Leafe leave it late

Whyteleafe 1 Sevenoaks Town 1, Isthmian League South East Division, Saturday 14^th December 2019

Not for the first time this season, I woke up on Saturday morning still unclear about where I would be heading later that afternoon.

With the wet weather still playing absolute havoc with non-league fixture lists up and down the country, picking games ahead of time has proved to be a complete and utter waste of time in recent weeks. So why bother!

Thankfully, with my Saturday morning coaching commitments having now ceased until the New Year, making a late decision on where to attend a match is slightly easier for the next few weeks. It also means that I can get further afield than I can on a typical ‘working’ Saturday if needed.

Slightly easier, maybe. Easy, no. By 12 o’clock the first three matches that I’d provisionally selected using the recently rather confusingly renamed Groundhopper App (it’s now called Futbology for reasons that remain unclear to me) had all been postponed.

Becoming fed-up with constantly having to switch between the App and Twitter to check on a particular game’s status, and also worried that I could arrive at a game only for it to be called-off at the last minute (not for the first time this season), I ultimately decided to play it safe. I’d look for the closest 3/4G pitch (still not totally sure on the difference) that I hadn’t yet visited and head there.

After a bit of research (not a strength of mine, as regular readers of this blog will be aware) I eventually discovered that Whyteleafe’s Church Road Ground met my requirements. And with fourth-placed Leafe playing host to sixth-placed Sevenoaks in the Isthmian South East Division, I was hopeful that a decent spectacle awaited.

There was a brief moment of panic when, moments before leaving the house, my youngest son decided he wanted to accompany me. My six-year-old loves football, but he dislikes long drives and cold weather; both of which the afternoon’s visit would necessitate him having to endure. Suddenly, I had visions of a peaceful afternoon at the football being replaced by an afternoon with a whiney nipper.

Really, the only reason he wanted to go was because his current bedtime story – The Naughtiest Girl by Enid Blyton – is set it Whyteleafe. Quickly explaining to him that the story was written long ago, so Whyteleafe would be very different to how it is depicted in the book, and that it was only fiction so the characters weren’t real only led to confusion.

‘But they are real in the story,” he argued, a confused expression etched on his face.

“Yes, but not in real life,” I explained. “Take my Alfie Jones books,” I continued (quick note, I write a series of children’s football books, you can check them out here). “He’s not real, is he?”

“You said he was based on you?” he pointed out. He doesn’t like losing arguments and has an annoying habit of remembering things that I may or may not have said at some point or another.

“Yes, but he’s not me, is he? Alfie has curly blonde hair. I don’t,”

“I do,” my son noted. “I could be Alfie Jones!”

You can probably see why the thought of a two-and-a-half-hour round trip filled with such conversation wasn’t overly appealing to me. Eventually, I managed to persuade him to stay at home in the warm. Much to wifey’s chagrin.

I arrived at Church Road at 14:30, parked on a road outside the stadium and then made my way to the ground where it was £10 to get in.

Whyteleafe are another of the growing band of clubs to have gone fully digital with their programmes so, not for the first time this season, there was no paper programme to purchase. Digital-only programmes certainly seem to be far more prevalent this season than they were last and this, unfortunately, is a trend I expect to see become more prevalent over the coming season.

Church Road is a decent little ground, with plenty of covered areas for spectators. The impressive main stand is behind the near goal and features a mixture of seating and terracing. There is an older, covered seated stand running along one side of the pitch, and then a long covered terraced stand behind the other goal and a shorter covered standing area on the other side of the pitch by the away dug-out. This was where I chose to stand.

After a scrappy opening few minutes, the match quickly settled into a pattern that would become familiar for the rest of the half. Leafe seeing more of the ball, and the more direct Sevenoaks looking to hit them on the break, making use of their pacey forwards.

The hosts twice went close to taking the lead in the opening half-hour. First Junior Aikhionbare had his shot brilliantly cleared off the line by Thomas Ripley; then a cracking shot from Martin Sontan from the edge of the area unluckily crashed off the underside of the bar and bounced to safety.

At the other end, Sevenoaks’ Tyrell Richardson-Brown twice got in behind the home defence, only to smash over from a tight angle both times, when a cross would arguably have been the better option.

It was the visitors, however, who took the lead ten minutes before the interval. From a threatening Whyteleafe attack Matthew O’Donoghue failed to pick out a teammate in the area, Sevenoaks broke swiftly and within 30 seconds Bradley Schafer had a drilled home a powerful low shot from 25 yards.

The visitors could have been two ahead going into the interval had it not been for a good save from Tyler McCarthy in the stroke of half-time denying Tommy Whitnell.

With a lead to protect, Sevenoaks looked to soak up pressure in the second-half and hit their hosts on the break. After a positive opening ten minutes to the second half for the hosts, the visitors soon began to look fairly comfortable.

While Leafe undoubtedly continued to see more of the ball, a lot of this possession was coming in areas that weren't causing the well-organised Sevenoaks defence too many problems.

In fact, if anything, for long periods of the second-half it looked as though the visitors would be more likely to extend their lead than Leafe would be to equalise. As the hosts began to commit more and more men forward, thus leaving spaces for Sevenoaks to exploit, the home fans had to endure a few nervy moments. A couple of, shall we say, rather cynical fouls to stop Sevenoaks’ players advancing clearly angered the visiting bench by which I was standing.

Leafe, though, continued to persevere with their patient approach play, despite continued pleas from their bench to be less obvious with their approach play. Sevenoaks looked largely comfortable, and with their goalkeeper looking to take sting out of the game by playing for time wherever possible – much to the obvious ire of the home fans – It seemed the three points was on their way to Kent.

However, in the last minute of normal time, good work down the right led to the ball being pulled back into a dangerous area, where Freddie Parker was waiting to prod the ball home, much to the obvious delight and relief of the home faithful.

With four minutes of added time signalled, both teams had set-pieces in dangerous areas to snatch a win, but ultimately the defences held firm and the points were shared.

It was hard to tell from the reactions of both benches upon the final whistle whether either team were viewing this as a point gained or two lost but, from a neutral, on the overall balance of play throughout the 90 minutes a draw was probably just about the right result.

With family Christmas commitments taking precedence over football next weekend, and with wifey out and about on Tuesday, it’s unlikely that I’ll be getting to another game before Christmas.

So let me take this opportunity to wish all those reading this an amazing Christmas. I would wish you a happy New Year too, but I’m hoping to be back out and about on Boxing Day, so there’ll be plenty of time for that then.

Have a great Christmas!

Enjoyed this blog post? Then you may be interested in reading my kindle book which recounts my 2018/19 groundhopping journey (take a look, it’s only 99p).