.png)
The hot summer we’ve enjoyed and at times endured will have had no effect whatsoever on the Seadogs’ playing surface, as it’s as fake as the Spennymoor goalie when he lay down for a bit as soon as they took the lead last weekend. National League North bigwigs and referees – please, please, please realise that this sort of thing seems to be rife in the division and completely messes with it as a spectacle and really should be stamped down on hard. Players who do it – please, please, please realise that you just look pathetic and dishonest.
The Bulls wisely incorporated a trip to Rushall Olympic’s 4G pitch as part of their pre-season programme, so at least that experience will be fresh in the players’ memories. Coming through these games without any nasty injuries is perhaps not quite half the battle, but it’s certainly a factor.
Athletic are a phoenix club formed after the liquidation of Scarborough in 2007. Up from the Northern Premier League via the play-offs last season and given no chance by the bookies this term, they opened their season last Saturday with a 2-0 loss at Brackley, and no-one loses 2-0 at Brackley; that’s precisely double what you should be losing by at Brackley.
Ex-Manchester United midfielder Jonathan Greening manages the hosts, and won promotion in his first year in the job. A handful of signings were made in the summer, but it wouldn't be too surprising if they bolstered again before Saturday with a loanee or two. It would be fair to say that their form was patchy in pre-season, which brought defeats to Stockton and South Shields. Actually it would be fairer, and ideed more accurate, to say that that isn't really patchy at all, it's consistently poor.
However, as 4G pitch merchants they’ll be looking to rack up the points at home on a surface they’re familiar with, and which is a bit weird for everyone else.
As for Hereford, on last Saturday’s
evidence there are quite a few reasons to be optimistic. Firstly, when the Bulls are awarded
corners and free kicks in attacking areas the opposition no longer sniggers as half a dozen
jockeys mooch forward on a mission everyone in the ground knows is futile.
Spennymoor predictably fielded two horrible centre backs but they and the rest
of the team looked mildly intimidated rather than smugly amused when the home
side won corners. A big step forward, that, and that’s before the addition of
Aaron Amari Holloway into the mix, who reportedly won’t shy away from a bit or
argy-bargy. Secondly, Kane Thompson-Sommers…it’s as if Olu Durojaiye was just a
bad dream. Maybe he was. A wonderful acquisition and well done Josh Gowling.
Brackley have got a post-Christmas gem to look forward to signing there.
Thirdly, Ty Barnett at both ends of the pitch is an absolute revelation.
OK, the team has a midfielder and a
converted striker as centre backs, but it looks like there’s the power, potency and ability at last to win matches 4-3 and 5-4 when that defensive set-up leaks
goals, and who’s going to complain about that apart from the County Hospital’s
cardiology unit when fans are admitted en masse every other Saturday
afternoon?
 |
| 'Defending' vs Spennymoor |
The brilliant thing about away games this season of course is that the home kit will be left, er, at home, apart from when the away kit clashes with the home team’s home kit (is that how it works?). Replica kit wearers: do not wear your home shirts in supermarkets as it will cause havoc with the barcode machines and you’ll be bleeped as a bag of carrots when you go through the checkout, and no-one wants to be reduced to bag-of-carrots status.
It's back-to-back week this week, and the fixture computer has somewhat unfairly handed Hereford another away trip on Tuesday, although it’s a much shorter hop to Chester. Enough good things happened last Saturday to suggest that this season could be a good ‘un, and that the Bulls will be unbeaten on four points going into that tougher looking game at the Deva.
COYW