British Universities & Colleges Sport
South Eastern 5C
Wednesday 13th November 2019
Kick Off 14.00 Actual 14.16
University Westminster 3 Brunel University 3rds 2, attendance 4
2’ 1-0
34’ 2-0
68’ 2-1
90’+ 2, 2-2
90’+ 3, 3-2
@ Quintin Hogg Memorial Sports Ground
Hartington Road
Chiswick
London
W4 3TL
No Admission or Programme.
The lower down the levels of university football you go, the more ‘Mickey Mouse’ it can become. The match kicked off late, due to the late arrival of the Referee, although to be fair to him, he was a replacement for a ‘no show’, so at least it meant the game could go ahead. Then there are the colour clashes of the kits. One team played in all black, the same as the Referee, although he wore tracksuit bottoms, which did help things a bit, whilst the other played in navy blue, with a yellow front. Great when they were facing you, but awful when they turned away and were in a chase for the ball with the opposition.
Westminster scored early on and made it 2-0 just after the half hour mark. A minute before halftime they had a player sent off for an over the top tackle, but having disagreed with the decision, the argument went on for a couple of minutes before he finally left the field. He then stood on the touch line shouting at the Referee, before both he and the coach continued the argument at halftime. Not content with that, the two of them started up the argument again as the players lined up to restart, meaning another three minute hold up. Unbelievably, they pressured the Referee into agreeing to reverse his decision, by downgrading the red card to a yellow one…..but only if Brunel agreed. They didn’t, which was seen as ‘unsporting’ by the Westminster players, but as one Brunel player said “we’re here to win bro, so it will be easier playing against ten men, so no way are we doing it”. With the extra man Brunel attacked at will, but it took a stoppage time header from them to pull it back to 2-2. From the restart, Westminster played the ball forward, and following a scramble in the box, the ball was cleared, only to see it hammered back into the bottom corner of the net for an unlikely looking winning goal.
When entering the car park, immediately in front of you is the Roko Health Club, which itself flanks the old stand of the Polytechnic Stadium, home of Fulham R.L.F.C. (now London Broncos) from 1985 to 1990 and used for hockey during the 1948 Olympic Games. The stand looked in good condition, but the pitch, which is still there, looked far less so.
