Bank holiday sports fest

It was quite the bank holiday sports fest for me. Four sporting fixtures. Three away trips for teams I support. Two university teams. And one railway museum as an added bonus. 

The weekend began on Friday night with...

Pontypridd United v Cardiff Draconians

Dracs ready in red

The Dracs have a bingo card this season. Play like a herd of deer in the headlights for the first 20 minutes. Give away at least one avoidable goal. Goalkeeper Harry Johnson will do one crazy thing that has me biting my knuckle and muttering "Oh, Harry, what are you doing". Someone on the bench gets a yellow card. Then finish the game strongly playing like a team that deserves to be at this level. On Friday they ticked all the Dracs Bingo boxes. And some.

I went to games at Pontypridd United a few times when they were on an upwards trajectory and made it into the Cymru Premier Leaguer. However, it feels like they are declining now. Their temporary stand behind the goal got repossessed a little while ago. The pagoda they used to put up at the entrance has been replaced by a table and a cash box. The bar area in the university building isn't being used any more. Their supporters seemed outnumbered by a noisy Dracs away following.

The home team took the lead after a player controlled the ball on the ground with his arm then scooped the ball forward with his leg. A team mate got the goalward side of the last man and went down in the box. It was a penalty, but the Dracs fans who saw the handball were incensed by this turn of events. Unfortunately the ref didn't appreciate the abuse and from then on on proceeded to dish out yellow cards to Dracs players for offences that went unpunished when emulated by Ponty players resulting in more angry comments from the sidelines. 

By the end of the first half, the Dracs had learned the Ponty defence were commanding in the air, but couldn't play on the floor. After the break a lovely passing move brought the Dracs level and then a drilled pass sent a Dracs forward through. Despite an attempted drag back by the defender, the Dracs scored to make it 2-1. Then the ref got involved again. Two quick yellow cards dished out, we think, for sarcasm saw one of the Dracs wingers sent off. A midfielder picked up a second yellow card for a dive with less than ten minutes of normal time to go. He admitted it was a dive as he walked to the dressing room in front of the Dracs fans.

Down to 9 men, the Dracs dug in. Long clearances into empty space in the channels kept the Ponty goalie busy scampering across the pitch to wallop the ball back. Harry the goalie had been booked in the first half after dashing out of his area and colliding with a player - that was his bingo card moment. But in additional time he pulled off two awesome match-winning saves - a block on the goal-line he dropped down to and a reflex save to tip a shot over the bar.

The win gives the Dracs their first points of the season and they moved up to 11th in the table. Their game on Monday has been moved and its cup action next weekend. But this was a massively important win and hopefully it will get their season going.

The next day, I set off down the M4 to watch...

Swindon Town v Shrewsbury Town

Before we got to the match, Paul, Paul and I went to STEAM, the GWR museum. It was an interesting museum with a well-ordered set of interactive exhibits and some big gleaming static green and black GWR locos. Highlights included being able to walk underneath a loco and some of the odder items like a Scammell tractor and a Wickham trolley made to look like a little car. 

After lunch we headed to the County Ground for the battle of the STFCs. Both teams have rather fallen from grace and are slumming it in the basement division now. The County Ground is too big for the current level of support and one end was empty.

After conceding four goals in both their previous league away games, I thought there was a good chance Salop would be on the end of another battering. After 5 minutes Swindon passed the ball around the Salop players like they were cones on a training exercise and scored, and I wondered how bad it could get. But after that, Salop forced some chances, Swindon sat deeper and deeper content with making breakaway attacks when they could.

That pattern continued in the second half until Shrewsbury got a deserved goal on 87 minutes. It looked like they might pick up their second point of the season but 7 minutes of added time proved too long for them. The defenders backed off Swindon sub Billy Bodin, inviting him to shoot. He shot. He scored. Absolute limbs in the home end behind the goal he scored in. Despondency around me in the away section.

Overall, both teams were poor really. Both struggled to retain possession and neither were good enough to capitalise on gaining possession. It's hard to tell whether Salop have improved from their previous hammerings in terms of performance. However, it was yet another defeat and right now the result is all that matters.

Despite the result, I enjoyed the apple rolling challenge at half time.

On Sunday I switched out sports and companions and went to...

Cardiff Devils v Concordia Stingers

Every time. I go and watch Ice hockey I think I should go and watch ice hockey more often. This was my first time in the Vindico Arena since an international game about 18 months ago, and my first Devils game for almost 3 years when I did a "two sport twofer" with my brother, Dave. Best of all, Cathy felt well enough to come with me and was able to stay for the full game.

This was an intriguing match up. Concordia is a University in Montreal who have also played against Nottingham Panthers on a short UK tour this month. They have a lovely maroon and dark yellow kit combination. Sadly there was no visitors merch on sale but I did go a bit daft in the Devils club shop and bought six pin badges!

The Devils spent most of the first quarter peppering the visitor's goal but couldn't get the puck past the Stingers massive goalie, who I think had the surname Vrbitec. I'm not sure how tall he is and he's not on Concordia's roster to check, but he towered over his team mates. He was excellent at stopping shots and, for a big man, dropped down fast to block any low attempts. After sustained Devils pressure, Stingers scored against the run of play and led 0-1 at the end of the first period.

Things got spicy in the second period leading to lots of power plays. At one point the Stingers were two players up due to Devils players being sin binned after trying to squash the netminder, all other attempts to score having failed. Eventually the Devils did find a (legal) way through to equalise but the announcer had barely listed the assist and pre-assist before Concordia scored again. It was 1-2 at the end of the second period.

Devils started the third period a man down and Stingers quickly made it 1-3. A fightback saw an excellently worked goal for the Devils. Cardiff took their netminder off for the last 2 minutes to try and force a tying score, but again the giant in the Stingers goal proved more than a match for a frenetic series of shots. The goalie was given man of the match by the sponsor to much applause from the crowd none of whom seemed to begrudge the visitors their win.

I love the atmosphere at ice hockey, the pantomime around it. And I really laughed at how the mascot was put to work helping clear up after "chuck a puck" in the second break.

Mascots have to earn their keep these days

After chilling in the ice house on the Sunday evening, on the hottest every August bank holiday Monday in Wales I went to my fourth and final sports event of the weekend:

Cardiff Metropolitan v Barry Town

Cardiff Met have a new logo that includes the year 1957. But I suspect they are fabricating a history they don't have. 1957 doesn't link to any known football team of the many institutions that feed into their history. Before the game I spoke to Dave Collins, the editor of Welsh Football magazine, about it and even he didn't know why they have settled on that year. It could possibly be linked to one of the precursor clubs that formed Inter Cardiff whose place in the League of Wales was taken over by UWIC before they rebranded as Cardiff Metropolitan. Anyway, they have a mural with their new badge and the year on it. 

There might be more change coming as the Met are apparently going to drop "university" from their name as well. I'm not sure what that means for their long-term outlook. Their relationship with the wider university has worked quite well for them for several seasons and this looked like the weakest, and also the shortest, Met team than I have seen in a while. 

Paul, Paul, Val and me

Cyncoed Campus looks different in the sunshine. I'm used to November mizzle and darkness not blazing almost 30 degree heat. Fortunately there was a brisk breeze blowing across the pitch to keep us slightly cool in the corrugated iron stand. But the first half was dismal and I'm convinced the heat and the cross-wind were factors in the dismality.

Welsh football's other Ryan Reynolds

Whatever the Met coach said at half time worked because the team came out fizzing, forced some good chances and scored a well worked goal. Barry had nothing in reply until a desperate roll of the dice with a centre back coming on as a makeshift centre forward. This changed the impetus of the game and two minutes into stoppage time Barry forced an equaliser. They even had a couple of chances to nick all three points but couldn't convert any of them.

The draw meant that of the three football teams I supported this weekend, one won, one lost and one drew. It all feels very balanced.