Editorial - February 2008
Welcome once again to another edition of North West Side Stories. Issue 5 already, and the site has now on the go almost 18 months. Time flies indeed.
We are just over halfway through the season, and if I was to try and sum up my feelings about the League at the moment I’d say they were mixed. On the one hand I think there is much to be positive about, on the other I feel it is also a time when everyone involved in the league should be looking at how we can improve.
On the latter points, I’ve decided to drop them in a separate article elsewhere in this issue. For now, let’s concentrate on the positive, and on the playing side of things I think there is a lot to be positive about.
As you do the rounds of different grounds, as I do, talking to people along the way, a regular topic of conversation is the fact that we have lost so many clubs to the Unibond League in recent years. In fact, after losing three clubs of the quality of FC United, Curzon Ashton and Nantwich Town last season, if you were a Vodkat League fan at the start of this season you could be forgiven for thinking that this campaign was destined to be a poor imitation of previous seasons. But for my money, that has been anything but the case.
OK, there are cynics out there who will say that I’m hardly likely to say anything else. As someone whose role involves trying to publicise the Vodkat League as much as possible, I’m bound to paint a positive picture aren’t I? And yes, where our league is concerned I will always look to accentuate the positive. But that job would be much harder if the general picture wasn’t a pretty one.
I haven’t counted, but up to now I reckon I’ve now seen over 30 games in our league this season, and I am struggling to remember a bad one. In fact, I’d go as far as to say I’ve not even seen a mediocre one.
Looking back at the Saturday games I’ve reported on for the BBC Radio Lancashire website, I’ve seen one goalless draw, and after that, apart from a single goal win for Salford at Squires Gate at the beginning of January, the lowest number of goals I’ve seen in a Saturday game has been two.
I know that is not necessarily a way of judging the quality of a game, but it’s a decent start. More to the point though, my overall impression is that every team I’ve watched – and I’ve seen a good number of the teams in this league now – are out to play football, rather than try to stop the opposition playing. There isn’t a team I’ve watched this season that has noticeably relied on playing long balls, or whose sole tactic seemed to be to hit a big target man up front with crosses.
As an aside, that’s a thought that occurred to me more than once as I watched England’s finest against Croatia, where the only tactic they seemed comfortable with was pinging high balls up in the direction of Peter Crouch.
Coming back to our league though, I’m not the only one with positive tales to tell. Various members of the League management committee have similar views, and just to give one example I spoken to several people at Colne a few weeks back who watched Colne beat Congleton 5-4 at the Holt House Stadium in January. Everyone said it was fantastic entertainment, a game that had absolutely everything, although in those circumstances the respective managers usually see it differently.
While in positive mode, I must mention our cup successes too. Despite losing the clubs I mentioned earlier, our clubs have proved they are still capable of beating the best of the country’s finest in the FA Vase. Not only that, thanks to the efforts of league newcomers Kirkham & Wesham, we’ve also claimed two “Team of the Round” awards into the bargain. I don’t want to labour a point, but I genuinely believe that has been an excellent season so far, and that’s with plenty more action still to come.
Changing the subject entirely, my Vodkat League watching for 2007 ended on a rather unusual note. Wasn’t there an old comedian who used to start off telling a joke with the words “A funny thing happened to me…”. Well, that’s a good starting line for my experience of visiting Atherton LR during 2007.
In the editorial for Issue 2 of North West Side Stories, I told the story of how fog descended across the Bolton area on Saturday 3rd February 2007. I’d originally gone to Daisy Hill and on finding out that fog had caused the game to be called off, I headed for Crilly Park, only to get there just as the game between Atherton LR and Newcastle Town suffered the same fate.
Anyway, the last Saturday before Christmas took me back to Crilly Park again, and as a cracking game unfolded between LR and Squires Gate, mist began to descend over the pitch. With ten minutes to go, and the sides tied at 3-3, the mist had thickened to the point where the referee was unable to pick out his assistants on the touch lines, so once again fog caused the abandonment of the game.
I’m just about old enough to remember the old days when people used to talk about a real pea souper (remember how blowing your nose used to make the hankie all black? Sorry, digressing for a moment). But I’m sure I’m not alone in thinking that thick fog is like heavy falls of snow, something you don’t really expect to see these days.
I reckon that there can’t have been many instances of clubs in our league having two home games abandoned because of fog in the space of just over ten months, although if there is I’m sure someone will remind me. I am, however, as LR chairman Alan Grundy pointed out to me at the time, now considered a jinx as far as they are concerned. I think I’ll save my next visit to Crilly Park until late in the season to avoid the possibility of an unwelcome hat trick.
Anyway, hope you enjoy this latest issue of North West Side Stories.
Ian Templeman
Editor
North West Side Stories
1st February 2008
The Vodkat League on-line magazine
