Guildford City - Spectrum Arena

Guildford City FC

Spectrum Arena

Parkway

Guildford

Surrey

GU1 1UP

Official Website

Twitter 

Ground: 24

Date: Saturday 7th October 2017

Guildford City 2-3 Farnham Town

Combined Counties League Premier Division
Attendance: 94 (official)

Guildford City FC - History

After the original incarnation of the club folded in 1974, the club was resurrected in 1996 after Burpham FC moved to the Spectrum Arena in Guildford and changed names to AFC Guildford.

Initially, AFC Guildford played in the Surrey Premier League, with this league eventually becoming Division 1 of the Combined Counties League. In the 2003/04 season, the club won this league and earned promotion to the Premier Division, although they had to share at Cranleigh FC to do so, at least until the Spectrum Arena was brought up to scratch by November 2004.

In 2005, the club changed name to Guildford United, before adopting the current name a year later. The first season under the name Guildford City was less than successful though, with the club finishing second-bottom of the Premier Division. However, the club secured a runners-up spot the following season, before later winning the league title in the 2010/11 season, only to be denied promotion when the Spectrum Arena failed a ground-grading inspection.

The following season saw the club once again win the Premier Division title, but this time the ground was deemed good enough for promotion and the club entered the Southern League Division 1 Central for the 2012/13 season. The club finished 9th in this league before being transferred to the Southern League Division 1 South & West for the 2013/14 season. In this league, the club seriously struggled and finished bottom, returning to the Combined Counties League Premier Division after just two seasons at Step 4.

In the aftermath of that disastrous 2013/14 season, the following three seasons saw the club struggle near the bottom of the Premier Division, although the club have been doing a bit better this season, being 3rd at the time of my visit but dropping down to mid-table since then.

In the current incarnation, the club's best run in the FA Cup came in the 2010/11 season when they reached the 2nd Qualifying Round, beating Egham Town, Three Bridges and Tonbridge Angels before losing to Clevedon Town. In the club's two seasons in the FA Trophy, they won just one game, beating Cirencester Town to reach the 1st Qualifying Round in the 2012/13 season before losing to Shortwood United. In the FA Vase, the club made it to the 4th Round in the 2010/11 season, beating Sevenoaks Town, South Park, Horley Town, Brading Town and Moneyfields before losing to Leiston.

My Visit

Having started at the University of Surrey in Guildford just two weeks prior to this, and having to come back home for my dad's wedding the weekend before this, Non League Day on the 7th of October became my first opportunity while at University to do a groundhop and, after seeing that Guildford were at home, it was a fairly easy choice where to start. Saying that, having convinced my friend Matthew to join me for a groundhop on this date (he'd never been to a non-league game before, so this was some achievement), we had discussed going somewhere in London, but Guildford happened to work for him too as he wanted to visit Anderton's music shop in the town.

On the day of the game, we met up at around 10:30am at the train station - with him being at University College London - and headed into town, looking around shops such as Game, HMV, WHSmiths, Waterstones and others before stopping at Muffin Break for lunch. After this, we headed over to Anderton's for him to look around and buy some guitar stuff, while I looked around in shock at some of the prices in there (£10,000 for a guitar, for example). Eventually, he found whatever he was looking for, and we headed to the bus station, getting to the ground by around 2:10pm.

With the rain starting to come down, I started to take my circuit of photos, stopping to buy a pin badge from the club shop along the way. Eventually, by the time the game kicked off, we had settled in a covered area on the dugout side of the ground, from which we watched the game and talked about it and various other things.

In any event, here's my report on the exciting game that we watched:

This was certainly a day of surprises, with the ground being better than expected, the quality of football being better than I expected and the team struggling near the bottom beating the team fighting at the top in a topsy-turvy fixture that could have very easily gone either way. That being said, I could just as easily sum this up by saying that set pieces proved most effective for both sides.

The game started fairly simply, with both teams tentatively pushing and testing the other, before an excellent Guildford free kick into the Farnham box was converted by Kieran Campbell after 12 minutes. Then, Farnham caught the entire Guildford team napping to equalise through Nick Medcraft on 14 minutes. But the drama wasn't over, with a Guildford corner (which, like the earlier free-kick, was masterfully taken by Ben Franklin) 2 minutes later being converted by Kieran Campbell once again. After this burst of goals, Guildford seemed fairly content to maintain their advantage, while Farnham struggled to break through and create any meaningful chances.

In the second half, Farnham came out and immediately went on the attack, causing lots of problems for a Guildford side who seemed to have become complacent and unfocused over the half time break. As a result, it was entirely unsurprising when a Farnham free kick was saved but not cleared, eventually allowing Ashley Peck to tap into the net on 51 minutes, much to the frustration of the home fans. After this, Farnham took the lead for the first - and ultimately final - time on 57 minutes, Elliot Cardona's shot rocketing into the top corner from 25 yards out. After this, the game largely petered out in similar fashion to the first half, except this time Farnham seemed comfortable while Guildford were trying to pull a goal back. In the last ten minutes, Guildford had several good chances, an excellent double save denying them an equaliser on 80 minutes, while a header hit the bar not too long afterwards. Farnham also had a few chances of their own, but ultimately no more goals followed and the away side claimed a surprise 3 points from what was an excellent advert for non-league football; so much so that I seem to have got Matt (it feels more natural to call him that rather than Matthew all the time) very interested in both non-league football and groundhopping as well (hopefully he can join me for more games as the season progresses).

The Ground

Despite being an athletics arena first and foremost - and all the issues associated with that (distance from the pitch, athletics nets blocking views etc.) - the Spectrum Arena was nowhere near as bad as I had feared it would be, with the elevation of the hill behind the near goal and the main stand compensating for the distance away from the pitch, while at the same time I was nowhere near as far away from the pitch as I had expected to be.

The elevated main stand provides seating for 255 people, while at the same time providing uncovered standing for at least 200 more people. Other than this, the only area of cover at the ground is an area of covered standing on the dugout side, which could hold around 100 people (possibly more) if the situation called for it.

The rest of the ground is uncovered, with all sides but the far goal having hard standing as well. The ground's current record attendance is 295 for an FA Cup game against Kingstonian in 2012.

While it is a decent ground, it is notable that the club are still looking to move away from the Spectrum Arena into a proper ground of their own, although I don't think much progress has been made on this front in recent years.

Photos

Fakenham Town - Clipbush Park

Fakenham Town FC

Clipbush Park

Clipbush Lane

Fakenham

Norfolk

NR21 8SW

Official Website

Twitter 

Ground: 23

Date: Saturday 22nd July 2017

Fakenham Town 0-3 Yaxley

Pre-Season Friendly
Attendance: 30

Fakenham Town FC - History

Fakenham Town were founded in 1884, joining the Norwich & District League in the early 1900s. After going on hiatus during World War 1, the club didn't rejoin the league until 1921, before joining the Norfolk & Suffolk League in 1935. When the league merged with the East Anglian League in 1964 (forming the Anglian Combination League), Fakenham were placed in the Premier Division, but were relegated at the end of the 1965/66 season.

Fakenham returned to the Premier Division after winning Division 1 in the 1971/72 season, a season after winning the Norfolk Senior Cup for the first time (they won this again in 1972/73 and 1973/74, as well as the Anglian Combination League Senior Cup in 1978/79). In 1988, the club became one of the founding members of Division 1 of the Eastern Counties League, earning promotion to the Premier Division in the 1991/92 season after finishing 2nd.

In 1994, 1998 and 1999, the club won the Norfolk Senior Cup again, and the 1998/99 season also saw the club record its highest-ever finish after coming 2nd in the Eastern Counties League Premier Division. However, this was followed by a period of decline, culminating in a relegation back to Division 1 in the 2003/04 season. At this level, the decline continued, with the club finishing bottom of the league in 2008/09 and 2009/10 (though neither campaign saw the club relegated back into the Anglian Combination).

After the latter of these two bottom-place finishes, fortunes slowly started to improve for Fakenham, with the club earning promotion back to the Premier Division after finishing 2nd in Division 1 in the 2013/14 season. Since then, the club has finished mid-table for the last three seasons in the Premier Division, but they are currently struggling at the bottom this season.

In the FA Cup, the club have made it as far as the 1st Qualifying Round on two occasions, most recently in the 2001/02 season, when they beat Marlow before losing in a replay to Leyton. The club has fared slightly better in the FA Vase, reaching the 3rd Round on three occasions, most recently in the 2006/07 season: in this campaign, they beat Walsham-le-Willows, Gorleston and Newmarket Town before suffering a 5-1 defeat at home to Cogenhoe United.

My Visit

After the previous pre-season saw Yaxley play no away games (for whatever reason), I was fairly eager to get to this game as soon as I saw it listed as one of our pre-season friendlies. This was even more the case after other obligations meant I missed Norwich's pre-season friendly at Lowestoft Town, and thankfully my dad was more than happy to drive me up there, after paying a visit to my grandparents in Attleborough of course.

Unlike a lot of other grounds I had visited up to this point, Fakenham's was very easy to find, with me using Google Maps on my phone to lead the way while my dad drove. As such, we got to the ground well before kick-off, giving me ample time to go around the ground and take a circuit of photos, with us eventually settling in front of the covered stand behind the goal Yaxley were shooting towards in each half (these areas of cover didn't extend all the way from the fence enclosing the ground to the pitch), moving properly under the cover in the second half as the rain started to pour.

As for the game itself, my thoughts on it below:

For a pre-season friendly, the first half of this match was very high energy, with both teams contributing to an exciting affair, albeit one which Yaxley somewhat ran away with. That being said, had Fakenham scored their clear-cut chance in the first 30 seconds, things could have been different. However, this was not the case and Yaxley instead went straight up the other end and won a penalty, Dan Cotton calmly converting from the spot. Yaxley then starting to firmly dominate proceedings to the point where Fakenham struggled to get out of their own box for large periods of play. By the 25 minute mark, Yaxley had added two more goals - another from Dan Cotton and one from Jack Saunders - and had been through on goal on several other occasions as well.

In the second half, Yaxley seemed somewhat fatigued by their first half efforts and mostly sat back, allowing Fakenham a chance to exert some control over proceedings. Several chances followed for Fakenham, but ultimately it was not their day and they could not convert any of their chances into goals. Late in the half, Yaxley had a few more chances that really should have been converted, but the goals in the first half ultimately proved to be enough for Yaxley to claim yet another pre-season victory.

The Ground

In many ways, the set-up at Clipbush Park reminds me of Wisbech's Fenland Stadium, and there are certainly lots of similarities, not least of which being the identical areas of cover behind each goal, both of which could likely provide cover for 100 people (same as Wisbech, except without the area of seating that one of these areas has at the Fenland Stadium, and without the steps of terracing seen there), while one of them could also provide some seating in the form of a solitary park bench (presumably a memorial bench of sorts, by the look of it).

The main stand, however, is definitely better than the one at Wisbech, and not just because it isn't an Arena stand: the stand looks as if it could provide seating for at least 200, and possibly as many as 300 people, although it is odd that the seats are red when the club play in amber and black. 

Other than this, the rest of the ground is open hard standing, with the ground having an overall capacity of at least 2,000 (based on the fact that the record attendance at the ground is over 2,000 for a pre-season friendly against Norwich City in 2006). It also looks as if there would be ample room to expand should the club ever rise to Step 4 or above, although I would imagine the ground is probably (in terms of football furniture, at least) good enough for Step 4 as it is.

Photos

Peterborough Sports - Lincoln Road

Peterborough Sports FC

Lincoln Road

Peterborough

Cambridgeshire

PE1 3HA

Official Website

Twitter 

Ground: 22

Date: Monday 1st May 2017

Yaxley 2-1 Wisbech Town

United Counties League Knockout Cup Final
Attendance: 491 (official)

Peterborough Sports FC - History

Peterborough Sports were founded in 1919 as Brotherhoods Engineering Works, initially joining the Northants League (this later became the United Counties League). They won the league in their first season, but left at the end of the 1922/23 season, transferring to Division 3 of the Peterborough & District League.

The club won this league in the 1925/26 season to earn promotion to Division 2, but soon dropped into Division 3 North. The club returned to Division 2 for the 1937/38 season, and were elevated to Division 1 after World War 2. However, they finished bottom in 1949 and were relegated back to Division 2, before being relegated to the new Division 2 (the Division 2 they had been in was renamed Division 1 in 1952, while Division 1 became the Premier Division) in 1953.

Another relegation followed in 1964, but the club returned to Division 2 after a single season. For the next 15 or so years, the club went up and down between Division 2 and Division 3 South, before earning promotion to Division 1 in 1983. This was followed by promotion to the Premier Division in 1988, where they remained until the end of the 2012/13 season, when they earned promotion to Division 1 of the United Counties League (in this time, the club changed named to Bearings Direct in 1999, before adopting the current name in 2001).

After a rich benefactor started backing the club, promotion to the Premier Division of the UCL followed in 2015/16, with the club losing just three league games all season. The following season, the club won the Premier Division at a canter, finishing on 112 points to earn promotion to the Northern Premier League Division 1 South.

In the FA Cup, the club have made it as far as the 1st Qualifying Round in each of their three campaigns, while their first campaign in the FA Trophy saw them lose in the Preliminary Round to Basford United. In the FA Vase, the club's best run saw them reach the 4th Round last season, beating Mildenhall Town, Swaffham Town, Biggleswade and Wembley before losing to Newport Pagnell Town.

My Visit

As soon as it was confirmed that Yaxley's League Cup final would be played at Peterborough Sports' ground on the 1st of May, the game was immediately put in my schedule as my way to finish the season (although it would have been wherever it was played, even in the unlikely event that it was at one of the few grounds in the United Counties League I had already visited).

On the day of the game, my dad decided - for whatever reason - that we needed to be at the ground before 1:30pm, and so we got there well before kick off; as it turned out, this was for the better as the car park near the ground was not especially spacious and, as the crowd started to grow, I could only imagine how difficult it would have been to find somewhere to park had we arrived an hour later.

After I had finished my circuit of photos, we stood in the terrace behind the near goal until just before kick off, at which point we moved to an area on the far side near the goal Yaxley were shooting towards (in the second half, we once again stood in the terrace behind the near goal). 

 

 

Before I talk about the game (with a match report from the Yaxley website, as my personal report is pretty messy), I think it's only fair to talk about how each of the two teams competing in the final had gotten this far:

Yaxley had beaten Bourne Town, Leicester Nirvana, Cogenhoe United, Oadby Town and Olney Town to get to the final.

Wisbech Town had beaten Potton United, Deeping Rangers, Raunds Town, Thrapston Town and Desborough Town to get to the final.

Overall, before the match report, I'll add some general thoughts of mine from the game: despite both teams having been on excellent runs to close out the season, neither were particularly impressive in this game, partially because the teams cancelled each other out and also partially because of some of the bad blood between the two teams (thanks to then-Yaxley manager Brett Whaley having moved from Yaxley to Wisbech and back again - with a lot of players following suit - a pretty fierce rivalry has developed between the two sides, and there were moments in the game when this was plain as day (both teams had a player sent off, for instance). The main incident that disrupted the flow of the game, though, was a major injury to Yaxley striker Matt Sparrow near the end of the first half due to a clumsy challenge from a Wisbech player, with the game delayed by an hour to ensure he was safely removed from the pitch (the ambulance showed up very quickly, which is the good thing about this ground being so close to the city centre).

In any event, more on Yaxley's victory below:

Yaxley will have been beginning to worry that their appearances in major cup finals should come with a warning. Having seen a Hinchingbrooke final abandoned after a terrible injury to Matt Barber a few years back, the sight of an ambulance arriving at PSL for stricken Matt Sparrow will have had the Cuckoos fans worried. The game was affected as a result with a lengthy first half to allow for the medics to do their stuff.

After the resumption Yaxley went ahead through Dan Cotton before half-time and could have extended that advantage before a spell of Wisbech pressure. Aaron Butcher was in inspired form though but was finally beaten by Liam Adams to make it 1-1.

When Wayne Morris received a red card soon after, you could have been forgiven for thinking it was slipping away from Yaxley, but they were given a leg up by a former Cuckoos legend: Michael Frew is one of the best players in Yaxley FC history, but it was his red card for Wisbech today that got it to ten-a-side and changed the momentum.

Soon after ex-Fenman Ross Watson got the winner from close range and the UCL cup was coming back to Leading Drove.

A huge day for everyone associated with the club and a brilliant moment.

Overall, it was a great day out and a great win for my team in the first cup final I've ever attended (I don't count the play-off final as one, given that it determines promotion and is hence an extension of the league season). It was also the best way I could have asked to end my 2016/17 season.

The Ground

While I would imagine Lincoln Road is fairly basic by Step 4 standards, it was a decent Step 5 ground on my visit, although I would imagine it has seen some changes since my visit to further satisfy the ground graders. On my visit though, the only seating at the ground was in the main stand, which looks to have seats for around 200 people. Other than this, the only cover at the ground was the terrace behind the near goal, which could provide standing for at least 100 people at a guess.

The rest of the ground was open hard standing, but unlike most there was plenty of room to expand, and it looked as if they were making room for a small stand near the dugouts, but I do not know for sure if this was actually what was being done at the time.

Photos

Just a quick disclaimer here: the last photo in the "My Visit" section isn't mine, but it was too good to not include here.