St Neots Town FC
Rowley Park
Kester Way
St Neots
Cambridgeshire
PE19 6SN
Ground: 85
Date: Tuesday 20th August 2019
St Neots Town 2-5 Yaxley
Southern League Division 1 Central
Attendance: 203 (official)
St Neots Town - History
St Neots Town were founded in 1879 as St Neots, spending the majority of their early history in the Biggleswade & District League. In 1924, the club changed name to St Neots & District, before joining the Bedfordshire & District League (which later became the South Midlands League) in 1927. The league title was won in the 1932/33 season, and four years later the club moved to the United Counties League.
After World War 2, the club rejoined the South Midlands League, before becoming founding members of the Metropolitan League in 1949. After two successful seasons in this league - a title win in their first season and a 4th-place finish in the second - the club rejoined the United Counties League for the 1951/52 season, entering its Division 1. After five consecutive bottom half finishes, the club moved to Division 1 South of the Central Alliance. Around this time, the club changed to its current name.
In the 1960/61 season, the club rejoined the Metropolitan League, this time finishing as runners-up. They remained in this league for a further five seasons before returning to Division 1 of the United Counties League in the 1966/67 season. After three top-three finishes (2nd, 1st then 3rd), the club transferred to the Eastern Counties League, believing it to be a stronger league. And so it proved, with the club finishing in mid-table in their first two seasons before finishing fifth-from-bottom in the 1972/73 season.
After this, the club returned to the United Counties League, this time joining the Premier Division. They remained in this league for the next fifteen years, finishing as high as 4th in the 1976/77 season but struggling in the bottom five in their final few seasons. At the end of the 1987/88 season, mounting debts forced the club to fold, but they returned two seasons later, initially joining the Huntingdonshire Junior League.
Four consecutive promotions saw the club return to Division 1 of the United Counties League for the 1994/95 season, before winning it at the first attempt to return to the Premier Division. Progress slowed somewhat after this, with the club remaining in the Premier Division for the next fifteen years. In this time, the club mostly finished in the top half, but it wasn't until the 2009/10 season - when they finished as runners-up - that promotion seemed like a possibility.
The 2010/11 season saw significant amounts of money spent by the club as they stormed to the Premier Division title, earning promotion to Division 1 Central of the Southern League. This too was won at the first attempt, with the club earning promotion to the Premier Division. After a couple of respectable mid-table finishes, the club almost won another promotion in the 2014/15 season when they reached the play-off final. However, they missed out as Truro City beat them 1-0.
After this successful campaign, the club found themselves struggling to avoid relegation, finishing 20th in the 2015/16 season and 19th the following season. Things seemed to have improved after a 12th-place finish in the 2017/18 season, but midway through last season the club was forced to slash its budget to survive. This saw the club finish third-from-bottom to return to Step 4 for the first time in eight years.
In the FA Cup, the club's best run saw them reach the 1st Round in the 1966/67 season, beating Ely City, Desborough Town, Rushden Town and Wisbech Town before losing to Walsall. In the FA Trophy, the club reached the 3rd Qualifying Round in the 2014/15 season, beating Ilkeston and Darlington before losing to AFC Sudbury. As for the FA Vase, the club have twice progressed as far as the 5th Round: in the 2001/02 season, they beat Stowmarket Town, Wembley, Romford, Melksham Town and Rushall Olympic before losing to Durham City; in the 2010/11 season, they beat Felixstowe & Walton United, Burnham Ramblers, Epsom & Ewell and Gresley before losing to King's Lynn Town.
My Visit
This was always going to be one of the new grounds I visited with Yaxley this season, so long as the fixture list put it at a time when I was at home rather than University. As it turned out, it was put in as our first away game of the season, so after finding that out I asked my dad about it at Luton Town, and he was happy to take me to the game.
On the day of the game, there were no issues with the weather, but as it was an evening game I decided I would take a jacket out with me as the temperature was bound to notably drop once the sun went down (and so it proved, with me ultimately wishing I'd taken a slightly thicker jacket than what I did).
After having an early shower and early dinner, my dad picked me up at around 6:30pm and we made quick progress down the A1 towards St Neots. We arrived at the ground half an hour later, parking in the nearby school car park due to the main one being closed. Being on the Yaxley complimentary list, I got into the ground for free, while my dad paid £7 (excellent value for Step 4 football, to be fair).
As we entered the ground, we bumped into one of my dad's coworkers (something he wasn't entirely happy about) and they chatted for a bit while I took a few photos. We then moved around the ground for me to do as much of a circuit of photos as the ground layout allows, stopping to talk with other Yaxley fans and the chairman on the way. Once that was done, we stood at the far side of the stand while awaiting kick-off, moving across once it became clear we were shooting at the near goal. In the second half, we stood behind the goal in the terrace.
At this early stage of the season, it's never easy to know what to expect, especially when coming up against recently-relegated opposition like this. For our part, we'd lost in the last minute at home against recently-relegated Halesowen Town (who are said to be overwhelming favourites for the title), while St Neots drew against the third recently-relegated side in Bedworth United. I was hoping to see a response after Saturday's promising performance, but with St Neots seeming to be in transition I had no idea what result to expect.
Here's my match report on a match which saw us run rampant against an inexperienced St Neots side despite not necessarily being close to our best:
After Saturday's last-minute defeat, we flew out of the blocks at the start of this match, going straight on the attack and taking the lead after 5 minutes: a throw-in was nodded down by Charley Sanders in the box, with Tom Waumsley pouncing to tap-in. After some more bombardment of the St. Neots box, we doubled our lead in the 12th minute: Ross Watson headed in from a corner, with a defender getting a slight touch in his attempts to stop the goal. It should have been 0-3 to us three minutes later, but Tom Waumsley wasted a golden chance, shooting tamely at keeper James Philp after intercepting his poor pass.
We lowered our intensity after this, gradually allowing St Neots to grow into the game as a result. However, due to some poor decision-making and finishing in the final third, they struggled for a while to create meaningful chances, even as they took more and more of the possession. Their first clear-cut chance came in the 27th minute, an audacious long-range shot from Prince Mutswunguma forcing an excellent save out of Aaron Butcher. However, even with their poor finishing, the amount of possession we were granting St Neots - particularly in the midfield area - was always going to come back to bite us, and so it proved when the home side pulled one back in the 35th minute: a free kick was played into the box and one of our defenders got a touch on it, but this just saw the ball fall perfectly for Sam Goode to tap-in. 1-2 at half-time.
The second half saw St Neots continue on the front foot, with our midfield continuing to sit deep and leaving St Neots space to attack. Early in the half, there was a mass brawl after a terrible tackle on Joe Butterworth, with the referee inexplicably only giving out one booking after everything calmed down. In any case, we extended our lead against the run of play in the 55th minute: John-Paul Duncliffe played an excellent early cross into the box and Waumsley was in the perfect place to shoot and score. This should have calmed us down and allowed us to retake control of the game, but St Neots caught our defence napping and responded immediately, Mutswunguma shooting beneath Butcher to score.
After a quieter fifteen-minute period, we began to take control of the game again, with a couple of substitutions in the 70th and 75th minutes improving our overall play. In the 76th minute, Waumsley had another excellent chance after a Dan Cotton cross, poking narrowly over the bar in front of goal. However, the referee judged that Cotton had been fouled inside the box while making the cross and pointed to the penalty spot. After a couple minutes delay, Cotton stepped up to take and calmly converted. The rest of the game saw us dominating proceedings and attacking quickly, resulting in our fifth goal in the 87th minute when Watson volleyed inside the box.
Overall, despite the margin of victory, I feel somewhat hard-pressed to call this an excellent performance. This is because, outside of the opening and closing fifteen minutes, we struggled to retain possession and were frequently overrun in the midfield. Fortunately, St Neots were profligate in front of goal and our defence did well to hold them out, but there's certainly a few things for the manager and coaching staff to think about going into the Biggleswade double-header this Bank Holiday weekend.
Overall, while a few aspects of our performance weren't fantastic (the midfield sat far too deep for most of the match, for instance), there's no disputing that it was an excellent result so early into the season, not least because it was the joint-largest away win I've seen Yaxley pick up in my four years following the club.
On the way back, as happened this time last year when we visited Bedford Town, we had to contend with road closures, diverting through Godmanchester due to parts of the A1 being closed. Fortunately, this only added around five minutes onto our journey time, and I was back indoors by around 10:20pm. Upon getting back, I first updated my records before writing up my match report, not finishing that until 11:30pm (it may be less coherent than usual as a result).
Up next is the FA Cup game at Biggleswade Town this coming Saturday, before we visit Didcot Town in the league the following Saturday. The next groundhop after that will depend on what happens in the FA Cup on Saturday, so I'll update accordingly in the next blog entry.
The Ground
Rowley Park is a relatively new ground, having opened as recently as 2008. And it's a good one compared to most new builds, with cover on three sides of the ground and no Arena stands to be seen. The only seated stand is on the near side and provides seats for 250 people, while there's an additional area of standing cover on this side by the near goal.
Behind each goal is a covered standing terrace extending the full length of the pitch. Each of these contains three steps of terracing, so you could probably get around 500 people in them (although it would be very tight). There's no football furniture on the far side of the ground, and nor is there any room for any.
The ground has an overall capacity of 3,500 and, having been used at Step 3 for several seasons recently, is certainly good enough for this level. I would imagine it's not too far off being good enough for Step 2, though I imagine more seats would be required were the club to ever reach that level.
Photos
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