GET IN! (Enjoying both paying at the gate and watching a glorious goal)

Kernow Stone St Piran League Cup semi-final

Illogan RBL V Penryn Athletic

Saturday, May 22, 2021

Played at the neutral venue of Underlane, Wendron

THE SHORT MATCH REPORT: Penryn sealed their place in the league cup final thanks to a simply sensational volley by Morgan Vallejo three minutes from time which finally saw off Illogan’s brave challenge.

As football fans, we are a bit prone to hyperbole at times, but I cannot imagine a better strike on any football pitch anywhere in England last weekend than Vallejo’s 87th-minute stunner. As the ball dropped from the sky, he hit a volley across his body from a good 30 yards out and it sizzled into the top corner. Everyone in the crowd, whoever they were supporting, made an “ooh” noise as the ball hit the back of the net and the entire Penryn contingent, including the keeper who ran 80 metres to join in, just piled on top of the scorer in jubilation. Scenes, as they say.

It needed something special to see off a determined RBL, who had taken the lead after just seven minutes with a header from a high cross to the far post. The scorer was Simon Ellis and it was no more than they deserved after a bright start. However, by the 18th minute, Penryn were 2-1 ahead, thanks to a 15th-minute penalty by Ryan Reeve after a trip in the box, and then Vallejo wriggled free inside the penalty area and squeezed home his first of the match.

Neither side could add to the score before the break and the second half settled into a pattern of Illogan dominating possession and looking threatening from set-pieces, especially corners, while Penryn played some neat football on the break and came close a couple of times. But neither side could find the net again until Vallejo came up with his absolute worldie three minutes from time. What a way to win a cup semi-final. Wow.

FINAL SCORE: Illogan RBL 1 Penryn Athletic 3

PICTURES: Search for Peter Harlow on Facebook and there you will find a selection of snapshots taken on my phone.

A BLOGGER’S THOUGHTS: On Saturday, I paid to get into a football match. It was a wonderful feeling. What a strange world we live in at the moment.

Saturday’s match was always going to be special. It was a cup semi-final at a neutral venue, which adds a certain amount of tension and excitement to any footballing occasion. It is always something special. And you always know there is something out of the ordinary about a game at this level, which is Step 7 of the Non League Pyramid, when the man on the gate directs you away from the normal parking spaces and into a grass field. That’s definitely the sign of a big game!

OK, so Wendron Cricket Club was also in action at the sporting complex which is Underlane and so they took up some of the regular parking spots but there is always the feel of a carnival atmosphere, of something different to the run of the mill, when you have to park in a field.

Or maybe I just haven’t got out enough recently …

The excitement was added to by the fact that the same man at the gate who directed me to the parking also took £3 from me for the privilege of coming in to watch the game. I couldn’t help but smile at him and say: “This is better, innit?” and got a similar beaming smile in return. We were all feeling good about being here.

That sense of joy was added to by the unexpected sunshine (the forecast earlier in the week had been horrendous) and a definite sense of freedom. I was so looking forward to the game that I got there earlier than usual which meant I also had time for a quick pre-match pint that, incidentally, cost me than the entrance fee, and had time to watch some of the cricket action. It all felt quite miraculously normal. Bloody marvellous.

Even putting aside all that pandemic pandemonium, this was a football occasion to be excited about. The Kernow Stone St Piran League has had a difficult birth, having failed to complete a single season since the competition’s 2019 inception because of virus restrictions, but it has managed to rescue competitive football this campaign by staging the league cup. It started out with four groups, giving teams four or five proper games at least, followed by quarter-finals, this weekend’s semis, and a final to come. In the short history of this league, this felt like its most important weekend so far.

Penryn, though, my hometown team, were celebrating even before kick-off. The details of the FA’s latest reorganisation of the pyramid were announced this week and saw dozens of teams across the country “upwardly moved” – a delighted Penryn were one of those to benefit. They will begin next season at Step 6, playing in the Kitchen Kit South West Peninsula League Premier West, and looking forward to two big local derbies against Falmouth Town. When they met in a cup game a few seasons ago I tried, without success, to coin the name Fal Classico for this meeting of footballing minds. Now that that clash is back on the calendar, I shall begin that particular campaign again. You have been warned.

It also made them the “big scalp” in this cup clash, despite the fact that, when the 2020-21 league season was declared null and void a few months ago, Illogan RBL were top of the St Piran West Division with nine wins and a defeat from their ten games, while Penryn were only sixth, with five wins and a draw from their ten league matches. But they had had a superb run in the previous virus-truncated season and so were almost nailed on for promotion when the two campaigns were added together. There might be grumblings and queries from various quarters across the nation about the fairness of the whole restructuring but ‘Ryn are delighted to be heading on up. Congratulations to them.

And they made a bit of a point in the group stages of this competition by winning all four of their games, scoring 17 goals in the process and only conceding two. They then beat St Austell Reserves 3-1 in the quarter-finals. They will be competing against “Snozzell’s” first eleven next season.

Illogan, meanwhile, had finished second in their group, with three wins, a draw and a defeat from their five games before squeezing past Bude on penalties in the last eight. The question now was, could they pull off a minor cup shock by knocking their promoted opponents out of the cup?

They nearly did.

While Penryn started the match slowly, perhaps fazed by having so many spectators in the ground for the first time in ages, Illogan started on the front foot and deservedly took the lead with a far-post header after just seven minutes.

I can’t type the words “far post” without hearing in my memory the voice of my primary school football teacher from nearly 50 years ago, Mr Thomas, yelling those words from the touchline every time one of our wingers got the ball in an attacking position. At 10 and 11 years old, it was quite hard to kick the ball as far as the far post but we all tried to do as we were told. I was, at the time, a centre-forward but not of the goal-scoring type, more of the linking up play type, a false number nine if you will. I was, as ever, ahead of my time – mainly at this age because I didn’t really know what I was doing, although I did once score four goals for Applegarth Primary School in a game against Good Shepherd School in a Croydon League game. That was as good as it ever got and why I do sometimes go on about it!

The cry of “far post” also makes me think of one of our wingers, Andy White, who weighed about four stone dripping wet and who was always cold, even when it really wasn’t cold. I wonder whatever happened to him. Andy, if by some chance you ever read this, get in touch, let me know if ever warmed up!

Despite the sunshine, it was colder than it looked at Underlane on Saturday because of the wind and poor old Andy would have been frozen. Hopefully the action on the pitch would have warmed him up, especially in the first 20 minutes, as Penryn hit back after conceding that goal to take the lead through a penalty and a twist, turn and shot from inside the box. This was a cup tie that really was on fire and was really appreciated by the spectators lucky enough to be there.

Things got a little more raucous in parts of the crowd as the game moved on and the beers piled up, culminating in one fan losing control of his dog, which promptly ran onto the pitch and burst the ball as Illogan prepared to take a corner. “Keep that dog off the pitch,” barked the ref. “You try holding back a Penryn dog,” came the fan’s reply, to much amusement from that quarter. It was all good-natured, though, and the dog never made a pitch reappearance, thankfully.

Without doubt, the big moment of the game came three minutes from time. The score was still 2-1 to Penryn despite Illogan pressing and looking dangerous from set-pieces, while ‘Ryn had gone close on the break a couple of times. But then, on 87 minutes, the ball started to drop from high, high up, set in sharp relief against the bright blue backdrop of the springtime sky. We could all see it clearly, but none as clearly as Penryn’s Morgan Vallejo. Thirty yards out from the Illogan goal, he watched the ball drop, shaped to hit it on the volley across his body and struck the falling football as sweetly as anyone ever could. It absolutely flew into the top corner of the net. What. A. Goal.

There were noises of admiration all round the ground, a spontaneous round of applause, and the Penryn lot went nuts. Completely nuts. They all piled in on Vallejo as he turned to celebrate, leaving him at the bottom of a heap of delighted, stunned, Penryn players. It was a simply fantastic moment, the sort of moment we all go to football matches to see.

Many years ago, on the other side of the country, I saw a player from Suffolk side Sudbury Town score with a magnificent strike from fully 40 yards on a freezing cold Tuesday night in Felixstowe. It was a goal that has always stuck with me over the years. Vallejo’s strike on Saturday might be the best non-league goal I have seen since then. It’s another that will be stored in my footballing memory banks for years to come, to be talked about whenever I am in a discussion about the best goals I have ever seen. Magnificent.

(Of course, it wasn’t as good as Gary Alexander’s 35-yard screamer for Millwall in the play-off final against Scunthorpe, nothing will ever beat that, but it was a good effort!)

A few minutes after Vallejo’s wonder strike, the final whistle went and Penryn’s place in the final was secured. Now they will want to end their stay at Step 7 by taking the silverware when they take on Polperro, who beat Hayle 4-2 in Saturday’s other semi-final.

For Illogan, their focus can now shift to preparing to chase the title next season in what will, hopefully, be the first-ever fully completed season in the St Piran League. A normal, uninterrupted campaign in 2021-22 would be as satisfying for everyone as paying to get into a game proved to be on Saturday.

It’s a funny old game in a funny old world, innit?

THE WAITING GAME

North Cornwall District League, sponsored by SMG Plastering, Group A

Padstow United v Boscastle AFC

Saturday, May 15, 2021

Jury Park, Padstow

THE SHORT MATCH REPORT: Visitors Boscastle sealed their place in the final of this special Covid-disrupted season competition with a generally comfortable victory at their slightly higher ranked opponents – but we all had to wait to find out for sure.

At the start of the day either of these two teams could still have made the final, as could Polzeath, who were playing St Mawgan Reserves in the other game in the final round of group matches, all three of them starting with nine points from five games. Boscastle topped the table on goal difference, on plus eight to Polzeath’s plus five and Padstow’s minus one, so the final table would not be revealed until the results of both matches were known.

Boscastle did their bit, taking a 2-0 lead by half-time at Jury Park and then easing through the second half without too many scares; then it was a case of waiting for the other score. That finally came through with Polzeath winning 1-0, meaning Boscastle topped the group on goal difference and will play in the final.

Boscastle took the lead at Jury Park after 15 minutes, when neat play on the left ended with the winger sliding a low cross into the box where the forward cleverly took the ball round the keeper and rolled the ball into an empty net.

The visitors were the better side throughout the first half but spurned numerous chances to make it 2-0 before finally doubling their lead with a crisp strike on 37 minutes.

The hosts battled valiantly after that, without ever really threatening to get the three goals they needed to have a chance of making the final and the match result was not truly in doubt for a long time before the final whistle. Then there began the wait to find out if Boscastle had done enough. They had.

FINAL SCORE: Padstow United 0 Boscastle AFC 2.

PICTURES: Search for Peter Harlow on Facebook and there you will find a selection of snapshots taken on my phone.

A BLOGGER’S THOUGHTS: One of the wonderful things about football is that you never know where it will take you, both physically and emotionally. Whether it be stumbling across a game in a beautiful out-of-the-way place or getting over-excited because the team you love has just scored, it is still, at heart, the same game, the same adventure. OK, grassroots football might not have neutral linesmen (sorry, assistant referees), or straight white lines (sometimes) or a carpet of a pitch (usually) or VAR (thankfully), but it is still football, it is still the beautiful game that we love.

That was perfectly illustrated on the flower-filled pitch at Padstow United’s lovely but very exposed Jury Park on Saturday. (The dominant colour of the playing surface was more yellow than green in places, which just added to the charm of the setting).

Now, I have both played and watched football at some very wild and woolly venues. Growing up in South London, I played for a junior team called Wayside Wanderers and our home games took place at a park called North Downs. The name gives you a clue. It was on the edge of the chalk escarpment of that name in South East England and there was, basically, no protection from the wind and rain, whatever direction it came in from. The housing estate in Croydon which the park served was known by the nickname of Little Siberia, for many reasons, the main one being the weather. It could be crisp and dry five miles away in the middle of town but the estate, New Addington, could be under five foot of snow. And that was in May!

So I am used to exposed football pitches. But Jury Park was still a surprise. It was completely open, apart from some hedging here and there, and you could see for miles. I mean, miles. On the drive there, the weather was awful but, happily, the downpours stopped as I drove from South Cornwall to North Cornwall. I think the wind had blown them away. The relentlessly strong breeze fairly whipped across the pitch for the whole match, disrupting the flow of the game and generally making goal-kicks a bit of a lottery. And, as it was blowing from behind me, I couldn’t hear anything that was being shouted on the pitch and so my usual blogging trick of picking up on one or two interesting calls from the players and officials had to be put away this time. The windy silence was deafening.

The game kicked off at 2.30pm and that gave me just enough time to get home to watch another game of football on the telly, the FA Cup Final. This was still football but a million miles away from the match I had just seen. It had 20,000 people there, a perfect surface, proper linos (!) and the inevitable VAR, passion-killing nonsense. Just the football boots for each player on show probably cost more than the combined operating costs of both Boscastle and Padstow, but it was still just a game of football, with the same rules (mostly), the same terminology, the same desire to win.

The matches at Jury Park, Padstow, and Wembley Stadium, North London, on Saturday were both part of the magnificently contrasting worldwide web of footballing joy and despair and that’s why we love it so much.

Saturday’s young ref at Padstow, Josh, can definitely attest to the contrasting nature of the experiences this sport can give you. His Jury Park appointment was his second in the North Cornwall District League grassroots competition this season. But, on Wednesday, he is due to run the line at a game being played at St Andrew’s Stadium, the home of Championship side Birmingham City.

It is the English Schools’ Football Association’s Super League under-18s boys’ final between Park View Academy, from Durham, who have close links to Carlisle United, and the John Madejski Academy from Reading, which has close connections to, er, Reading. It is actually the final of the 2019-20 competition, which has been delayed by the Covid-19 pandemic, like so many other things.

It is a big occasion for Josh and he definitely won’t be accosted in the car park at St Andrerws’ by a football blogger wanting to know if it was OK to block him in! And I suspect the changing facilities, even in these pandemic times, will be somewhat plusher.

But he will still be officiating to the same rules as he was at Padstow, it is still the same game, players will still be contesting the same decisions. But it will be a hugely different experience, just like the difference between North Cornwall and North London was on Saturday.

What was also a different experience for me was waiting to find out what the Jury Park result on Saturday actually meant. Now, I am, as I am sure you will be aware, an advocate of straightforward knockout football, of pure cup drama, of the urgency of it, of the nature of it, and I love it when league or tournament football has that same feel. It might be a long way from Padstow United to Wembley but it is even further from Jury Park to the World Cup, but that is where my mind wandered off to on Saturday.

You see, just knowing the final score of this one game wasn’t enough. I needed to know the result of the other game in this group, Polzeath v St Mawgan Reserves, to know what this Boscastle victory meant, whether it was enough for them to get to the final. It reminded me of sitting at home during the final group games of a World Cup or a Euros, watching two games at once and trying to work out whether Colombia’s equaliser against the United States was enough to knock out Egypt, or whether England had scraped through on goal difference after beating Nicaragua 1-0, or whether Scotland had managed to be eliminated despite not losing a game (the answer to that last one was always yes).

And so, while sitting at home watching Leicester City beat Chelsea in THE cup final, my mind was still full of thoughts about THIS cup final. The message I had been waiting for finally came through just after the final whistle had gone at Wembley and long after it had blown at Jury Park. Polzeath had won, leaving them on 12 points, the same as Boscastle, but they had only triumphed 1-0, which meant Boscastle topped Group A of the NCDL, sponsored by SMG Plastering, on goal difference and so were in THAT final. Phew!

Another link between Wembley and Padstow was that both games could be classed as mini cup shocks. Yes, both the Foxes and The Pensioners play in the Premier League but Chelsea would probably have been classed as the favourites. They would certainly have thought of themselves that way – cue your own arguments over “The Big Six” and European Super Leagues. Whatever way you look at it, Leicester’s victory was a minor surprise.

As was Boscastle’s.

Both Padstow and their visitors play in what is classed as grassroots, or junior, football in Cornwall, with the hosts plying their trade in the East Cornwall Premier League, one step up from where Boscastle play in the Duchy League Premier Division. But it didn’t feel like a big cup shock, it just felt that Boscastle were the better side on the day. They deserved their place in the final – even if they were made to wait for it.

THE BIG MATCH

The Whirlwind Sports Trelawny League Division One

Constantine v St Just

Saturday, May 8, 2021

Constantine Recreation Ground

THE SHORT MATCH REPORT: St Just were crowned league champions after beating title rivals Constantine at a windswept Recreation Ground in the final game of the season. Leading 2-0 at the break, they more or less sealed the championship with a third goal nine minutes into the second half. Constantine never gave up and got the goal their perseverance deserved with a 78th-minute penalty but their title chances were gone by then.

The two sides went into this title-decider with St Just heading the standings and knowing that a win or a draw would be enough to win the trophy. For Constantine, it was all or nothing.

The strong, gusty wind blew in several powerful showers, especially during the first half, and the visitors almost took an early lead with an enormous, gale-driven free-kick which flew over the home keeper and, thankfully for him, over the home goal. At that stage, it really looked as if the wind would be a major factor in deciding the destination of the title but, as the teams settled into the game and the conditions eased slightly, the quality of the football gradually improved.

St Just took the lead with a moment of quality after 20 minutes with an excellent free-kick from 25 yards out. It was a lead their bright start deserved but the game levelled up after that and Constantine came more and more into it. However, their best spell of the half actually ended with them going 2-0 down five minutes before half-time. Just moments after Constantine had loud appeals for a penalty turned away at one end, they got themselves into a defensive muddle at the other, leaving St Just with a tap-in to double their lead.

That left the visitors with one hand on the league title and it was all but fully in their grasp nine minutes after the break, a lovely chipped finish making it 3-0. The hosts kept plugging away, playing some nice football along the way, but all they could muster in the end was a penalty for handball 12 minutes from time. As the disappointed hosts trudged off after 90 minutes, St Just celebrated a deserved championship triumph. Well played, Tinners. Commiserations ‘Tine.

FINAL SCORE: Constantine 1 St Just 3

PICTURES: Search for Peter Harlow on Facebook and there you will find a selection of snapshots taken on my phone.

A BLOGGER’S THOUGHTS: Anyone who has ever read one of my blogs will know that I am an advocate of cup football, of knockout football. I love the drama of it, the immediacy of it, the winner-takes-all nature of it. The most thrilling moments usually come in cup football, the most fantastic memories are made. League football, by contrast, is often more run-of-the-mill, more bread and butter. You know when a league game is really exciting because someone somewhere is bound to say: “This is almost like a cup game.”

But, every now and then, league football steps up to the mark. Every now and then, it really provides a cup feel, a winner-takes-all atmosphere. Every now and then, it really does have that sense of occasion that marks a really special day of football. Every now and then, it really is the big match.

Welcome, then, to Constantine Recreation Ground, the venue for Cornwall’s big match of the day, the Trelawny League Division One championship decider between Constantine and St Just, ‘Tine v Tinners.

In this disrupted season, cup fixtures have been at a premium and, for the second season running, I expected to be deprived of my normal springtime diet of Cornish cup finals with all the usual knockout tournaments in the Duchy having been cancelled again because of Covid restrictions. But the Trelawny League has been my saviour, plugging on despite the pandemic pandemonium, culminating in this big match, this tie to see who would be crowned as champions. This cup final.

For that’s exactly what it felt like. There was a much bigger, much more excited, crowd than you would normally expect for a game of grassroots football in west Cornwall, with supporters of both sides gathering in decent numbers and helping to create an atmosphere of genuine excitement and tension, of laughter and cheers and jeers. This was a proper football occasion with a proper “trophy at stakes” buzz. A league game masquerading as a cup final. Fantastic.

What wasn’t quite so fantastic was the weather. Cup finals are normally played in blazing May sunshine – at least in the hidden depths of my footballing imagination they are – with fans in shirtsleeve order, red faces burning in the sun. The only red faces on Saturday were those battered by the powerful winds that gusted throughout the 90 minutes. And, instead of shorts and T-shirts, those of us watching were bundled up in big coats and hats, trying to keep dry and warm in the showers that were blown in on the gales.

The weather also made life difficult for the players – wind makes playing football so, so difficult – and they were not helped by the undulating nature of the Constantine pitch. It was my first visit to this particular village recreation ground and the thing that immediately struck me was how far the pitch slopes down towards the touchline opposite the changing rooms, especially into one corner. I spent quite a lot of time trying to take a photo showing that, when the keeper at that end was taking a goal-kick, from the other end of the pitch you couldn’t see anything below his knees. I am not sure I succeeded – check out my pictures on Facebook to see what you think.

The changing room building itself, with a small covered patio just in front of it, was a source of discussion. Whether it was because of Covid restrictions (probably) or gamesmanship (it’s what I would have done), the home side made use of the facilities while the visitors used an open-sided bandstand/shelter as their base. It wasn’t really the weather to get changed outside but, honestly, I have used worse places. As a Sunday League player on Mitcham Common in South London in my playing days, the dressing rooms were often so crowded and such a mess that you would have been better off getting changed outside. And, if you used the showers afterwards, you probably ended up muddier than when you started. Grassroots football is not all glamour, you know!

Talking of putting on football kits, I watched Constantine a couple of weeks ago and was less than complimentary about their yellow and claret ensemble. After a bit of pre-match chat with one of their players during the warm-up, I agreed to describe it as “memorable”. I am still not a fan of it though. Sorry.

Whatever the kit situation, changing in a bandstand did not knock St Just off their rhythm. They went into this game unbeaten in the league all season and knew that even a draw would be enough for them to take the title. ‘Tine, whose only previous league defeat was by 1-0 in the reverse fixture at St Just’s Lafrowda Park ground back in October, knew that nothing less than victory would be enough to take the title.

It was the green-and-black-striped shirts of The Tinners that swept forward early on. This was probably partly due to the fact that they had the gusty wind mainly at their backs, long balls into the home box causing chaos early on as the flight of the wind-driven football proved so difficult to judge. Nerves also played a part as Constantine took time to settle.

It also took some of us watching some time to settle. Several spectators mingled with the home subs on – and often just beyond – the touchline in front of the changing rooms. I smiled when I overheard one fan say she wasn’t tall enough to see over this gathering from the slightly raised patio and so had to move to a different vantage point. Not being able to see through the crowd is not often an issue at a grassroots game, so this just demonstrated how many people had turned up to watch. (I did try a head count but people kept moving so I gave up. Let’s have a random guess at about 100, not including those who watched the action from the protected environment of their cars parked on the edge of the rec).

As it happened, I also had to move a bit to get a better view as it was impossible to see the action in one corner at the far end because of the Constantine gaggle on the touchline. That sparked an old memory of another cup game.

Many years ago, when I lived in the east of England, Colchester were playing at home to then non-league Accrington Stanley in the FA Cup. Layer Road wasn’t the most well-appointed ground and thousands tried to cram in to watch a team who were, at that time, more famous for being name-checked in a milk advert than for their footballing achievements. (A little lad in a Liverpool shirt drinks a pint of milk and tells his young pal: “Ian Rush says that if I don’t drink more milk I will only end up playing for Accrington Stanley.” His mate replies: Accrington Stanley? Who are they?” And the first lad says, in a deep Scouse accent: “Exactly.”)

(And if anyone asks who Ian Rush is, you shouldn’t be reading a football blog)!

Anyway, spurred on by this ad, I was one of those who thought it might be my only chance to see the famous Stanley in live action and so joined the thronging Essex crowd. This was in the days of terraces rather than seats and, in order to be able to see properly, I spent the whole match on tiptoe, peering over thousands of bobbing heads and the roof of the pie stand. I was knackered by the end . . . and I never got a pie.

Meanwhile, back in Cornwall . . . Because of all the moving about shenanigans, I found myself behind the goal that St Just were attacking in the first half and had a lovely view of the opening goal, a well-struck free-kick from outside the box. It was nothing more than The Tinners deserved and it left the ‘Tine fans beginning to contemplate the possibility of this not being their own big party after all.

Their team, however, reacted well and offered more and more of a threat going forward, feet and legs often disappearing from view over the hill as they went on the attack. I hope the players had a better view of the action in that corner than I did!

The big turning point of the match came just before the break. Constantine launched loud appeals for a penalty, which were emphatically waved away. As I was close to the other goal, I couldn’t judge whether it was a good decision or not but the ref said no pen so no pen it was. The action soon moved to the goal area near me and this time I had a good view of the action as St Just doubled their lead after a muddle in the home defence.

So 2-0 at half-time. The Tinners retired to the bandstand for their team talk while ‘Tine headed for the dressing rooms with much to ponder. They now needed to score three times to snatch the Trelawny Division One title. Nine minutes after the restart, they need four, St Just having scored an excellent third.

Despite pushing forward for the majority of the rest of the half, the great comeback never really looked likely to materialise. A penalty on 78 minutes, this time given for handball, was their only scoring reward and, in truth, it had been clear to everyone in the rec for some time that Saturday night’s football party town would be St Just not Constantine.

So, after 90-odd minutes of league/cup football I wandered away from Constantine Rec with a little lift in my cup football blogging soul and with the sound of Tinners’ cheers ringing in my ears. And also ringing in my heads, and it has been ever since I thought of the title of this blog, is the theme tune to The Big Match, ITV’s football highlights package from back in the day when the beautiful game wasn’t all over our screens all the time. All together now . . . da, da, da, de-de, da, da, da, de-de, da, de-de, da, de-de, da, da da.

HEALING A RIFT

The Whirlwind Sports Trelawny League Division Two

Chacewater v St Erme

Saturday, May 1, 2021

Chacewater Recreation Ground

THE SHORT MATCH REPORT: For the second week running, I was at a game between a team looking towards the top of the table and one sitting in the nether regions of the standings. And, for the second week running, the final result was no real surprise, although this game ended up being much closer than the final scoreline might suggest.

It didn’t look like that would be the case early on, though, as Chacewater raced into a 3-0 lead after just 14 minutes and were quickly on course for their 12th win in the 14 league games they have played. As a neutral, it was all a bit worrying and I found myself expecting a double-figure victory for the hosts. But, although they created several chances in the remainder of the first half, they failed to add to their lead before the break.

The second half was a much more even affair. In fact, St Erme, who have now won just three of their 13 league games this season, were the better side for large periods and the final 75 minutes of this entertaining encounter actually finished one-all.

The green and black shirts of Chacewater flooded forward right from the kick-off of this Division Two encounter and took the lead after just three minutes, a home forward converting what was already their second one-on-one chance of the afternoon. It was 2-0 on 12 minutes when the St Erme goalkeeper could only parry a powerful long-distance free-kick into the back of the net. Two minutes later it was 3-0, the hosts firing home from a corner that the visitors failed to clear.

That looked like the points secured and they were definitely staying at the Recreation Ground after 52 minutes when Chacewater cracked home a fourth, this time with a superb volley from a corner which earned a round of applause from the scorer’s team-mates.

But St Erme, who tried to play some tidy passing football throughout, maintained their positive approach and, on 70 minutes, got the goal their performance deserved with a nice run and shot.

FINAL SCORE: Chacewater 4 St Erme 1.

PICTURES: Search for Peter Harlow on Facebook and there you will find a selection of snapshots taken on my phone. For the third week running, the game was also covered by proper photographer Darren Luke. Obviously, the “public park only” Covid restrictions are reducing our choice of games! Follow him on Twitter at A Season In Helston for links to his pictures.

A BLOGGER’S THOUGHTS: A couple of seasons ago, I had a bit of a falling out with the Trelawny League – although it was only in my head and so the league never knew about it!

You see, because of a season of bad weather, there had been myriad postponements and, in order to finish the league, officials decided to cancel all the cup competitions they run. As a cup football blogger who extols the virtues of the knockout game, I was not a happy bunny, not a happy bunny at all.

I was doubly upset because, previously, I had praised this grassroots set-up in the west of Cornwall for the amount of cup competitions it ran – there was one for each division and a couple for a wider selection of teams. And one of my favourite days of blogging was at the league’s cup finals day a few seasons back, when I was able to take in bits of four matches all staged on the pitches at Wendron United FC. That was an absolute dream for a cup football fanatic.

So I wasn’t happy when the cups were ditched.

But me and the Trelawny League are now friends again, even though cup football has again been scrapped this season because of the Covid pandemic and its attendant lockdowns.

This time, I completely understand that decision.

But the TL’s best decision has been to resume playing the league format of the beautiful game after the latest restrictions were eased. And, this being grassroots football, some of the games take place in public parks, which means that football-starved fans like me are allowed to go along to watch. Thank you for that, Trelawny League, thank you.

All of which meant that on Saturday, for the third week running I was at a Trelawny League game, this time at Chacewater Recreation Ground for that village’s contest with their nearby visitors from St Erme.

Well, I say nearby. According to Google maps, it’s almost 13 miles from one to t’other. Does that count as a local derby at this level? Could I call it El Neartruro-ico? Probably not but, eh, who cares? It was a live game of football played out in front of me, with no screen in the way, no fake crowd noise, no verbose commentator spouting obscure statistics, no nothing except players playing and watchers watching all for the love of the game.

That’s the way it should be, so thank you Trelawny League for giving that opportunity to people like me – even if I am having to settle for the bread and butter of three points rather than the glory of a place in the next round of the cup.

But this was a beautiful place to watch a game of football. As well as the obligatory children’s play area, there was also a charismatic old covered stand, plus a stone wall and raised bank on which the majority of supporters and officials were sitting, a bowls club behind a high wire fence along the opposite touchline, a church and school building in one direction and views to rolling hills and manicured fields in the other.

All in all, it was a proper grassroots occasion, a real example of football finding a place of the heart of its community. I absolutely loved it.

And the grassroots nature of the event was beautifully emphasised when Chacewater decided to make a substitution during the first half – the Trelawny League uses rolling subs, which is a great way of giving so many more players playing time than would be the case if “traditional” substitutions were used. And it helps prevent injuries. Late on in the game, St Erme were able to replace a defender struggling with cramp by a player who had come off twenty minutes earlier. “We need you for next week, no need to hurt yourself now,” the player was told by his understanding manager as he hobbled off.

His own goalkeeper, I believe it was, had been less understanding when the player first went down with cramp in both legs. While the ref did the traditional “bend the foot backwards” treatment that all footballers understand is a cure for cramp, on one leg and a St Erme team-mate did the same on the other, the inevitable call came from the direction of the penalty area: “Pull the middle one”. Cue smiles all round, apart from the centre-half who was still in agony!

But I digress, as Ronnie Corbett always said. (One for the youngsters there). Back to that first Chacewater substitution. I was standing on the far side of the pitch but was certain that I could see a couple of the home subs detrousering and passing a pair of team shorts from one to the other. This being grassroots football, I was able to ask the home linesman, who was standing next to me, what was happening. He explained: “We are one pair of shorts short because a player who is not here today took his kit home.”

Now that’s proper grassroots.

Another joy of football at this level is that you can hear a lot of what is said on the pitch. As well as the St Erme keeper pulling the leg of his hurt team-mate, I also heard a nice line from the ref who, incidentally, had a very good day in the middle. After a midfield tussle, in which both sides claimed a foul, I heard him shout: “No. Play on. Six and six,” which is a very nice piece of shorthand for: “It was six of one and half-a-dozen of the other.”

That made me smile, as did a shout from one of the Chacewater defenders when, with his team under a bit of pressure during a St Erme purple patch, he yelled: “Where’s the middle of the midfield gone?!” That succinctly explained where he thought the problem was!

And, to be honest, that was one of the few moments of stress either side displayed throughout the 90 minutes. Chacewater were generally quite relaxed after they raced into that early 3-0 lead, while St Erme were determined to stay positive throughout, never getting on each other’s backs or questioning the ref too much.

This really was a game played with a smile and it was an absolute pleasure to be there to see it. I have now completely forgiven the Trelawny League for its cup aberration of a couple of seasons back and for giving me the chance to see some live football being played in this most curious of seasons.

But, please, don’t cancel the cups again. I can quite grumpy!