Shirebrook Town 2-1 Blackstones

In this crazy age of football in which a player can earn 300,000 grand a week whle playing in Russia,it costs 70 quid a ticket at QPR, and there are more Irish than Scottish teams in the group stage of the Europa league,its good to know some football traditions are still going strong. Ladies and Gentlemen, Guinea pigs and Ferrets i give you the start of the FA Cup (Sponsored by Budweiser.


Today's location was Langworth Road home of NCEL division one side Shirebrook Town. The visitors Blackstones FC hail from the Sleaford area and ply their trade in the UCL. I must admit to having a soft spot for Shirebrook. It is one of the first non league grounds i went to and it's a cracking set up. I normally like to go at least once a season but some how missed out on going last season, it must have been all those exciting Lincoln games i took in. Last year was quite eventful for Town as they had three separate management teams during the season on their way to a lower mid table finish. Lets hope the club gets a bit more consistency this time around.

My plan was to get a lift to Worksop, catch an hour or so to watch the number one cricket side in the world thrash India then hop on the train to Shirebrook.
I don't venture over to the other side of Bassettlaw very often and it must over a year since i took a stroll round Worksop. I must admit to being very disappointed to find out that the Newcastle arms was shut (our lunch time hangout in the college day release days during the "Jenkins years") and the Carlton Tavern is now a shop selling bathroom suites. What was the Kings arms is still shut and so are two cracking little chippy's. Sad times i am afraid. I did find a chippy but it was shit and served up the worst fish i have had for a while.
Then the real icing on the cake came when i tried to watch some Cricket. I decided to venture into one of the two Litten tree pubs in the town and was pleased to find out that they had the Cricket on. However after watching it for well over an hour and with Ian Bell closing in on a double century it was switched off in favour of Arsenal v Liverpool.
Happy bunny i was not.
Lets look at this. Here we have the best side in the world playing out of their skin smashing the side that were number one all over the place and they don't get prime billing? I remember that day back in 1999 when after a home defeat by New Zealand, England slumped to the very bottom of the world rankings, and after all the thrashings the Aussies gave us over the years I intend on enjoying each and every moment of this team being the number one in the world. To switch it off in favour of a football match between two sides that have as much chance of winning the Premier league as the four Retford Imps do of representing Great Britain in the 100m x4 sprint relay in London 2012 is mind boggling to me. Sure there were a few "fans" coming in as kick off approached but the money they took from them was less than than what they will have lost from the folk who left when the cricket was turned off. And with Cricket lasting till 6.00pm i am sure the bar would have taken more cash. If folk wanted to take in some football then Worksop Town were playing their first Saturday league game at Sandy lane for three seasons just a short walk away. Rant over!

After a couple of pints in the Vine I boarded the train to Shirebrook for some live football.

Some of the top clubs now look down on the FA cup, but at this level it still means a hell of a lot to the players, committee men and fans. The social club was doing a roaring trade and they even had the Cricket on in the lounge room. It was a nice day so i decided to get into the ground early and bag a programme in case they sold out(Yes i am getting sadder i know) Admission was a bargain £4 and the programme was £1.50 and was a great effort with plenty of stuff to read in it. It was a great source of information about the visitors of whom i know very little about and even less about the standard of the league they compete in.

As i strolled round to sit on the grass banking on the far side of the ground to read the programme the Shirebrook players were out early going through a pretty tough warm up routine. By contrast Blackstones emerged a good 10-15 minutes later than their opponents and seemed to be taking a much more laid back approach to it all. Fail to prepare, prepare to fail as the saying goes. I felt a comfortable home win coming on.
Shortly before the kick off I ambled round to get a cup of tea which was a very reasonable 60p. Shirebrook Town's snap hut must be the only one i have seen that sells Pot noodles. However having spent two of the last three weeks on nights (hence the late write up) and eating them more or less every night i am sick of the sight and taste of the buggers. Kudos for offering something different though. I can think of no better tonic for a horribly cold December evening match than a piping hot Bombay Bad boy! Maybe not that great for a sunny afternoon game in August though.

To my surprise Blackstones came out and played much the better football in the first half. Shirebrook got a foothold in the match after about 15 minutes or so and from then on it was end to end stuff with a combination of bad finishing and good goalkeeping combining to keep the score goalless. Blackstones missed the best chance of the game when a great ball was floated in from the right in that awkward area between the keeper and the back four but was just missed by the on rushing forwards. On the balance of play the visitors were slightly the better side having created the better chances and the lion's share of the ball.
HT 0-0 time to retreat to the clubhouse to check out the scores and such.

The second half was much better than the first. Blacksones took the lead through Nelson following a corner when Shirebrook failed to clear their lines. This seemed to finally wake up the home side as they went on to dominate the rest of the match. They drew level when a deflected shot from Haslam found its way into the net, and took the lead shortly after when the same player scored a great goal after beating a couple of players and blasting into the top corner. Cue huge celebrations from the Shirebrook players which led to the scorer being booked for taking his shirt off. The home side continued to play the better stuff and in the end could have won the game far more convincely than the 2-1 scoreline suggests.