West Lancashire League

Premier Division

Saturday 27th April 2024

Kick Off 15.00 On Time!

Burscough Richmond 2 Coppull United 1, attendance 48

18’ 1-0

36’ 1-1

55’ 2-1

@ Richmond Park

Junction Lane

Burscough

L40 5SS

No Admission or Programme.

I had to look at the 3 pm kick offs in order to get in a double today and with the two clubs I hadn’t visited in the West Lancashire League Premier Division both being at home this afternoon, my mind was easily made up. I opted for Burscough Richmond (the other being Hurst Green) as it was the nearer of the two to Ince and arrived a good thirty five minutes before the scheduled kick off. The ground is accessed off Junction Lane, where I turned left into the small car park between Nos. 14 and 12 as I arrived from the south. On entering Richmond Park, there is a bowling green to the left, with the clubhouse/changing rooms adjacent, whilst the pitch is beyond, running at a slight angle. It is fully railed and has a pair of dugouts on the near side. The clubhouse had hot/cold food and drinks on offer and had I known just how good the pies were, I’d have had one pre-match, rather than waiting until halftime!

The match was 5th versus 14th (out of 17) in the league table. Burscough Richmond are the reigning champions, but third place will be their best possible finish this time round, such is the gap between them and leaders Thornton Cleveleys and second placed C.M.B. Although Coppull United could still mathematically be overtaken by second bottom Wyre Villa (it would take a freak set of results) they will survive at Step 7 for another season at least.

Both teams played an open game, with both playing attacking football, with no thoughts of negative tactics at all, which made it an excellent game to watch from a neutral perspective. Burscough opened the scoring after eighteen minutes, beating the ‘keeper at the near post with a diagonally hit free kick from 25 yards. Coppull deservedly levelled nine minutes before halftime, when a cross field pass was chested down and finished clinically into the far corner. What turned out to be the winner came ten minutes into the second half when a through ball was flicked on and finished into the bottom corner. Coppull nearly grabbed an equaliser four minutes into stoppage time when a header from a corner was headed clear off the line.

So, a successful day was had and a good way to notch up the milestone of my 6,000th football ground I’ve seen a match at. It certainly feels like it was a long time coming, not helped by the Covid 19 pandemic and of course the cardiac arrest I suffered that certainly slowed things down considerably!

For the record, the others were….

1,000 – 3rd March 1998 Bridgwater Town – Fairfax Park

2,000 – 13th December 2003 Ferryhill Athletic – Sunnyvale Leisure Centre

3,000 – 9th September 2009 Berkshire County Sports – Berkshire County Sports & Social Club

4,000 – 18th January 2014 R.F.C. Xhoffraix – Rue de la Tournerie

5,000 – 11th March 2018 Pont-A-Celles-Buzet- Rue Norte Dame des Graces

6,000 – 27th April 2024 Burscough Richmond – Richmond Park

Hopefully, both me and the blog will still be going strong when number 7,000 needs to be added sometime in the future…..