spot in the Europa League.

Having said that last bit, to be honest the way the season began, I am seriously grateful that Liverpool are not in the massive battle to avoid relegation. When Liverpool had the previous owners and the unfortunate Roy Hodgson as manager, a relegation fight looked very realistic indeed, so for the club to be merely challenging for a European place next season is actually quite an achievement. If the club doesn’t qualify, it would be a disappointment but nowhere near the end of the world. We can concentrate on the League Cup!

What is currently happening is more fundamental than playing in Europe next season. Liverpool FC is a club regaining its own self-worth and re-building for the future. There is a lot of work to be done, many changes are needed in playing personnel, the defeat by Sporting Braga illustrated that quite clearly. But off field the willingness is there, the desire is definitely there and a statement of intent was made when Luis Suarez and Andy Carroll were bought from Ajax and Newcastle respectively. Suarez already looks like a fantastic signing, Carroll I’m not so sure about just yet but he has been hindered by injury.

Much more is needed, not just in opening the wallet and paying silly money for players but in placing trust in Liverpool’s youth system, which is producing some almighty talent at the moment. No point doing that if they don’t get given a real opportunity to progress.

As I said at the top of the piece, it’s a big week of football. Kingstonian away to Hastings is the first match of the week. I said in the previous blog that we need to make sure that Saturday wasn’t a fluke. Too many times we have gone into games on the back of a decent or good performance and seemingly decided that football is an easy sport and the hard work doesn’t need to be done. The result is usually an ordinary performance and an annoying defeat.

Also, too many times we have looked at the table, seen that we’re playing a team near the wrong end of the table, decided that they’re rubbish and the cycle begins again, easy match, hard work doesn’t need to be done, annoying defeat.

Anyway, this is a reasonably long journey for us supporters on a Tuesday night (though merely a short hop when compared to the Lowestoft game!), anything less than total commitment from the players will not be taken kindly.

Game number two of the week remarkably doesn’t feature Kingstonian. It will be my first game of the season in which this will be the case, but it has massive Kingstonian ramifications. I will be off to Merland Rise on Wednesday night for a Ryman Youth League match in which Sutton United will be at home to Leatherhead in what should be an excellent game of football.

A home win or a draw means that Kingstonian win the Central Division, whilst an away win means Leatherhead can still win the title (and means that I visit Colston Avenue in seven days’ time as the Tanners visit the Robins that night). Still no assorted poultry being counted…

Making the most of it...

2011-03-20T12:47:00.001Z

As Dowse has said, we got battered in the first twenty minutes against Lowestoft. We benefitted royally from a couple of incidents, one very contentious indeed, and came away with a decent 2-0 win.

As with the match last month, Lowestoft flew out of the blocks and tried to blow us away. Once again, they very nearly did, and once again they couldn't quite do it. Once again, they had a goal mysteriously disallowed for offside.

The fun began before the game, Ks' line-up took a very unfamiliar look. We were missing Gary Mac again due to injury, so Adam Thompson was put back into the centre of defence next to the superb Tom Hutchinson, whilst our midfield had Sam Clayton starting (Dean Lodge not fit to play 90 minutes apparently) and quite startlingly Ian Pearce. Ian had played just the one match for us in the past, it was in the 1-6 mauling we received at the hands of Aveley where he played up front without any success at all. Yesterday he played almost sweeping in front of the back four. Yesterday he was outstanding.

Anyway, in the tenth minute Lowestoft had a penalty. It was a good decision by the referee, Dean Hamlin did foul his man on the edge of the box but it did look inside the box. It was a good, well-taken penalty but Rob Tolfrey replied with one of the best penalty saves you will see. It was outstanding.

Not long afterwards Lowestoft scored a fine goal. I lifted up the microphone, looked at the team sheet to work out the name of the scorer and then was quite stunned to see the linesman's flag waving. Disallowed for offside. I still can't work out who was even close to offside. I fully understand the messages on the Lowestoft forum claiming conspiracy at worst, incompetence of the officials at best.

I have less sympathy for the Lowestoft player that was sent off, whilst both his tackles had no malice in them, they were both clumsy and late and deserved yellow cards. However, the decision to send the player off did change the game almost completely in our favour.

We pressed the advantage in personnel home in no uncertain terms, and after a great deal of pressure we finally broke the deadlock in the final minute of the half thanks to another ridiculously brilliant finish by Paul Vines. Paul and Bobby look to be a marvellous pairing, I don't know where we'd be without Bobby's goals this season, especially when our form began to dip when the snows came down. Not only are both guys scoring goals, they're usually of really quite high quality.

And then just as we were contemplating leading by a single goal at half time, in the third minute of stoppage time Sam Clayton's shot from distance went like a bullet into the net. Fantastic finish. We don't shoot often enough from distance and usually when we do it threatens to knock a satellite out of the sky. This shot was top quality. And so we swapped around two goals up.

The second half was less open, we tried to score a third goal to wrap the game up, Lowestoft tried really hard to overcome the man and goals defecit, neither side could quite achieve their aims. That suited Kingstonian, as the Ks did a good job soaking up any pressure that came their way whilst still providing a threat themselves at the other end.

The result of all this was a 2-0 win for the Ks, I have to say I didn't expect that to happen. The worry now is that we'll have expectations now for the visit to Hastings on Tuesday, we play well below those expectations and return home angry after another sub-par performance. Let's hope that doesn't happen.

The Pilot Field is one of the best places to watch football in the Premier Division, I love visiting that ground, even though I don't ever recall winning there. It has been a great surprise to see Hastings struggling so badly this season, but I'm afraid our need is just as great and I am desperate for us to win on Tuesday.

Waiting for Saturday...

2011-03-18T17:05:00.001Z

And so any interest I have in the European competitions comes to, well, not a crashing end, more like a limp end. Last week, Liverpool played without imagination and lost 0-1 to a very limited Braga team. Last night, same type of performance in front of an incredibly quiet Anfield, a 0-0 draw and Braga moved into the quarter-finals. What an incredibly frustrating night, frustrating to see so many players who did so well against Manchester United then play like they’re out of their depth against Braga. I’m not even going to point at the lack of Steven Gerrard in the team as he was practically invisible in the United game. Is Luis Suarez already important enough for him to be irreplaceable? Argh, good luck to Braga in the quarter-finals against Dynamo Kiev, but nevertheless frustration abounds…

It was with a shock that I looked at the Ryman League Premier Division table and saw Kingstonian in 11th place. But when you think about it, it shouldn’t be a shock, such has been our form in recent weeks. However, all is definitely not lost. We have a huge opportunity to boost morale and league position when we face Lowestoft tomorrow afternoon, hopefully in front of a big crowd, swelled by the efforts of some of our esteemed supporters doing some publicity in the centre of Kingston tomorrow morning.

I shall be at home tonight finishing my preparations for the game as I choose the music that will be blared out of the speakers. My wife Rosey has expressly banned me from playing David Bowie’s “The Laughing Gnome” tomorrow, which is frankly quite unfair. Still, I won’t get a lift home if I breach the ban, it’s not something worth risking. There will probably be something by The Darkness, seeing as a) they’ve just announced their re-formation and b) they hail from Lowestoft.

It’s the second time this season that we’re playing a match with red footballs, in honour of Comic Relief, but to be honest I really don’t like them, for some reason I have difficulty following them, I understand some people find it next to impossible. It’s just an unnecessity, really, and not really something that registers on the novelty value scales either. Bring back the dayglo orange balls, I say!

Lowestoft will be a big game, they’ve been in the promotion hunt all season, and whilst results in recent weeks haven’t been fantastic, they will be formidable opposition. With the Ks having developed a Jekyll and Hyde consistency this season, it’s imperative that the good one turns up. If it does, I like our chances, but if it doesn’t then it might be time to get the crash helmets on.

However, we do possess potentially the most talented forward duo that I’ve seen at the Kingsmeadow, if we can be solid at the back and our midfield can be supportive of Bobby Traynor and Paul Vines, and then we can get the three points. Our manager Alan Dowson has said in his online interview that he’ll give the current squad four matches to prove their worth and get themselves back into the play-off zone, otherwise he’ll “throw in the kids”.

I wouldn’t be too surprised if he did, though I would have mixed feelings. Speaking purely with my U18s secretary’s hat on, I would be delighted if the likes of Jamie Summers, Ali Dewar, etc., etc., were given a chance, but at the same time because I haven’t seen how they would play in adult football I would be worried about whether they would cope. It’s a delicate issue that can’t be answered until they’re thrown in at the deep end.

But then again, heck, why not throw them in at the deep end. Some of our players at U18s level have matured and would definitely succeed at reserve team level, one or two of them I believe are better than those on the current fringes of the first team squad. I think they could do a positive job, they wouldn’t be overawed and they wouldn’t let anybody down. Craig Mullen showed that it’s possible to jump from U18s to Division One South, we’d be asking a lot more from our current U18s to jump to the Premier Division but I think it might be worth the risk.

Of course, if the current first team squad improve performances and results, the last two paragraphs may be a waste of typing but I wouldn’t want to discount them anyway.

Oh well, let’s finish this for another blog…ha ha ha, hee hee hee, I’m the Laughing Gnome and you can’t catch me…

U18s lose in the League Cup, but no need to be upset

2011-03-15T13:44:00.002Z

Cobham is one of my favourite grounds to watch football. I have had plenty of excellent evenings at the Leg O Mutton Field happily watching Kingstonian’s U18s ply their trade. We used that ground for about two years during our criss-crossing of Surrey in a search for a permanent home.

Due to the unavailability of Merland Rise last night, we went back to Cobham to play another “home” game there. It was nice to be back.

There’s not much to the ground, the dressing rooms, boardroom and bar are all in one block, there’s a small stand in front of that block, a small amount of cover both ends and the dugouts on the far side, behind which there’s enough room to do a full warm-up without having to do it on the pitch, which last night was iron-flat. No, not much to the ground, but I like going there, though I would appreciate it if British Rail moved Cobham and Stoke d’Abernon station to Cobham instead of Stoke d’Abernon…

We played Lewes last night in the Lucas Fettes Cup Third Round – the League Cup for the Ryman Youth League. We did want to do really well in that competition, we beat Woking in Round 1 and then had that stupendously stupendous penalties victory over Hayes & Yeading United in Round 2. A win last night meant a trip to the quarter-finals.

Whilst it wasn’t to be, Lewes came from behind to beat us 2-1, it was a tremendous football match between two excellent footballing teams. I can’t complain about how we played, because I thought we played very well, we just got beat in a quality game by a team who played a little bit better on the night, especially in the first twenty minutes after the break when they scored their goals.

Still, we beat the holders in the first round, beat a Conference National team in the second round and played well in defeat in the third round. All of our opponents were Conference South or above and we competed really well in all three games. Not a bad run at all, just a bit of a shame we couldn’t go further.

This means that we have just one game to go this season, and I’m hoping that there will be nothing riding on it. Wednesday 30th March we go back to Merland Rise to play Whyteleafe. A point will give us the Central Division title. If Leatherhead don’t win away at Sutton and then at Carshalton, we don’t even have to do that as we will have won the title already. I’m still counting no members of the poultry family; I have too much respect for Leatherhead. But I am getting excited and still nervous…

Very few shades of grey

2011-03-15T12:45:00.000Z

I’m not sure what it is, but Concord Rangers certainly bring out the worst in Kingstonian. After the most disappointing performance at the Kingsmeadow in many a month came one of the most fruitless trips of the season as we were left navel gazing after another deserved defeat at the hands of the Beach Boys. Certainly no Good Vibrations here, and after one of the most tedious halves of football I’ve witnessed in a while, no excitations either.

The visit to Canvey Island is now a very familiar one, when the traffic is flowing, it’s not a long journey at all. Although thinking about it, when you’ve done Lowestoft away in midweek, no other journey seems like a long one at all. Turning right at a roundabout once on the island is when it gets unfamiliar, although even that’s not the case as I realised that the bus route from Benfleet Station to Canvey Island’s ground actually passes Thames Road, the home of Concord Rangers.

The Thames Road ground is different from anywhere I have ever seen. For example, there’s Bedfont, which is on the landing path of planes landing at Heathrow (I could swear I saw the whites of the eyes of one pilot). There’s Dover, almost perched halfway up a hill. Of course there’s the Arena at Croydon where you’re so far away from any action. Where I went to last night, Cobham, actually a ground I love watching football at, but quite how our car is still working after driving along the pathway to and from the ground (we went at 6mph which was way too fast…). And I’ll never forget Shoreham and Clacton, both close to smaller airports, and the match at Shoreham where bored spectators could watch fly-pasts of vintage planes.

Thames Road, Concord Rangers FC, is definitely different from all of those. There’s a refinery of some type behind the main stand and to the right, there’s a caravan park behind the other touchline and a massive car park to the end on the left. It’s no joke that you could probably lean over a fence and watch a match for free, and if you’re bored of the Ryman League game, you could lean over a fence and watch an impromptu game of football in the caravan park (though home supporters wouldn’t have been bored on Saturday…).

Football grounds come in all shapes and sizes, some are better than others, so are more enjoyable to watch from than others regardless of perceived quality, but for reasons unknown I quite liked this ground, despite the awful smell when the wind blew in the wrong direction. What actually ruined it was the football.

Concord Rangers are a good team, they know their strengths and they play to them. Very well indeed. Whilst the Ks were mostly poor, in retrospect they were made to be poor on the day. Concord hassled us and harried us, gave us no room, no time, little respect, actually quite how it should be. Through their efforts and our inability to deal with the situation, we fell two goals down not long after half time.

Both goals were quite awful defensively, as our guys messed up in ways not successfully done before this season. In contrast, our forward line was given no service at all, it took until the 75th minute before Sam Clayton became the first Ks player to have a shot.

We managed to get the ball into a dangerous area just once, and that allowed Paul Vines to score a quite marvellous goal, though the mood generated by the previous 88 minutes guaranteed very little celebration.

It wasn’t as bad a performance as the home game against Concord, I think Concord played better on Saturday than they did against us in January, at least they came up against more resistance. I heard a couple of complaints about the pitch, but it wasn’t that bad. It is the same for both teams, the best teams adapt to it. And it was miles better than the corrugated turf of Aveley, and we played some good stuff there, so the pitch isn’t an excuse, it very rarely should be.

So where do we go from here? For us it was to the A13, the always-spectacular QEII Bridge, the boredom of the M25 and then the Gypsy Moth restaurant on the Purley Way. As an aside, it’s never that full when we visit, which is a crying shame as it’s a really good place to eat, we always have the carvery and it’s always excellent stuff, though I always overdo it… In contrast, the Pizza Hut next door was heaving…

Back to the football, where do we go from here? We’ve flown outside the play-off zone after being in it for most of the season, we’re showing the form of a side who will definitely miss those play-offs, but it’s so darn close that a couple of wins would catapult us back up that table. We are still in contention, though sometimes it doesn’t feel like it.

Thanks to the permanent signing of Paul Vines, we have potentially a brilliant strike force. But not even Jimmy Greaves, Ian Rush or Pelé could do the job as brilliantly as they did without the backup (how many goals did Dalglish score for Liverpool? And he was a midfielder.). No service means running after lost causes means a striker or two being pulled out of position just looking for possession which means little opportunity to score. And this cuts down our opportunities even more if the midfield aren’t winning possession and having the ability to stride into that penalty box and test the goalkeeper themselves.

Our defence does worry me on a consistent basis. We are too reliant on Gary MacDonald staying fit, and he got hurt once again against Concord, this time lasting just ten minutes. Even though any replacement we have are decent in quality, for some reason we’re not the same when Gary Mac gets hurt and sometimes it shows in glaring ways. We should be strong enough to cope without Gary, but we frequently let in particularly stupid goals, two of which happened at Thames Road on Saturday.

As it stands at the moment, I don’t see us getting to those play-offs. We need to suddenly flick a switch and turn it on and that usually isn’t possible. It would be disappointing, certainly not the end of the world (too many people are already forgetting the Khosla era and the utter despair that caused), and, like last season, I would worry at the moment about our survival chances in Conference South should be somehow get to those play-offs and win them.

Reading one of my previous blogs talking about optimism at the Kingsmeadow, this one sounds like the polar opposite. The truth is definitely in between but unless you wear an old England away kit, there are very few shades of grey in football.

Kingstonian U18s nearly there...but not quite...

2011-03-08T16:44:00.002Z

It was a momentous evening at Merland Rise last night as Kingstonian’s U18s played their penultimate League fixture of the season. Last time out was one of the most unacceptable nights in my football career, I can’t describe it in detail because it is being dealt with internally and no doubt externally, but it was a very sour night, and that doesn’t even take the poor game we had into account.

We needed a big night against Carshalton Athletic. Even though we have led the division all season and are now very close to winning the title, I have never agreed with the Ryman League bulletin that has proclaimed us as runaway leaders. OK, we currently have an eleven point lead at the top of the table, but everybody has games in hand on us, and before last night four rival clubs were still in contention. Carshalton Athletic was one of that group of four.

The Robins began like a house on fire, they were quicker to the ball, they were faster, stronger, hungrier, it was a very worrying first half. I was having worried visions of us throwing away this championship just as we were in the final straight, a football version of Devon Loch looming on the horizon.

For the first time this season we were missing Matt Amis, who is away in America I believe interviewing with a college, so we signed Andy Small on the night. It turned out to be his first game of football for eight months. You could have slaughtered me with a feather when I found that out… Andy started out very nervously but he was protected by a damn fine defensive unit.

I was delighted when the half time whistle went and it was goalless. Whilst the Robins didn’t have a cast iron chance to score, they looked more likely to score than we did.

Whatever was said during the half time break, it worked. It was the Kingstonian that I have watched most of this season, we played as a team, we worked hard, we passed and we moved, we went in where it hurts. At times it was lovely to watch, and it was lovely to see a bunch of lads suddenly and collectively regain form in the middle of a game that we decided we had to win.

That Matt Robinson scored the goal with twenty minutes to go was no surprise, but it was a huge roaring relief nonetheless, even though I can’t remember for the life of me how the goal went in. I don’t really care, to be honest.

It would be a negative comment to say that we hung on to win 1-0, because we were never really hanging on. In defence Jamie Summers was a monster. Even in a career of fabulous performances for the Kingstonian U18s, this was a brilliant one. He can head the ball further than some lads can kick it…

It helped to have someone as good as Dean McQueen next to him, and then Charlie Dunne (very underrated player he is) and Laurie Child next to them. When Dean had to go off with a rather painful-looking attack of cramp, Tom Siefers was solid as a replacement. Thou shalt not pass, and the Robins couldn’t.

The midfield was pretty ordinary in the first half, but when it clicks, it really clicks. When Jack Wadmore and Carl Downs hit form you have trouble believing that there’s only two of them in the centre of midfield. On the wings, Karl Ellis and Ali Dewar were excellent in the second half, and the front pairing of Matt Robinson and Matthew Rose-Hazel was outstanding after the break, both defensively (I love it when centre forwards defend so high up, time for me to bring out the old “Ian Rush is one of the best defenders Liverpool ever had” lines, I think) and going forward. It’s because Carshalton are such a good side that we only scored one goal. Ollie Robinson came on for us towards the end and was mightily impressive in what became the last fifteen minutes as the referee decided to try and kill us all by adding eight minutes of stoppage time.

So 1-0 it stayed, Carshalton can no longer win the title. It’s between us, Leatherhead, Walton & Hersham and Sutton United for the championship.

A win for us in our final game against Whyteleafe (no gimme, they beat us at Church Road) and we win the league whatever happens.

Leatherhead have four matches remaining, Walton and Hersham five, Sutton United eight. Realistically, they have to win every game to catch us. It is possible that one of those can do it (not possible for all three as they all have to play each other between now and the rest of the season), so we’re not celebrating just yet, but we do deserve to be where we are.

Neutral readers might accuse me of “bigging up” these lads a bit too much. They may be correct, but ultimately I couldn’t care less, it’s my team, I'm their team secretary and I’m proud of them and proud to be their team secretary.

Positive attitudes abound at Kingsmeadow and Anfield

2011-03-06T18:20:00.000Z

I'll start at Anfield, where Liverpool have just beaten Manchester United. And this was no fluke at all, whilst Liverpool weren't dominant they played closer to their potential than Manchester United did, it was such a positive performance with a hell of a lot of self belief mixed in with large dollops of very entertaining football.

In Luis Suarez, Liverpool finally have a man who could well end up as a worthy player to wear the hallowed number 7 shirt. We had Keegan and Dalglish grace Anfield with that shirt, Suarez certainly has Dalglish's skill levels to be worthy, though I doubt anyone in the history of football will ever have the work rate of Kevin Keegan.

In Raul Meireles, Liverpool have finally replaced Xavi Alonso, the man who under Benitez ran the midfield as much as Steve Gerrard did. In Raul Meireles, Liverpool have a positive to remember Roy Hodgson by.

It's obvious that Liverpool don't have the depth and the strength of at least three of the teams above them, but there is incredible potential at Anfield at the moment. Maybe it's time the owners announced that Kenny Dalglish stays as manager for next season, quite how he's almost instantaneously transformed a self-loathing underachieving club into a club full of belief and desire (with practically the same squad), is beyond my understanding.

With Sporting Braga the next opponents in the Europa League, I have high hopes of progressing to the last eight, but Braga haven't got there by accident, they must be more than decent to get this far and underestimating them will be a gross miscalculation. Still, it's nice to celebrate winning against Manchester United, and deserving to win against Manchester United into the bargain.

Back to the Kingsmeadow, there is also quite a bit of optimism. We drew with a very good Tonbridge Angels team, but we did well, especially in the first half. Paul Vines' goal was a sensational piece of finishing, the introduction of Paul into the team has been a huge boost to the club, as has the new centre back pairing of Gary MacDonald and Tom Hutchinson.

They may not be the quickest, but their positional sense and organisational skills are outstanding. I have been definite for some time in my belief that we would have had a much better season had we managed to keep Gary MacDonald fit. It's such a shame that Jon Boardman didn't stay with us, but he recommended Gary Mac to us and I think we have a lot to be thankful to Jon for.

Yesterday's game was an outstanding match, two good teams playing each other. We edged the first half, Tonbridge were much the better side in the second half and deserved to score at least one goal. It's just annoying that we let in another one of those one-off long range screamers. Is that bad defending or bad goalkeeping, I seriously haven't a clue.

We might make the play-offs, we might not. It's not the worst thing in the world if we don't, but I do know we'll give it our best shot. There has been a change of attitude, hopefully we will turn up for every first half, hopefully we won't roll over and die like we did against Concord Rangers. I am looking forward to our first visit to Concord Rangers on Saturday, it is sure to be a tremendous game of football.

Tomorrow evening the U18s are at home to Carshalton Athletic in our penultimate Ryman Youth League fixture. We need to win, for many reasons. We are still looking over our shoulder at the pack of clubs below us in the division, I am still nervous about being caught by Leatherhead or Sutton United, or maybe Walton and Hersham and even Carshalton Athletic. We were appallingly bad against Chipstead, our attitude stank, the effort wasn't there, we were outplayed and we deserved to get beat. Some of our players let the team down, let us down, let me down. That won't be tolerated tomorrow, we haven't come all this way to blow it all because of one or two attitudes.

Bring it on.

Ks do good against Hendon

2011-03-02T16:08:00.003Z

It was with some trepidation, really, that I went to the Kingsmeadow on Monday for the game against Hendon. An opportunity to get out of the funk that the club has been in was dashed on Saturday when the weather caused our game against Hastings to be called off very early indeed, which finished off the perfect weekend for me (see previous blog) – actually Liverpool finished off the perfect weekend for me but we’ll slide quietly on from that game…

The journey to the Kingsmeadow was horrendous. Worcester Park is a pain in the behind at the best of times when it comes to traffic issues, but this was ridiculous. Normally the swearwords appear when the queue back from the bridge at Worcester Park station extends to the top of the hill. This queue started opposite what used to be the Queen Victoria pub in North Cheam. It took about an hour and a half to get from North Cheam to Worcester Park station. Standing up inside a crowded and over-warm X26 bus was no pleasant experience.

It turns out there are roadworks under this particular bridge and there are (or were on Monday) temporary traffic lights. It seemed as if these lights were biased towards traffic going up the hill rather than going on to the A3 and New Malden. Once past these works, the bus almost flew to the Fountain roundabout in New Malden, the 131 bus came almost immediately and I made it to the ground at about 7.15pm. Slowly passing WH Smith in Worcester Park, I very seriously thought about giving up and going home.

I’m glad I didn’t. And I’m pleased that we kicked off late to start what should be our last midweek home game of the season, which means I don’t have to faff around Worcester Park again for another season.

Ks debuted a new centre half partnership against Hendon, with Gary MacDonald returning from injury and Tom Hutchinson making his debut. Even though injury has almost ruined Gary Mac’s season, the little that we’ve seen from him has made it obvious that we’re not the same team without him. Gary Mac and Tommy Hutch made a fine impression on their first outing, it looks like they’re not the speediest in the world, but if you have a footballing intelligence and can organise well, that’s a handicap that is easily overcome.

I desperately hope that we can keep hold of Paul Vines, he has been excellent for us so far in his loan spell, and the two goals he has snatched in the last two games have been justifiable reward for his efforts. He is a similar player to Bobby Traynor in the senses that they can score goals, they work hard when they don’t have the ball, they can poach a goal as well as create one, but refreshingly despite the similarities they are disciplined enough not to get in each other’s way – in the 80s at Anfield there was always the discussion as to whether Ian Rush and John Aldridge could play in the same team – they were so similar that even Kenny Dalglish never worked it out…

Ks played well against Hendon, it’s the first time in a while that I’ve been able to say that we actually played well, and in both halves. Hendon are a decent side, although their attack is undoubtedly better than their defence at the moment, and they are obviously lacking in confidence; after what Lowestoft just did to them it’s not really surprising.

We didn’t give them a chance to settle, Paul Vines flicking the ball home in the second minute. Hendon always proved to be a threat going forward, but so did we, and whatever Hendon threw at us was repelled most of the time by Mac and Hutch. Though there was one weird incident when a shot from the edge of the D managed to hit post and bar and Tolfrey knee before dribbling only just wide.

Just as it looked like we would settle for being one goal up at the break, Bobby Traynor curled the ball in unexpectedly. There is still debate as to whether he meant it, but ultimately who cares as the ball floated past the astonished and strangely still Hendon goalkeeper and into the net.

The second half was much of the same. The foul on Dean Lodge, who looked unfit in the first half yet raring to go in the second half, by the Hendon defender was astonishingly bad. And not very intelligent either as I don’t really know how two players didn’t break their leg with this challenge. The referee had little choice but to brandish the red card.

The third and final goal was outstanding. Traditional, old-fashioned, knock-em-all-over centre-forward play from Allan Tait forced him through the Hendon defence, his pass to the inspirational Bashiru Alimi was perfect, as was the captain’s finish. Maybe 3-0 was harsh on Hendon, but we did play very well on the night.

Tonbridge on Saturday will be a completely different kettle of fish. We have an appalling record against the Angels and it’s about time that changed. It will have to change if we are to uphold our ambition of getting to those play-offs, and Tonbridge are the type of quality club that we will have to win matches against in order to do so.

In Tommy Warrilow they have an excellent manager, I worked with Tommy during his 12-month stint as Leatherhead manager many moons ago. We were relegated that year, but I tell you what, with the budget he had and the players he had at his disposal, he got the absolute best out of his troops every single game. It was a travesty that he was sacked at the end of that season, and no surprise to see him do well at Tonbridge. After the start that they had this season, the Angels could easily have shown Tommy the door, results since then have proven the Tonbridge board to be wise on this occasion.

In less than ninety minutes I will be travelling to Chipstead for a massive U18s game, the most important of my career. A win today won’t win us the Ryman Youth League Central Division, the mathematics rule that out 100% but it would take a collapse akin to Hearts in 1986 to stop us denying Leatherhead the title. If the players can control the nerves better than I am at the moment, I like our chances of winning tonight. I won’t underestimate Chipstead, though, we scraped past them in January and lost very deservedly at High Road around this time last season. Sutton United and Leatherhead face each other tonight as well, the result of that match will be very interesting to see and I will be anxious to find out this particular score as well.

Time for me to start humming unnervingly in a dark corner… (edit: looks like the team underestimated Chipstead, as they deservedly won 2-0 - Leatherhead's 1-2 home defeat at Sutton is interesting, but to be honest I haven't had the chance to analyse the table...Carshalton Athletic at home on Monday is next. We won't underestimate them. I will promise that.)

Life is nuts...

2011-02-26T20:24:00.001Z

It's not going well at the moment. Not well at all. It's very difficult to cope with life at the moment but somehow I will.

It's been going wrong all over the shop in the last few weeks. It has been no secret that I have been unhappy at work in recent weeks, and the unhappiness has accelerated. So much so that I am now actively seeking work once again as I do not feel useful in this particular job, I don't enjoy the job, I don't like where the company has moved to, and I have lost faith in the company. I have some thinking and some researching to do in order to decide what to do next, at the moment I am pleased a decision has been made but really I am not pleased because I don't particularly know how to proceed..., but something will have to be done quickly to prevent my mental health situation (which is poor at the moment) from going out of control.

The Big C has the family very hard, as Rosey's mum is terribly ill. Although she is still able to get around a little bit, the prognosis is not good. Having this bastard disease strike a second time - I lost my own mother 17 years ago to cancer - has been shattering.

Yesterday was actually a very harrowing day, where my sense of humour, willingness to stay calm and a lot of life enjoyment flew way out of the window. Rosey's mum has always wanted to see the Aurora Borealis in person, normally to do that you have to go off to the north of Norway, maybe go to Scotland and keep your fingers crossed, maybe fly to the Faroes or Sweden and spend a few days up there. Kathleen is not physically up to that, so her daughters found a very clever alternative.

So, five of us went to Gatwick Airport to get on to a plane to see the Aurora and a large part of the cosmos from above the clouds. Fantastic idea in principle. In practice...well...there's issues.

First thing to mention is an appreciation of the efforts of all the astronomers in charge of this trip. Their enthusiasm and hard work to try and make sure everyone had a good time cannot be underestimated. Their knowledge of the constellations and their undoubted love of astronomy shone through all evening.

I was already in trouble on the evening as firstly the stress of the job has been doing weird things to me so I am not the most sociable person at the moment, to be part of a group of four other excitable people is actually not a good experience. Secondly, my choice of shoes turned out to be a huge mistake as I now have the shittiest most painful blister on the back of my heel (no, I wasn't wearing my high heels...), trying to walk around Gatwick Airport with an ever worsening heel is not good for the mood.

Onto the plane now, and it's obvious very quickly that this isn't going to work properly. I must admit that I hadn't thought this out properly, and what I found was a packed plane of people squashed like sardines into not much room at all. Not much leg room, the promised light meal of sandwiches turned out to be the tinest of fruit scones, and (the main bit that I hadn't thought out) the windows were tiny, as they have to be, it's an airplane after all!

The idea is basically sound - fly up to the Shetland Islands, turn all the lights out in the plane, view the constellations and hopefully the Aurora. Also, change seats from time to time to allow everyone to see out of the window. Sound idea, as I said, but really there should be a height restriction to this - firstly I needed to be surgically removed from my seat every time (I'm not even close to being the smallest person in the world), secondly the windows are placed too low for me, I am not a master of contortion and it proved impossible for me to see anything (Rosey, twelve inches shorter than me, says she had issues trying to see anything). Apparently there was very little Aurora last night, I saw none of it, but the only bright light in the sky that I knew I saw was the flashing red light from the wing of the plane ("block the light out with your hand" said the astronomers, "you have to be joking, that blocks out the entire window" whinges I). I think I saw a bright orange star but I do have doubts as to whether I did see that now...

So, after flying up to around the Shetland Islands and back, it's now one o'clock in the morning, I've had a wasted flight where I saw nothing, and now it takes half an hour for people to get off the plane, and then it's on to a bus to get to the South Terminal (passing the hotel that Rosey and I were staying at near the North Terminal...). More walking on an even more painful left foot and back to the hotel at about two o'clock.

The absolute highlight of the evening? Seeing two rabbits munching on grass on a bank next to the pavement we were walking on in order to get back to the hotel. At least we'd have a game on Saturday.

I am so grateful that my mother-in-law paid for all five of us to go on this trip, I am just desperately upset that it went to so wrong for me as I feel as if I've thrown away a couple of hundred quid. I have admiration for the astronomers, I think the organisers get a little greedy and put too many people on each of these trips, and I will never fly Monarch Airlines again.

Oh no we won't. Elphinstone Road in Hastings is waterlogged and the game is called off at around 10.30am this morning. Un-f***ing-believable. Let's just sum the week up.

Kingstonian are frustrating to watch. Results are not great, performances at times oscillate wildly between ok and absolutely awful and there is no consistency.

We don't know what Kingstonian is going to turn up every half, let alone every game. We battered Aveley to a pulp at their place but couldn't get the win, it was a disappointing 1-1 result. Away to Lowestoft, we were slaughtered in the first half and were delighted to go into the half level at 1-1, it was a testament to the team's guts. In the second half, it was still mostly Lowestoft but we could even have won it had their goalkeeper not made a stunning save in the last minute from Bobby Traynor.

A surprise arrived for the game against Wealdstone when Dean Lodge was in the team. Any boost to the morale came rapidly to an end in the first seconds when Lodgey was clobbered - if it was a deliberate thing that's fine (shouldn't say it too loudly but it is a decent tactic...even more so when the referee doesn't get the book out...), but Lodgey was not a factor in the game. In fact, no Kingstonian player was a factor in the first half as the Ks were absolutely pathetic. In the second half Paul Vines finally got the goal his play has deserved and we battered the Stones without levelling, finally falling to a penalty which was a shocking decision by the referee. Wealdstone deserved their win because they took their chances and we didn't.

Someone did say on the Ks Forum that we haven't played a good first half in ages. I have to say that I agree. It's got to change quickly if we want to get to those play-offs.

The Academy and the U18s are highlights for Kingstonian at the moment - the U18s are on the verge of winning the championship, but I will count no chickens as we still need to perform and get results in order to win that title. Leatherhead look like our main challengers and they're too good a team to discount in any way at all, they have plenty of games in hand but they are capable of winning all of them. If they do, that forces us to get two wins and a draw from our last three games, I'd like some breathing space but we're going to assume that there isn't any.

The Academy are finally getting results that their hard work has deserved for a long time, not only beating one of the Boreham Wood teams 1-0 (satisfying on a number of levels) but then beating Woking 2-1 at their place, severely damaging their hopes of challenging Tottenham for the division title.

Right, I have to start the programme for Monday's Hendon game and then work out a strategy in order to change job and leave Newsquest as quickly as possible.

One day, just one day, life will stop being nuts...

Some in, some out at Kingstonian

2011-02-05T11:55:00.000Z

I had a suspicion that things may well happen after Monday's game. That doesn't make me a genius as I would have thought that many Kingstonian supporters will have thought the same.

And so, in the last hour Ali has been able to announce that four players have come in and two have left. Of the guys that have left, I wasn't particularly surprised at Lee Hall, who has gone to the Met Police on loan. He's a 100% honest player, but I've never worked out what his best position is, wherever he plays for us, for some reason he doesn't quite fit.

Matt Gray is a big surprise, however. He has been off form for two or three games but who hasn't. He has accepted an offer from Met Police, and I think it's a blow for us. He has been as consistently good as anyone in the squad and has given everything in every game. I'm sad to see him go.

But times move on. Two guys return to the club - Paul Vines is back on loan, supporters of football at this level in the south of England need no introduction to him, but they probably won't remember his fruitless and very short first spell at the Kingsmeadow. He scored no goals, but was given very little chance by the management five years ago. Before that he scored a million goals for Beckenham, did the same on his return to Beckenham and then scored a billion goals for Tooting. He's arrived on loan from Bromley for 31 days, Traynor and Vines up front for Kingstonian for 31 days is potentially a very damaging strike force.

Mo Harkin's injury during the semi-final against Sutton is one of the main reasons why we lost the play-off final against Boreham Wood, as he was unable to play. Mo at the time was our quiet engine and when he ticked, we ticked. Injury has destroyed his season this time around as well, I am desperate for him to get match fit as quickly as possible.

I remember Jordan Cheadle from Walton and Hersham's youth team (he has joined from Merstham) and know absolutely nothing about Nicky Greene who has arrived on a dual registration thing from Bromley. Whenever new players arrive there is always an excitement before games. Hopefully we can pick ourselves up from Monday's downer and do the business on a vastly improving Croydon Athletic team (let's ignore their previous few results, remember Concord got stuffed 1-6 at home in their game last Saturday...).

I have a dilemma

2011-02-01T13:23:00.002Z

I have a dilemma. It’s to do with the next Kingstonian programme, and specifically the editor’s notes. I am pleased that I don’t have to compile them until Thursday evening at the latest, because if I did them right now then who knows what vitriol will be placed on that page for Sunday’s game against Croydon Athletic.

To be honest, the editor’s notes may still be one heck of a moan as I don’t recall ever leaving the Kingsmeadow after a match quite as angry as that. If the game against Carshalton Athletic can be classified in the “disappointing” category, last night’s match at home to Concord Rangers was awful.

I didn’t think Concord Rangers played that well last night, but they didn’t need to. Their bottom gear was so far superior to the one low gear that we possessed on the night that they were able to rev away from us without really trying. And that’s the disappointing aspect of the evening.

As I’ve possibly mentioned before, I desperately detest losing but I can take it on both chins when it means that my team has lost whilst giving it everything. If a team is genuinely better than us then fine, good luck to them, but if they’re not (and I’m not convinced Concord are genuinely better than us) and they’ve beaten us because they wanted to win more (a helluva lot more in Concord’s case) then rockets are urgently needed up backsides.

And after last night, I’m past caring whether these rockets propel malingerers out of the club or force players with a little more respect for the shirt to at least look like there’s an effort to be done.

Apart from Rob Tolfrey and Bobby Traynor, I’m struggling to think of a performance that caught the eye in anything like a positive sense. Maybe Antonio Gonnella, but he was a substitute, he wasn’t given a whole lot of time to change the game and anyway we were 0-3 down and severely done for.

I have been extremely critical in the past of the Kingstonian Boo-Birds that frankly plague this club, but I don’t blame them in the slightest for going berserk after last night. People who were there last night may have noticed that I didn’t get on the microphone to plug the next game when the final whistle went – it would have a sick joke had I done that so I purposely put the microphone away before I made an eejit of myself.

I moaned like crazy in a previous blog after the Horsham game that I thought some players quit during that game. Yet last night was worse – you can work some of them out for yourselves (because seriously I have suspicions but can’t single out individuals), but there were some frauds out there. They let down their team-mates who give a damn, let down their management who are working bloody hard to make the club a success and the poor supporters, poor in three senses – a) they had to watch that rubbish, b) it was cold enough to freeze the balls off from the brass monkey and c) they had to pay to watch that. It feels dishonest that the club keeps the money and doesn’t give it back.

Apart from the habitual plague of boo-birds, who complain bitterly even on the odd occasion when Kingstonian lead a game by three or four goals, Kingstonian supporters are a patient, supportive lot. They usually get behind players, whether they’re good, bad or indifferent, but the boos that rang out last night may not have been anywhere near as loud as the booing at Anfield for most of this season, but for a crowd of 257 (paltry once again, for a team that has been in and around play-off zones for the past four years our attendances are appalling, and it’s definitely not Pete Bowers’ fault before anyone thinks I’m pointing a finger at him) they were plenty loud. Even I wanted to boo but I quite seriously couldn’t remember if I’d turned the microphone off…

I do wonder whether some players pull on a Kingstonian shirt and think that they’ve made it. Maybe I’m deluding myself, no problem if I am (Sutton United supporter Taz didn’t have a “Smugometer” on his website for years for no reason!), but they sure as heck haven’t “made it” when they join Kingstonian and if they think that way then they’re the ones deluding themselves.

I still haven’t decided what to write in the editor’s notes. Actually, I haven’t decided whether there will be editor’s notes, if you can’t say something positive, say nothing at all? Maybe I’m just doing my spouting off now so I can be a bit more constructive in the programme. We need to knuckle down, we need to change things. Messrs Dowson, Hams and Tyler are all capable of doing that, they’ve done it before, they’ll do it again.

With my other football hat on now, I’m still scratching my head at what’s happening at Anfield. I’m still sorry that Roy Hodgson had to leave, but he’s turned out to be the modern day Liverpool version of Wilf McGuinness. He had no chance of succeeding, he wasn’t wanted, he wasn’t welcomed, ok he didn’t help himself sometimes but he wasn’t on a winner. He should have stayed at Fulham, his legacy was intact (it may well still be, for his sake I hope so), he’d done amazing things at Craven Cottage, that run to the Europa League Final was wonderful, but it just didn’t translate to the strange world of Anfield.

So, in comes Kenny Dalglish. Possibly the cheap option, possibly the easy option, but for giving a club an immediate lift in morale and confidence quite the master stroke. Immediately after the first game, a 0-1 loss to Manchester United that will go down in Anfield folklore as the game Howard Webb won for United (something I disagree with), Kenny pulls a master stroke of his own. Recognising that being so long out of the manager’s chair means that there will be gaps even in his knowledge, he appoints Steve Clarke as coach. Widely recognised as being one of the driving forces behind Chelsea’s success under Mourinho.

After the United defeat came a poor defeat against Blackpool and then a draw against Everton. Suddenly, Fernando Torres looked interested. Now we know why…

A win against Wolverhampton that was overshadowed by people not even playing in the game has been followed by a win over Fulham. That was a struggle, won by the weirdest of own goals (Djimi Traoré ain’t got nothing on John Pantsil now), but it was a win and a clean sheet. Seventh place in the league, a goal difference of zero, some hope in our hearts for the first time since the first lot of Americans bought the club.

Transfer deadline day was very interesting as Chelsea and Liverpool swapped money as if it meant nothing. It is stunning to see Liverpool actually flashing the cash, something they’ve never done in this age of stupid money. Yes, there’s been the odd big signing (Torres for example) but nothing on the scale that Chelsea and Manchester City use. Yet yesterday Liverpool were being mentioned in such phrases as “Sky Sports understands” and “the BBC understands” for all sorts of player.

Fernando Torres had to leave. He didn’t want to play for Liverpool any more. I don’t really care that he’s joined Chelsea, after all at this current moment we are not competing with Chelsea. But 50 million is an amazing price for a guy with the dodgiest of dodgy hamstrings. It could be seen as a desperation move by Chelsea, under pressure to try and buy their way out of what for them is a huge hole. Torres in the last season or more has been a disinterested sulking guy, not a surprise when the first lot of Americans were around, definitely a surprise in the last few months. He has been outscored by David Ngog for crying out loud, an honest but not particularly talented forward. Being habitually disinterested and sulking, maybe he’s joined the perfect club as a lot of his new team mates have the same behavioural characteristics.

But he’s left a ship that’s no longer sinking, it’s a ship that’s not only rising again but at last has potential. I smell good things for Liverpool. While I’m wondering what possessed Liverpool to fork out 35 million on Andy Carroll, a largely untested but apparently talented Newcastle forward, and gawd knows how much on Luis Suarez, a guy who scored bucket loads in Holland but then again so did Dirk Kuyt, it’s a statement of intent. I’m not saying that we will stroll to the 2012 Premiership crown, though that would be lovely, but the new owners have told its supporters that the current league position is unacceptable and they will do anything (no matter how lunatic, and sometimes I think 35 million on an untested player is lunatic) to win that League Championship sooner rather than later. (And it’s also nice to see that you don’t have to spend millions and millions on super talent, Martin Kelly and Jonjo Shelvey definitely resemble that remark.)

Now to see if we can win that UEFA Europa League, we have a favourable draw, I really don’t see why not. It’s exciting to be a Liverpool supporter again. About bloody time :)

Disappointment against Carshalton

2011-01-29T21:14:00.000Z

I expected better out of this game - Carshalton have quite a few good forwards, we have been in the play-off zone all season. The game was dreadful. Two ordinary teams playing ordinary football, the game decided when the referee joined in the ordinariness, made two bad decisions which led to Carshalton's penalty, which Gary Noel scuffed to Rob Tolfrey, but then Noel tapped in the rebound.

Rob Tolfrey and Craig Ross must have frozen half to death during this game, it must have been difficult to concentrate given how little they had to do.

It is really cold today - and things have been made worse at home by the fact that the radiators are not working. Their timing is impeccable. They've never worked fabulously ever since this flat was built, but the timing today is fabulous.

I think watching bobsleighing, which I am as I type these words, makes things even colder but dammit bobsleds racing down the natural track in St Moritz has to be seen, it is one of the highlights of the sporting year. I know it's effectively ice skates on an ice track, but I still feel amazed that something without wheels can go so quickly. Bobsleigh and skeleton are two fantastic sports to watch.

Kingstonian are at home to Concord Rangers on Monday, the Beach Boys got mauled 1-6 by Wealdstone today. That can go two ways for our meeting at the Kingsmeadow, either they'll still be shellshocked and ripe for a second mauling if we can work out where the net is, or it will p*** them off so much that they'll quadruple their efforts. I'm hoping for the former, expecting the latter.

With my work life, I feel as if I'm coming to a crossroads, I'm not fantastically happy, the company knows it, we're trying to do something about it but if nothing or not enough changes then I've got to make a decision or two. I'm itching to do things that are more interesting, itching to get more involved in football (can anyone sponsor me to allow me to effectively work part-time or full-time for Kingstonian? That would be very nice indeed!), and wearing this jumper trying to keep warm, just itching...

I chose the wrong day to have my first haircut in just over two years, my ears feel blue. Have a good Sunday, I will be spending it programme writing for the Concord game. And yes, Good Vibrations is going on the playlist...

From Copenhagen to Billericay...

2011-01-08T11:31:00.000Z

Centre of Copenhagen to Copenhagen Airport - 15 minutes.

Copenhagen to Heathrow - A little less than 2 hours.

Heathrow to Wallington - A little more than 2 hours. Go figure.

Anyway, Liverpool's big news has just broken and Roy Hodgson is no more as Liverpool manager. Kenny Dalglish takes over as manager for the rest of the season. I still like Roy Hodgson as a man, he is a good man, I wish him well in whatever he wants to do, I am desperately sad that it didn't work out.

Off to support Kingstonian now and off to Billericay Town.

One more day in Copenhagen

2011-01-06T17:32:00.000Z

The snow fell overnight in Copenhagen, very heavily it seems. When we awoke from our slumber there was fresh snow on the window frames and stepping outside the Hotel Opera wasn't the easiest task. But throughout Copenhagen there is an army of snow ploughs and snow brushes, every shop on the Stroget was brushing snow away from their storefronts, but nevertheless walking on most of the pavements was difficult today. It has been a good visit to Copenhagen after all, but I have the desire to re-visit the city when it's not so snowy. We have missed out on several things, we didn't get to the Tivoli, the canals are still frozen solid so no canal trip, we didn't have the time or energy to visit nearby Roskilde or Helsingor, but one day we will. I'd even be tempted to stay here at the Hotel Opera once again, despite the lack of television channels!

Well, it looks like that for the second Wooldridge holiday running, a Liverpool manager has lost his job. Rumours are hot on Twitter (via BBC Radio 2 of all sources!) that Roy Hodgson's unfortunate and fractious tenure as Liverpool manager has come to an end. And there will be no tears for a most likeable man who has unfortunately confirmed most supporters' belief that he wasn't up to the job. He inherited a bad situation, coped with it poorly and made the bad situation worse.

It seems that nothing will be finalised today, but Sky Sports News has apparently shown pictures of Roy Hodgson leaving Melwood armed with "some big bags". Now either he's cleaned out his desk or he's got the bodies of one or two of his failed signings with him (from one or two things I've seen maybe it's Paul Konchesky or even his dear extraordinarily foul-mouthed mother) or SSN is causing a bit of mischief, but they'd never do that, would they?

In a sense, I hope a section of Liverpool supporters are happy. They never wanted Hodgson in the first place, they never gave him a chance, they wanted him sacked even before the first pre-season friendly. However, Roy's actions and style of management has not been compatible to the Liverpool way. Performances have been so lacksadaisical, Liverpool under Benitez in his most defensive mood seems dynamic by comparison. Players have seemed unable or unwilling to attack, even some of his own signings have been disowned by Roy Hodgson, the treatment of Joe Cole has been a disgrace in my eyes, worse than Benitez's treatments of Peter Crouch and especially Robbie Keane.

Roy Hodgson is far from being the sole culprit for this disaster of a season, but the buck stops at the manager, and if this is true, then it is for the best for Liverpool. (BBC Radio 2, unused to so much sports attention, has apparently crapped itself and denied reporting that the sacking has happened or is about to happen...)

Tomorrow I return home from snowy Copenhagen desperately hoping to avoid snow in London, and I will be starting the compile the Kingstonian programme for Monday's game with Aveley, though I'm not sure what comments I will make about the Horsham game.

Hello from Copenhagen

2011-01-05T22:54:00.000Z

It's a quarter past eleven and I'm in my hotel room at the Hotel Opera in Copenhagen. This is night number three in Denmark and as usual I am exhausted. Shuffling slowly around a city is a tiring experience, especially for someone with the athletic ability and endurance of a long-deceased whale.

The weather has been very cold, though apparently not as cold as in recent days. It snowed on Monday night and last night, but we were spared tonight, but there is snow everywhere, the canals that criss-cross the city have been frozen solid and it slow going sometimes trying to navigate the pavements - needless to say they do a decent job with gritting, but remember we are staying slap bang in the centre of the city, so perhaps it's to be expected.

Well, the food is good, the people are friendly and the place, the little of it that Rosey and I have seen, is nice. We came here in order to see a partial eclipse of the sun, we thought it would be a good place to see it, and it was a choice of here or Nice as they were the places we could get to from Heathrow after having watched Kingstonian play Horsham. Maybe we should have chosen Nice, less likely to be this cold, and I'm wondering whether the south of France actually managed to witness this eclipse as low and very heavy cloud ensured that we saw absolutely none of it!

We walked up to the Little Mermaid this morning, saw that the entire bay was still frozen solid, but we saw the small statue and, unlike the Mannekin Pis in Brussels, is actually still impressive despite its size and worth visiting. Shame some Russian tourists were doing their best to knock it down when we were visiting...

I was a very annoyed man upon fleeing the Kingsmeadow in order to get the taxi to Heathrow on Monday evening. An insipid uninspired performance from a Kingstonian team that had three, maybe four guys trying their best. When that occurs, bad things happen. Bobby Traynor, Bashiru Alimi and Matt Gray were the only ones I saw that could leave the field and have a right to say that they tried their best. That comment might be unfair on Simon Huckle, actually, so apologies to him.

A couple of Kingstonian players, who I won't name because I can't be bothered, quit on their team-mates during that game. That is completely unacceptable, even more so with one of them as in my opinion he doesn't deserve a Kingstonian shirt in the first place as he's not good enough for our reserve side (even if we had a reserve side, something that, by the way, I am still screaming for).

Players who do that take the piss out of their team-mates, manager, coaches and their club's supporters and must be given the fastest way out of a club as quickly as possible. We have had a few of them before at Kingstonian, talented but complete frauds and it is imperative to cut them out of a club in a speedy fashion.

Now Dowse is facing a lot of stick for that result, and it is quite understandable. After all, two of the fans' favourites have left the club recently and haven't been replaced. I fully appreciate some of the angst, though another portion of the angst I don't appreciate as it seems to me that Dowse has never been accepted by a small percentage of the Kingstonian support for some bizarre reason (it's not because he's northern, is it?).

As for the portion of angst that I do understand, it is reasonable to moan at the management when players of the calibre of Carl Wilson-Denis and Dean Lodge have left (though Deano hasn't actually officially left yet, or if he has we still retain his Ryman League registration, which allows him to attempt once again to play Conference or Conference North/South football).

In Carl's case, we didn't want him to leave, he asked to leave, and there's no reason to keep someone who has made up his mind. Carl has unfortunately been off form this season, then got injured at Croydon Athletic and we didn't see him in a Ks shirt again. I was sad to see him leave as he's an honest guy, tries his best at all times, he does get downhearted at times when the referees are against him (which is most of the time, cheers men in black), but he still has something to offer.

Deano's case is weird - I only have Dowse's word for what has gone on and if it's true, then Dowse has done the only thing he could do, let him go. If Deano doesn't want to play for Kingstonian for whatever reason, why force him? Let him try out for the Conference or Conference North/South again and good luck if it works. I will remember the good stuff Deano did for us, and he did one hell of a lot of good stuff for us. Time does move on, sometimes it's an arse when it does, but maybe Deano not playing for Kingstonian any more will be for the best for both player and club.

I am writing this as Liverpool fall to another embarrassing defeat. How long before the Liverpool post becomes vacant? For the good of the club, I hope not that long. However, I remember writing something similar six months ago and look what I got when I got what I wanted...

Off to something close to sleep now as we have one more full day or dodging the ice in Copenhagen...

Couldn't keep away

2010-12-27T19:09:00.000Z

Ah well, couldn't keep away. Madness prevailed.

Happy Christmas to everyone, hope you're not iced in as we have been until today. The frustration of no football has been getting to me in recent weeks, Kingstonian weren't good in their last league expedition, the traditional bad performance against Harrow Borough came in a decidedly dodgy first half in which some Ks players proved that they weren't up to playing for Kingstonian. So they've either got to go out of the exit door or prove the likes of me wrong if they really want to.

With that being the last game until the third instalment of the 2010 Great Snow Attack, it has not been a great holiday period football-wise.

Liverpool have had two games called off in this Great Snow Attack, it being too dangerous to play at home to Wolverhampton at Anfield, thereby denying the Mind Yer Car Mister brigade their Christmas bonus. Blackpool joined in the fun by not having undersoil heating and getting their home game against the Reds postponed on Boxing Day.

Rumours flew about about Rafa Benitez's pending return after his firing from Internazionale, his return to the Wirral to spend Christmas and his apparently enrolling of his daughter in a Merseyside school. Liverpool flatly deny that they will be courting Benitez for a second go at being Liverpool manager, but as much as I love the city of Liverpool, it does seem strange that a man from Madrid, who worked in Milan, would choose Liverpool as the venue to spend the Natividad.

I do reluctantly concede that Roy Hodgson needs to seek employment elsewhere as he is not the man to steady the boat that I'd hoped he would be - but would Benitez be the man to steady the boat that he did quite a bit to rock in the first place? Whilst I would be intruigued by the possibility, I'm not sure if it should happen, after all (as my friend Ali correctly said to me) he was not the same man after Manchester United's eminent yet detestable manager did a number on him a while back.

Roy Hodgson has had the cards stacked against him from the beginning. He joined a club in chaos, more chaos than even that which was publicly seen. He replaced the most revered manager at Anfield certainly since Kenny Dalglish, maybe even Bob Paisley. A large percentage of the supporters didn't want him in the first place. He inherited a reasonably talented squad that had underperformed in a strange environment. A difficult job, to be sure.

He hasn't helped himself, though. His transfer dealings have, Raul Meireles apart, been awful. Konchesky (despite his enthusiasm) and Poulsen (partly because of his entire lack of enthusiasm) have been poor signings, Joe Cole is being mistreated (not my signing, said Hodgson in recent days), his press conferences are making those of Benitez look entirely normal. And that includes the legendary I-only-train-the-squad presser. Tactically, Hodgson has made Benitez look adventurous and sometimes Liverpool look scared to attack. And every time there is a glimmer of hope (beating Chelsea for example), we dash those hopes on the rocks of defeat at Stoke and the soon-to-be-traditional cocking up against Wigan Athletic.

It's been a long season so far for Liverpool - given the very unfavourable FA Cup draw where only indifference on Manchester United's part will give us a chance of victory, therefore minimal, it's going to be an even longer finish to the season unless either a) a new manager comes along, b) new on-field personnel replace some of the riff-raff that calls themselves Liverpool players or c) both as option b on its own won't work unless we actually attack from time to time.

Today's Kingstonian match away to Tooting and Mitcham United became the umpteenth to bite the frozen tundra this season but we're quite bizarrely having another go tomorrow afternoon. I'm not that chuffed with the idea of a game being rearranged at 24 hours notice, especially as Rosey and I were considering popping along to the cinema in the afternoon. We'll be at the Imperial Fields tomorrow, so let's not moan any more and just get it on.

Last week was a bit too action packed for me - much worrying has been done, partly due to the weather, and the resulting lack of football, but my beloved laptop decided to commit seppuku last Tuesday evening. I found a website on Tuesday late night who claimed they were 24 hours service so I phoned them. I wasn't surprised to get an answerphone but stunned when the gentleman called back twenty minutes later. He picked up the laptop on Wednesday, looked at it, took it away, came back Thursday morning, declared it to have passed on, took my external hard drive so he could rescue my data and came back Thursday around 4.30pm with the successfully rescued data. Comet benefitted from my custom on Thursday evening and I'm back and running again. A great relief.

Even though he was unable to resurrect a dead laptop, I can't recommend this company enough, so if you need your laptop or PC fixed, log on to http://www.suttonpcrepairs.com/ and give them a call. Cheaper and quicker than PC World, I can guarantee you of that.

Oh well, I seem to be blogging again. Darn it. I may as well carry on when I can...

Sorry folks...

2010-12-15T15:36:00.000Z

If I do have any regular readers, apologies - health issues, snow issues, some football issues, maybe not Big Issues, but stuff has got in the way of contributing to this 'ere thing. I'll try to come back to this and write something, don't be shocked though if I don't..., I thought this might happen anyway when I found myself a job, so sorry folks, if you want to see examples of the rubbish that are the thoughts in my head then have a look at Twitter and follow moosebert1 as that is me...

Without reservation...we need a second eleven...

2010-11-22T12:48:00.000Z

I’m having a senior moment here, I simply cannot remember where I left off the previous blog. No matter.

I think for me the biggest moments of the last seven days have been provided by Kingstonian’s Academy team and by a couple of Ks’ Under 18s.

The Academy, who I haven’t managed to see play yet, finally won a match last week, and according to John Fenwick’s report, it was thoroughly deserved. I will admit to bringing a halt to my usually quiet office with some celebratory noises when I found out the score. I really hope it was not a one-off. Interestingly, a re-arrangement means that the return match is this Wednesday.

Not knowing what the Academy fixtures were, it just occurred to me that I have Wednesday 1st December off work, and as luck would have it, they have an away game with Carshalton Athletic. I shall find out where they play and I shall be there.

The big news from the U18s was that two of our players, Jamie Summers and Matt Amis, have been selected for the squad for the England Schoolboys team. They may or may not get a game, but regardless of that it’s an incredible achievement for the two. If Ks were still in Division One South, I think Jamie would be ready right now for first team football with us, but seeing as we’re at the sharp end one division above, it is difficult to see Dowse giving him a go, other than in the County Cup or the League Cup should we beat Fleet tonight. If you looked at Matt Amis last season, you would see a goalkeeper lacking in confidence, but this season we have a different Matt Amis. It has been helped that he is playing behind a much improved defensive unit, but the difference in him is just so noticeable.

Both lads won’t be with the U18s next season as they will be too old, which highlights the Ks’ desperate need in my eyes for a reserve team. Alan Dowson is between a rock and a hard place here, he wants to give the lads a go, but when can he do it? He can’t really experiment in a game, for example, away to Lowestoft or home to Concord which is our next home game after tonight. So, in theory guys have to be loaned out. It’s not just U18s I’m thinking of, it is players who are on the fringe of the squad but not getting a regular game.

But loaning players out, in my opinion, doesn’t work. You have to rely too much on the goodwill of other clubs, most of the time this won’t be a problem but sometimes you get the odd disagreement, and there is a certain lack of control that makes these situations continuously uncertain.

The major down side to a reserves’ squad is the cost, which is prohibitive in a lot of clubs’ cases, but then again the value of that cost is determined by how well the reserve side is run. If it is run properly with the first team manager overseeing it and speaking from the hymn sheet as the reserve team manager, the reserves give a team an unmeasurable benefit. If it isn’t, then the reserve team may as well be another club and it’s a waste of time, money and effort.

The main cost for us would of course be pitch hire – I think if we got the funding and the pitch sorted out then the Suburban League would give us a favourable review in what would be our quest to rejoin the league in the South Division. (I do remember a previous Ks reserve regime demanding that, after a one season hiatus, the Ks reserves were elected straight back into the Premier Division. That was correctly shot down and I believe they had to play in either the West or North Division as extra punishment. A lesson learned, hopefully.)

Anyway, this is something I scream about quite often but the news of Jamie and Matt’s inclusion in the England Schoolboys team made me scream out quite vocally.

Also, I will admit to being rather selfish in the sense that, whilst I won’t be secretary of a reserve team, I would want to be involved with them, helping out and plugging them in the programme, and I’ve always wanted to win the Surrey Premier Cup for some daft reason…

But quite how we do so well without a reserve side is beyond me. It takes a lot of wheeling and dealing to try and keep players fit and happy, it sometimes means that players have to get match fit in the relative heat of first team games, it sometimes means that friendlies have to be arranged to get players match fit, and even then that doesn’t really work as, without the lure of either some points or a place in the next round of something, these games lack the intensity and competitiveness required to get them match fit.

And finally, it would alleviate us of, for me, the second last sign of the bad times that was caused by the family who took us out of administration and into the frying pan, so to speak (ironic that we got relegated at the Dripping Pan during this time…). The final sign of those bad times will take an immense amount of sorting out (and isn’t an immediate necessity anyway), I’ll leave it in your capable minds to work out what that is.

Fogbound Ks

2010-11-16T13:54:00.000Z

As you can gather, I’m getting less and less time and energy to carry on with this here blog. I haven’t made a decision as to whether I should just give it up or not, but don’t be surprised if it doesn’t get updated that much. Having said that, don’t be surprised if it’s the other way around either…

We’ve had our usual ups and downs at Kingstonian, our usual downs and downs at Liverpool and I’ve been hobbling around like a good ‘un after somehow damaging my ankle at Sutton Hospital.

It has been an exhausting week or so, with compiling programmes seemingly never ending. I’m pleased in a way that I haven’t got around to doing any U18s programmes this season, having said that I’m not pleased that a Ks match that I’m involved in takes place without some kind of commemoration by way of programme, which is a shame, but I can only do so much at the moment, which is not as much as I’d like.

Having to do the 125th Anniversary brochure and the Canvey Island programme at the same time during a week in which there were two away games against Sutton United (first team and then U18s) was the most challenging thing football-wise since I started working again. To get the souvenir brochure right was paramount for me, it’s not often things like this come around, and I wanted to get this 110% right. I think I succeeded, I’m very (very) pleased with it, especially the cover which was designed very quickly using inferior software, but Publisher can do quite a lot these days…

The week started disappointingly when the first team came off an impressive performance against Hastings United and were outclassed by Sutton United. I thought that with Mo Harkin and Simon Huckle coming back to fitness, the battle in midfield, which was one-sided at the Kingsmeadow, would be more even. Unfortunately for us, it wasn’t, and as a result we hardly saw possession and in a first half of almost total one-way traffic we let in two soft goals. We never looked like coming back, and didn’t deserve to either as Sutton held us at arm’s length for the rest of the game.

The following night though more than made up for it. At a freezing Merland Rise we won a pulsating encounter in the Ryman Youth League 4-2 against a team who last year won the Central Division without losing a game. Thanks to our defeat at Whyteleafe, we won’t go unbeaten this season but I love our chances of winning the title. We’ve only got eight games left this season in the division, seven of them at home, and whilst it won’t be easy (Leatherhead, Sutton and Carshalton all have good teams, as do one or two others), the points already in the kitty give us a good chance. Hopefully we can keep going whilst our rivals take points off each other.

Playing our home games at Merland Rise has made a fantastic difference to us. We have the most talented squad that we’ve had since our reformation six or seven years ago, and, apart from our time at Cobham, we are now playing home games on the best pitch we have had since then. Our squad so far has been a joy to watch, I just wish some more people came to see them as the games are just blinkin’ good. As people behind the scenes will attest, when first team home games are clashing with U18s matches, I am not a happy bunny this season!

I never thought I’d see the day when I would write that Ks easily beat Canvey Island. But that’s precisely what happened on Saturday. After the anniversary do, superbly organised by the Supporters Club and very well attended indeed, we routinely put our Essex opponents away with a 3-1 victory, the consolation goal coming in the dying minutes. It was pleasing, one of Bobby’s goals was majestic (not as good as his goal against Hastings which still makes me drool thinking about it…sad, aren’t I?) and good also to see Tom Bolarinwa exciting the crowds, he has been a very useful addition to our squad.

Yesterday came the first abandoned home game in my ten seasons at the club, and what a memorable League Cup tie with Fleet Town it was. There was a localised fog patch above the pitch – the Kingston Road was clear as a bell, Jack Goodchild Way the same. When I turned the corner, I couldn’t quite believe my eyes. And then the fog started going away and coming back and going away and coming back, conditions were not the same from minute to minute. We kicked off, it wasn’t good at the Athletics Ground End, Ks had a corner but I never saw it until Fleet cleared it. The fog cleared after about twenty minutes, Simon Huckle scored a gorgeous goal in the 40th minute and we went to half time quite happy.

The second half started the same way – Fleet trying to play football like they have always done, Ks trying to keep possession and kill off the game. Then the fog came back. Quickly. With twenty-five minutes to go it was getting worrying. The Athletics Ground End disappeared first. Fleet scored. I didn’t see it. I couldn’t see it. In fact I asked the goalscorer to come up to the press box and make himself known so I could announce it. The fog got even worse, and after a painful looking injury to Gary MacDonald (someone please give him some good luck, eh?) the referee called a temporary halt in the 70th minute, which four minutes later became permanent. Not sure as to when the game will take place again, but it was certainly a match not to be forgotten in a while.

U18s back in action on Thursday, I am so looking forward to seeing them play Lingfield in the Surrey Cup. Our opponents look like they’re capable of scoring goals judging by their results this season so we won’t take them lightly, but if we play like I know we can play then I like our chances. We’ll see, despite the possibility of hyperthermia I am thoroughly looking forward to it.

Liverpool? Talk to me when we stop losing to teams like Stoke City...

New website for the Academy and the U18s

2010-10-30T18:42:00.002+01:00

Short short blog today, basically plugging my new website...

Well, it's mine, but it's not mine as I'm not selling anything...

I have been doing a website using an excellent company called Weebly (www.weebly.com) and was quite happy with it, but it became a little time consuming and was getting lost amidst all the stuff that's going on at the moment (it's chaotic, for good and bad reasons), so I had a quick look at an alternative solution and, whilst they're a little formulaic, I found two and plumped for one, which seems to do the trick.

So, I present the new website (doesn't seem to work as a link, but click the title of this blog and it'll take you there):
www.clubwebsite.co.uk/kingstonianacademyandu18s/

If any parents or players read this, and you would like some photos featured on it, drop me an e-mail and I'll do my best.