Diary of a newfound groundhopper

Midhurst and Easebourne 0 Seaford Town 3, Southern Combination Football League Division One, Saturday 12 th January 2020 I took a week off non-league groundhopping last weekend to go to what some will unfairly – and rather disparagingly in my opinion – refer to as a ‘proper match’. For a while now my two boys had been badgering me to go and watch Brighton and Hove Albion – particularly the eldest one, who supports them. A few seasons ago, I used to go to the Amex fairly regularly – around ten times a season. Then they got promoted to the Premier League, prices shot up and the football became increasingly, shall we say, dull. Not being a Brighton fan myself, I wasn’t overly bothered by the outcome of the games, didn’t get much enjoyment from them and ultimately couldn’t justify the expense of going so regularly. So I stopped, started attending non-league matches, and haven’t looked back since. Until last weekend, that is. With prices for both adults and children havi...

Horsham 3 Lewes 0, Isthmian League Premier Division, Wednesday 1 st January 2019 I’m not really the sentimental type. I’ve never really bought into the whole ‘New Year-New Me’ ethos. It’s always been my opinion that the change of a digit or two at the end of the date isn’t really going to make a significant difference to anyone’s life. Surely, if you really do want to make changes to your lifestyle, then you can do this at any time of the year. You don’t have to wait until the clock ticks past midnight on 31 st December for any such changes to take place. Likewise, the whole trend of reflecting on the past 12 months also goes over my head. Surely there are good times in any year, as well as bad ones. If anyone really has just experienced 365 continuous days of constant misery then, obviously, they have my deepest sympathies. But as some generic pop star or another once sang – ‘life is a rollercoaster, baby, you just have to ride it.’ In my opinion, the best thing a...

Peacehaven and Telscombe 2 Newhaven 3, Southern Combination Football League Premier Division, Thursday 26 th December 2019 I love Christmas Day. The food. The drink. The presents. The ever-so-slightly disappointing TV schedule… Everything about it. But… let’s face it… it can be somewhat waring. Especially for those of us with young children. After a day stuck inside with two already-excited youngsters, only hyped up further by chocolate, chocolate and a bit more chocolate, by early evening you can find yourself going a bit stir crazy. Thank goodness, then, for Boxing Day football. A chance to escape the madness for a couple of hours. Having spent the day with family last year, there was no chance of me getting to a game. With a free schedule this year, though, wifey had somewhat surprisingly agreed that I could go to a game. There was, however, a small caveat. A small but rather annoying one. The kids would have to come with me. ‘They need the fresh air,” she reaso...

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 ...

Chipstead 2 FC Romania 1, Isthmian League South Central Division, Saturday 7 th December 2019 I’m starting to feel like I’m not destined to visit SCFL Division 1 side Roffey this season. Having planned visits to their ground a few times over the past couple of months, only for said plans to be ruined by the weather, I woke up on Saturday morning fairly convinced this would be the weekend where I'd finally get to see the SCFL’s newest senior side in action. In truth, Roffey’s scheduled match against Littlehampton Town hadn’t been my first choice of fixture. Ideally, I would have gone to Sutton to watch the last remaining Sussex side left in the FA Vase, Lancing, take on Sutton Common Rovers in a replay. Alas, with my Saturday morning work commitments making reaching Sutton in time for kick-off highly debatable, I begrudgingly had to shelve this particular idea. Even the last-ditch efforts of the Lancing goalkeeper, Matt Evans, to convince my boss to give me the m...