Cambridgeshire County League

Division 1A

Monday 23rd April 2018

Kick Off 18.15 Actual 18.46

Steeple Morden 1 Clare Town 1,  attendance 9

41’ 0-1

57’ 1-1

@ Steeple Morden Recreation Ground

Hay Street

Steeple Morden

SG8 0PD

No Admission or Programme.

With the F.A. Find a Club website not working, plus neither club posting any information on their Twitter or Facebook pages, it was very difficult to confirm if this match was definitely on. I telephoned the contact number for the league, at the Cambridgeshire F.A., in an attempt to obtain a number for the home club, which was a total waste of time, as the number I was given was not recognised !

In case of having to divert elsewhere, I left home early and having encountered no hold ups on the M25, ended up arriving at the ground at 17.00, where it was totally deserted. At 17.37, what turned out to be an away player arrived, shortly followed by the first of the home players. The distance of 40 miles for Clare to have to travel for an 18.15 kick off is ridiculous, so I wasn’t expecting them to arrive en masse, but in dribs and drabs.

Five minutes before the scheduled start, the home team headed for the pitch, but no sign of the away side, although I had seen at least 10 of them park up and head for the changing rooms. Apparently, they had no kit, but it duly arrived at 18.22, so at least we would have a match. We finally got started 31 minutes late, with the Referee deciding to play two 40 minute halves because of this.

The two teams were very evenly matched, not surprisingly, as it was 7th versus 6th in the league table. It was actually a really good game considering that the pitch was rock hard and very bobbly. Clare took the lead in the opening minute of the second half, with the hosts levelling when a penalty was saved, but another striker followed in to dispatch the rebound into the far corner of the net from a tight angle.