Football's back already!

Last weekend marked the start of the new domestic football season here in Cymru with some cup games. And last night the first Ardal League games of the season were played. 

The Ardal Leagues are the third level of football in Cymru, with 64 clubs split over 4 divisions. I decided to go and watch Cardiff Draconians play AFC Llwydcoed on the opening night. 

Ready to kick off!

I had a nice surprise in the morning when my friend Tom texted me and said he was in town and could he come along, and my regular partner-in-random-matchgoing, Paul, was free as well. 

So, how entertaining was the season's first game in the Ardal League South West Division? Hugely! 

Dracs took 4 minutes to score their first goal. The scorer was Sam, whose dad, Scott, is one of my former work colleagues. Scott and I had a good chat at half time over a cup of tea and barely talked about the game.

The Dracs went two up after 9 minutes. In the second half Dracs went further ahead with a 35 yard worldie. Then things went south.

Overall I think the female ref had a good game and the three red cards she ended up flourishing don't change my opinion. She had no choice to send off a Dracs defender for a second yellow. 

But in the 12 minutes of added time she had to sort out some silly buggers who were pushing each other. That meant a couple of yellows and another red card for the Dracs. Unfortunately, it was also obvious to everyone that the smirking Llwydcoed player who was the chief miscreant had got away with causing mayhem. 

The ref then sent off a Dracs coach for being a bit vocal in his disagreement with her decisions (I think). And, because he had had been a bit vocal, she took the Dracs free kick away from them and awarded it to the opposition. A gutsy move. I admired that. 

In between the first yellow card and the injury time shenanigans, the Dracs were awarded a penalty. I told Tom and Paul that it was going over the bar. Sometimes you just know these things. And boom! It went over like a comet.  It might even have cleared the house across the street from the ground. 

A last minute acrobatic save by Dracs keeper Harry Johnson kept the Dracs's opening day (night?) sheet clean. And we couldn't complain at the lack of drama. Three goals, two red cards for players and a skyed penalty.

And a lovely sunset too!

Football recap - October 2023

Continuing my account of this season (and freeing up space in my round up of the month for other things!)

Game 22: Cardiff Metropolitan University 2-1 Barry Town

Reason for going: An easy away trip for Barry. Although Cardiff Met is one of my least favourite away grounds to go to. The fan experience there is dismal and it feels like the club actively want to make it as dismal as possible. 

Point of interest: Barry's academy graduate, Callum Huggins, came on as a sub and scored Barry's goal with his first touch. It was his first senior goal.

I made a major error and didn't take any photos of this game so you all get to miss out on the dismal dismalness of a plastic pitch next to a massive sports hall in north Cardiff. 

Game 23: Cardiff Draconians 0-4 Swansea University

Reason for going: It was a beautiful sunny Saturday and this was one of the nearest games on. Plus I like going to watch the Dracs.

Point of interest: the players posed for a photo to show their commitment to 'give racism the red card' - if you look closely in the background you might be able to spot me!

I took a photo of the photoshoot as well.

Game 24: Barry Town 6-0 Porthcawl Town Athletic

Reason for going: This was a very late choice. I was working supporting a virtual conference that finished at 2pm - which was the kick off time for this Welsh Cup game. I decided as I logged off that I would see if I could get to at least the second half of the match. I actually made it in the ground about ten minutes before half time. I'd missed the first goal but I saw all 5 that were scored in the second half.

Point of interest: Callum Huggins came on as a sub and scored with his very first touch for the second game in a row! 

Game 25: Stockton Town 1-1 Dunston UTS

Reason for going: I was in the North East of England because my friend Tom was having a big birthday party and it felt like a good opportunity to see a completely random football match. Tom felt the same so off we went. 

Point of interest: This wasn't our first choice of game. A lot of matches were off because of Storm Babet. We stood in "The Shed" with the noisy Stockton fans who kept us entertained with their banter if the game was getting a bit dull. 

Game 26: Briton Ferry Llansawel 3-1 Carmarthen Town 

Reason for going: I'd not been to the Old Road ground before and this game was on a Friday night, which was the only slot I had free to attend a match on the last weekend of the month.

Point of interest: I think this was the first time I've heard bilingual announcements on the tannoy system for a normal league game.

Recap of the month - October 2023

October was a very busy month of travelling. In addition to our trip to DisneyLand Paris, I spent a weekend in Hartlepool (where, yes, I saw the monkey in the Marina!), and had a day working in London as well. 

The trip to London was to do some filming in the Diabetes UK London office. It meant an early start. I also had an extra-late finish because I broke my journey home in Reading, to attend the Quality in Care Diabetes Awards. One of the projects I worked on a couple of years ago, How to Manage a Mammoth, was nominated - and won!

As I said on LinkedIn, it was a long journey from the initial discussion around a kitchen table about doing this kind of book. My friend Rose wrote it. Another friend of mine, Richard, illustrated it. And now it's published and been turned into a short cartoon as well. 

It was a great night out for many of my colleagues from Wales. My friend Scott, who I keep bumping into at football matches, won an award too. And my former colleagues on the SEREN education programme were highly commended for one of their modules. 

Fist pump from Scott

"Team Cymru clean up again"

An added bonus was catching the train home afterwards with my friend Sara, which gave us a fab opportunity for a proper catch up!

Photo on the bus that took us to the train

The next week we went to DisneyLand. The day after we returned, I drove up to Hartlepool. It was during Storm Babet, and it felt like most of Derbyshire and Nottinghamshire was under water. 

I went up for a birthday party for my friend Tom. He had insisted on a dress code of "double denim" and had decided to complete the look with a mini mullet haircut. We all have different ways of dealing with growing old.

The final weekend of the month saw even more travelling as Cathy and I headed over to Gloucestershire to meet up with more family. I didn't take a photo of us all, but I did take a photo of the amazing cupcakes that Bonny made - all Sesame Street characters.

I really liked the look of Count von Count, but someone else called dibs. So I ended up eating Ernie instead. 

Footballing with company - 2023 edition

In what may become an annual tradition, here is a round up of the football season that has just concluded with selfies of some of the people who I enjoyed it with. 

First up, the two Pauls. Between them I went to more matches with someone called Paul than without someone called Paul. This was at Llantwit Major v Barry on 2nd January. 

I went to lots of Shrewsbury games with one of the Pauls, including to Oxford, which was my 100th football ground. Paul was the selfie-taker on this occasion.

And I went to lots of Barry games with the other Paul although randomly, this is a photo from when we went to Ipswich v Shrewsbury and saw the statue of the great Bobby Robson. 

And this is from when we went to Caldicot Town to watch my friend Ben play. 

I managed to get a selfie with Ben too before the game. 

Lots of Shrewsbury away games meant several selfies, including with my brother, Dave, nephew, Zac and mate-of-Dave, new-mate-for-me, Dan. 

I also met up with Ken who now lives in Bristol, for Shrewsbury's game at the Memorial Stadium. Yet another game in the "temporary stand" that has been there as long as I can remember. 

And at Cheltenham Town I sat next to my friend Chris, who I first met in junior school way back in the nineteen-eighties.

I did my usual thing of inviting people along to Barry Town games. Tom, Jude and Seb came to their first football match. They picked a good game. Barry won 5-0 and won the league title. 

Connor was in town on a Saturday so he also got dragged along to a game at Jenner Park as well. 

And Steve came to a game too.

Steve was also my matchgoing bud at the Cardiff Met game that was my only 0-0 of the season and technically in a post-season game. Although we did see a penalty saved in the game and two more saved in the shoot out at the end of extra time. 

I also invited people to some random games. My friend Charlie (who I saw play as a goalie this season in a game where he let in 16 goals!) joined me for a trip to Llwydcoed. This is a selfie he took!

One of the first games of the season was up in Cwmbach. I'd been invited up by Allan who I got to know through my previous job. He's on the committee and properly committed to his local club.

As it was that part of the world I was joined by my friends Sara and Leanne who brought their twins. The children were having a camera shy moment!

My friend Tom often frowns in photos, but in Llanelli he seemed inordinately excited. 

However, Tom seemed to be at a normal level of excitement when we went to watch Portsmouth play Shrewsbury.

Football is great with friends and also great with family! Cathy came to a Shrewsbury game with us for my nephew Zac's birthday outing. 

My eldest niece, Joy, came to several games too. And sometimes agreed to be in a selfie. 

And I went to lots of games with Zac, including an evening game at the Meadow and seeing Barry triumph 6-0 in the Welsh Blood Service Cup Final in Newtown!

Roll on next season, and if you want to come to a game with me, let me know!

November 2022 - a month in review, part 2: Occasions

November was a very busy month, including the loss of Cathy's Grampy, Jim. (See the month in review part 1.)

November is Cathy's birthday month, and with her birthday falling on a Saturday this year, we made a full day of it, starting with pancakes at McDonald's for breakfast. We then went to Cowbridge for a wander around and lunch - where I had pancakes again! Then in the evening we went to the Wales Millennium Centre to watch My Fair Lady. 

We went with June and Terri, but June was distracted during the pre-show selfie!

The show was very good, although there was a big delay midway through the first half because the revolving scenery stopped revolving and the unmistakeable burning smell associated with a blown motor was very apparent. The cast seemed to cope well with having a set that didn't spin any more, and there was some energy in the second half as it looked like they had to improvise some routines.

At the end of the month, we became godparents again - our third time. I made the joke that this meant I was The Godfather part III. This time it was in a Catholic church, which means I've now become a Catholic, Anglican, and non-denominational godfather. I am an exercise in ecumenism.  

Our latest godson (they've all been boys so far) is Herbert, son of Tom and Helena. Tom was a regular footballing companion when they lived in Cardiff, and I got to know Helena when the three of us were in the same Welsh class together. 

Midway through the month, my new boss started with the team. It has been a tough six months adapting to a new organisation with a much bigger remit and audience than I had in my previous job. I'm hoping that now our programme can start to kick on, having been in a holding pattern over the summer and autumn. 

The same week that my new boss started, I gave a Zoom presentation to the British Thematic Association. I talked about 'philatelic passports' that are issued at stamp shows with the idea that people would go round various stalls and stick in stamps from different countries. I have collected a few of these ever since going to the big Stamp World London exhibition in 1990.

This was the second time I have done a presentation to the BTA. Last year I talked about my collection of stamps that feature the Statue of Liberty.  That presentation is available to watch on YouTube and my latest presentation will be available in a few months' time. (We limit access to presentations to members for a few months.)

And with all that going on, we also saw the start of a bizarrely-timed and controversial World Cup. I was in two minds whether to boycott watching the whole thing, but I am quite weak-willed as it turns out. Plus, Wales qualified - even though they had a very disappointing campaign. 

Despite watching more of the competition than I thought I would, I have been strong and boycotted collecting the football stickers. That has been hard as there has been a cohort of people collecting them in work and an active sticker-swapping group!

In terms of live sport, I only went to three football matches in November, but I did get to go to an international rugby match and an ice hockey game on the same Saturday to chalk up my first ever "two sport twofer"! One of the football matches I went to was the final game of Gavin Chesterfield's 15 year tenure as manager of Barry Town. The 2-1 win for Barry was also the 50th match I've attended at Jenner Park, so a personal milestone as well.

After all that, I'd hope for a restful December, but December is never restful!

October 2022 round-up and review

Well, another month, another new Prime Minister. Time will tell whether this will be an improvement. At the moment it feels like more of the same corruption and cruelty. 

However, while the news was full of politics, our personal news was that we resumed gig-going after a few pandemic-filled years. I've already blogged about the gig we went to in the middle of the month in Manchester, when we heard Counting Crows return to form. At the end of the month, we saw another long-term favourite, when Tony Wright, the singer from Terrorvision, visited Le Pub in Newport on part of his acoustic tour.

Being a very small venue we could get photos with him afterwards. We also got him to sign a copy of his new album. 

And yes, he did play some classic Terrorvision songs including a thumping version of Alice, What;s the Matter? that had the audience singing along. 

Something I first noticed when we went to see Garbage in 2015 was that the audience of gigs from bands that were big when Cathy and I were in our early 20s all seem to have aged at the same rate as we have! This was no different. We were probably some of the young 'uns. 

I went to four football matches in October, starting with Shrewsbury's game away in Cheltenham.  

It was a disappointing game for Shrewsbury fans, but I did get to sit to my old school friend Chris who was there with his son.

On the way in I also noticed this well-stickered sign bearing labels stuck there by fans from lots of different teams 

(I actually tripped on the step on the way out of the ground. Despite this sign!)

My next game was another Shrewsbury game, at home against the team from Milton Keynes that are pariahs in the game. We went to this as a belated ninth birthday celebration for my eldest nephew, Zac. The game we had planned to attend nearer his birthday, in September, got cancelled after the Queen passed away. 

Quite a gang of us went, including my mum and Cathy as well. Zac had invited some mates along and they all got to meet Lenny the Lion.

My final game of the month was in Portsmouth to watch Shrewsbury again. I drove down the morning after the Tony Wright gig and met my friend Tom who moved there last year to do a ship-building course. We took the obligatory selfie with a sign for Fratton Park in the distance. 

Afterwards I realised I knew those two cops doing the high viz photobomb. One of them, Chris, grew up round the corner from me in Shrewsbury. 

I liked Fratton Park, which was both large and somehow quite open. We were behind one goal - with a decent view when play was down our end. We saw Portsmouth score in front of us. We almost saw Shrewsbury score too, from this corner. 

And I managed to capture the split second after a Portsmouth defender had cleared the ball with his hand. It should have been a penalty but the ref didn't see it. Everyone behind the goal did though!

The game finished 1-1, a creditable draw for Shrewsbury.

The fourth game I saw was Barry beating Llanelli, which meant Barry went top of the league! Here's hoping they can stay there.