December 9th tiptoes in with all the grace of a heavyweight boxer wearing a tutu. Where was I imagining revolting images on this date in the past? 1989 - FA Cup 2nd Round - Maidstone United 1 v 1 Exeter City My second visit to Dartfords Watling Street ground was to watch tenants, Maidstone United, take on Exeter City in this FA Cup tie. The Stones had made a decent start to life as a Football League club and came into this match against the Divisions top club with some confidence. A decent (for Maidstone playing at Dartford) gate of 2,358 showed that the romance of the FA Cup was not quite dead even if many home fans refused to make the 25 mile journey to Dartford to watch home games. An entertaining match saw City take a first half lead from I know not whom (poor record keeping from your correspondent!) with Maidstones Karl Elsey hitting a spectacular thirty-five yard equaliser in the second half. The reply, at St James Park, was one by The Grecians, by 3-2, who went on to win promotion to Division Three by winning Division Four. Maidstone made the Play-Offs but lost to cambridge United in the Semi-Final. 1995 - Premier League - Bolton Wanderers 0 v 1 Liverpool Liverpool were enduring a poor run of form and had not won since the 6-0 rout of Manchester City on October 28th. Not exactly, then, very good preparation for a tricky away match at Burnden Park, home of Bolton Wanderers. I had not been to Burnden Park before (this was my only visit) and found the away end, open terracing with an intrusive Sainsburys plonked into half of the end, to be somewhat inhospitable. This, quite possibly, had something to do with the temperature which was bloody freezing - in addition, watching any play around the corner flag closest to the Sainsburys was impossible! A rugged Reds performance saw us grind out a win, courtesy of Stan Collymores goal on the hour, which put a stop to the poor run of form. Boltons manager, Roy McFarland, would soldier on until January when he was replaced by Colin Todd. Interestingly, McFarlands predecessor was Bruce Rioch; I wonder how many other clubs have had three consecutive managers from another clubs Championship-winning team? I found out, afterwards, that my pal, Steve Langham, had also attended this match and he, too, froze on the away terracing! 2006 - Conference South - Cambridge City 0 v 1 Welling United I love Chris Moore! This open statement of affection should not be interpreted as being anything other than a platonic love. Why, then, do I love him? Ill tell you, gentle reader, Ill tell you! For more years than I care to remember, I have been considered the number one jinx for the Welling Massive and I have taken my place on the terraces of grounds all over the place to audible groans from my friends (there is another, far more worthy of the epithet jinx who shall remain nameless!). Long have I watched Welling toil in all weathers and produce performances which only cemented my position as being the first person to be thought of when one wants to stick a needle into a kewpie doll! So, Cambridge City away after watching Wings get bundled out of the FA Cup by lowly Clevedon Town and having been given instructions to Leave! Leave Now! when I took my place on the terrace at PVR only the previous Saturday for the home game against Newport County. Ha! What goes around comes around! Welling endured an uncomfortable afternoon at Milton Road (now, sadly, defunct) but had kept a clean sheet. Chris Moore, that wonderful man, then scored what turned out to be the winner and, upon hearing the final whistle, I burst into a happy song... Im not jinxy, Im not jinxy, Im not jinxy any more. Im not jinxy any more! In fairness, The Massive (Matthew Mein, Dean Shulver, Kevin Shulver, Paul Stirrups, Rowan Watt, Russell Prebble, Brian Smith et al) all joined in! A memorable day! No programmes to show as mine are still in storage and I could not find any relevant pictures on the internet.
Posted on: Tue, 09 Dec 2014 05:18:25 +0000
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