Spain

La Liga

Saturday 8th February 2020

Kick Off 18.30 Actual 18.31

Real Valladolid C.F. 1 Villarreal C.F. 1, attendance 19,557

15’ 1-0

53’ 1-1

@ Estadio Jose Zorrilla

Avenida del Mundial 82

47014 Valladolid

€40 Admission

No Programme.

The Estadio Jose Zorrilla was opened in 1982 and was used as a venue during the 1982 World Cup Finals, hosting three group matches involving France, Kuwait and Czechoslovakia. The current capacity is 27,846 with plans to increase to 40,000 in the future. From the outside it doesn’t look that big, but when you enter through the turnstiles you realise it is because the first tier of seats are below ground level.

Calling in at the stadium on our way to the afternoon match turned out to be invaluable. We were told that at six o’clock, which would be around the time we would be arriving, the car park queue would be long and slow. Instead, we were advised to use the supermarket car park on the opposite side of the stadium. As it turned out, the SatNav took us in the direction of the main stadium car park. Indeed the queue was bad, but we just followed the lead of the locals and parked on the grass at the side of the road running alongside. It was only a few hundred yards walk to the stadium from here and we headed straight to the ticket office (it was closed when we were here earlier) to find no queue, so tickets were quickly obtained and we were in our seats twenty minutes before kick off. Result!

The match was 14th versus 7th in the league table. Villarreal have been on a reasonable run lately, bar a defeat to second tier club C.D. Mirandes on Wednesday night in the Copa Del Rey, the scheduling of which was the cause of our game tonight being put back a day. Valladolid attacked from the off and it looked like that had taken an early lead, but the goal was chalked off for offside. It only took them fifteen minutes to open the scoring though, when a cross from the right was volleyed in from 15 yards. They missed some good chances, but just couldn’t find the second goal. Villarreal came back into the game during the second half, equalising eight minutes in. Until now we had assumed that the 17 fans in the away section of the stadium was the sum of their support, but it turned out that there were much larger numbers present, judging by the amount of people in our vicinity who celebrated the goal. It took V.A.R. four minutes to finally decide the goal should stand. Does it really need to take that long to check a replay of any incident.

Both teams went for a winning goal, rather than settle for a draw. It was end to end stuff, but littered with yellow cards as the game became stretched. The atmosphere was good and the place must be absolutely rocking when full. The stadium looked very impressive from the inside too, perhaps helped by the seats being in the purple and white club colours, which is a little bit different to the usual red, blue, black etc.

Spain

1st Division Regional

Castillo-León Group B

Saturday 8th February 2020

Kick Off 16.00 Actual 16.01

Betis C.F. Valladolid 0 Club Deportivo Onzonilla 0, attendance 54

@ Nemesio Gomez Ruperez “Peque”

Calle Canterac 73

47012 Valladolid

No Admission or Programme.

Even though we were in Portugal, and I had managed to find us three new ground visits today, which would have culminated at Sporting Clube Braga with a 18.00 kick off, we decided to head back east into Spain. There were two reasons for this. Firstly, this trip was booked with the intention of being a “Spanish weekend”. Secondly, my mate is trying to complete visits to all the La Liga grounds, and there were originally going to be two more off his list done this weekend, so that is what became the priority.

The only problem with this though, would be finding a match that was doable with the 18.30 evening match at Real Valladolid C.F. We came up trumps, when on Thursday, the day the kick off times are released (ridiculously late) there was a 16.00 kick off at Betis C.F. who play in the fifth level of Spanish football. Our drive in the morning was only 262 miles, which took just over three and a half hours. The good thing was, we would enter the city near to the ground of Real Valladolid C.F. so we could call in and get a feel for the area, then do a dummy run of sorts to the ground of Betis C.F. to make sure it was actually viable. It was, taking just twelve minutes to cover the journey to the east of the city, which was a fraction under three miles.

The match was 11th versus 8th in the league table. It became obvious quite early on that we would be lucky to see a goal today, and so it turned out. Betis C.F. did have a goal disallowed, but neither side looked like scoring in truth. They were just too evenly matched.

Portugal

Primeira Liga

Friday 7th February 2020

Kick Off 20.30 Actual 20.31

F.C. Paços de Ferreira 0 Boavista F.C. 1, attendance 3,105

35’ 0-1

@ Estadio da Capital do Movel

Rua do Estadio,

Apartado 26

4594-909 Paços de Ferreira

€15 Admission

Programme free, 16 pages.

A visit here was never in our thoughts until a few days ago. We had been planning a weekend trip to Spain, which despite being ranked as a top league in European terms, is certainly not so when it comes to how poor they are at releasing exact fixture dates and kick off times, usually working on four weeks ahead at best. Having seen the latest batch of dates released, we booked our flights on 13th January, heading for our planned opening fixture of the trip at the 21.00 kick off at Real Valladolid C.F. However, despite tickets being available to buy on the club website in the days running up to us booking our flights, we were astounded to see that at just six days notice. the match was moved to 18.30 on the Saturday night instead! There were still two matches being played in Spain tonight though, but unfortunately they were at Alaves and Almeria. One of us had been to Alaves, whilst the other had been to Almeria, so no use to us.
Portugal was our only hope. There was only one match scheduled in the top two divisions tonight, here at Paços de Ferreira. The good news was that neither of us had visited the ground. The bad news was that we had booked flights into Madrid (Valladolid is only 2 hours drive north of here) so we were faced with a five and a quarter hour drive (369 miles), but as our flight was due to land at 13.35, then we would make it comfortably. We were also helped by Portugal being in the same time zone as here in the U.K. (1 hour behind Spain) so we had an extra hour to play with once we crossed the border. The only problem was, the flight was delayed, leaving one hour thirty seven minutes late, and having landed in Madrid, it then took another 15 minutes for them to get the doors open to get us unloaded! By the time we had collected our hire car, the SatNav was showing we would arrive at the stadium just 43 minutes before kick off. We would still need a fuel/food stop as well, but as there were no other options, we would just give it our best shot.

We arrived in Paços de Ferreira, parking in a side street adjacent to the ground, by 20.05. A five minute walk soon saw as at the ticket office, then it was a case of joining the long queue at the turnstiles, which was slowed considerably by the ‘patting down’ security check, but we had made it. We were seated with six minutes to spare! (7 if you count the minute late it actually started). The stadium has a capacity of 9,146, which is ample for most games in the top level of Portuguese football. The new seated stand behind the goal was the only part of the ground that wasn’t open tonight,

The match was 16th versus 8th in the league table. A lot of games I have seen in Portugal have been dull affairs, but that certainly wasn’t the case here, despite there being only one goal. A right wing cross was headed in powerfully at the far post to win it for the visitors, but Paços should have won this comfortably. They made chance after chance. They totally outplayed Boavista, pinning them inside their own half for long periods, but just couldn’t break them down. Boavista were awarded a penalty in stoppage time, but this was overturned by V.A.R. taking a ridiculous three minutes for them to review the decision. The match kept the interest throughout and was really enjoyable from a neutral point of view. The atmosphere was good too. The 400 or so Boavista fans, in the open end behind the goal, were in full voice and even a couple of rain showers in the dying minutes didn’t quieten them down.

It had been a long day, most of it spent under pressure in one way or another, but it had been worth it. The fact that it was such a good game certainly lifted our spirits. At least tomorrow would see less driving………..

France

Ligue 2

Tuesday 4th February 2020

Kick Off 21.05. On Time !

Paris F.C. 2 Athletic Club Ajaccio 3, attendance 1,875 (official)

7’ 0-1

11’ 1-1 (pen)

24’ 1-2

42’ 2-2

86’ 2-3

@ Stade Sebastien Charlety

99 Boulevard Kellermann

75013 Paris

€15 Admission

Programme free, 8 pages.

The Stade Sébastien Charléty, which is in the south of Paris, was opened in 1939 and is now a modern all seated stadium of 20,000 capacity. It is far too big for Paris F.C. (tonight’s crowd was barely 500, despite what the official attendance figure claims), but along with Red Star ‘93 they are very much the poor relations as far as football goes in the French capital. Paris F.C. were formed in 1969, but just one year later they merged with Stade Saint-Germain, forming Paris Saint-Germain, who are now one of the richest clubs in the world. By 1973 the two clubs had split and they have certainly gone in different directions since. Whilst P.S.G. dominate the game in France, Paris F.C. have struggled to establish themselves and haven’t played in Ligue 1 since 1978/79 season.

Tonight’s match was 19th (second bottom) versus 3rd in the league table. As French matches go, this was actually quite entertaining. It certainly helped that the visitors (from the island of Corsica) took an early lead when a back pass was under hit, leading to the ball being played across the box for an easy tap in. Within four minutes it was level again when Paris scored from a very generously awarded penalty. A cracking left footed volley from 20 yards put the visitors back in front, but Paris made it 2-2 in the dying minutes of the half. The crossbar was hit three times, but it looked like we would see no more goals. However, Paris missed an absolute ‘sitter’ with four minutes to go, blazing high and wide with the goal gaping and Ajaccio then went down the other end and a through ball was slipped past the onrushing ‘keeper by substitute Jallow to take the three points.

Paris is just about as far as you’d want to travel for a day trip, and if you do, you certainly need four people in the car to try and offset the French Toll Road costs. The return journey, 185 miles each way from The Tunnel, was a whopping €42.20 in tolls, and on top of that, there was the car parking charge. €16.60 in the underground car park beneath the stadium. The journey down took considerably longer than the return, not helped by hitting Paris in ‘rush hour’. The 21.05 kick off, along with the near three hour drive, meant we had to book the 03.25 return on Eurotunnel, due to the lack of trains running through the night. At least it left on time, but it lost 10 minutes off the scheduled arrival. Once again the M20 had closures, which seems to be a permanent thing these days! It was closed from Junction 11 to 10, then again from Junction 4 to 2, meaning key in the door at 04.40. One consolation though. The other three passengers would be home an hour later than me!

Essex & Suffolk Border League

Premier Division

Saturday 1st February 2020

Kick Off 14.30 Actual 14.35

Flitch United 2 Great Bentley 3, attendance 25

1’ 1-0

29’ 2-0

59’ 2-1

82’ 2-2

86’ 2-3

@ Alcott Playing Field

Oak Field

Stebbing

CM6 3SY

No Admission or Programme.

Today’s match was 3rd versus 4th in the league table. Flitch United were 7 points behind the leaders Stanway Pegasus, but with two games in hand. Great Bentley were two points further adrift, but have an additional two games in hand, so they were both still very much in with a shout of winning the league.

Flitch United scored after just 30 seconds when a speculative shot found the bottom corner of the net from the edge of the box. It was 2-0 half an hour in, with a volleyed finish from twenty yards. Great Bentley had actually had the better chances, but it took them until just before the hour mark to make a breakthrough, when a cross from the right was chested down and guided into the bottom corner from 6 yards. They really pressed for an equaliser, which they finally got with eight minutes left, heading in from a corner. The inevitable winner followed four minutes later. The ball was hooked back across the six yard box and scrambled in at the far post.