Grays, a Hat and Me

Hopperational details
Date & Venue	Saturday 29 September 2012 at Rush Green Stadium
Result	Grays Athletic 1 Ashford Town (Middlesex) 1
Competition	FA Trophy First Qualifying Round.  Both sides play at step 4 - Grays in the Isthmian League Div One North and Ashford Town in the Southern League Div One Central.
Hopping	This is the second Grays home game I have seen – the last was in September 2006 at the Recreation Ground.  It was one of my early Conference games as I moved beyond the 92 and into the non-league world.  The Rec lease ended in 2009/10 and Grays dropped to step 4, groundsharing at East Thurrock for two years.  The arrangement at Rush Green Stadium, in partnership with West Ham, is seen as a temporary home.  It becomes number 483 on my lifetime list, and I am here because it is the shortest journey of the 24 Trophy ties at “unvisited” grounds today.  The Yappmobile is in need of a service and I need to keep the mileage down this week!
Pre-match preparation
Thanks to the excellent article on the Grays website I have established that neither side has had a 0-0 draw for months.  Both sides were tonked out of the FA Cup last weekend.  Grays beat Aylesbury and Ashford beat Walton Casuals in the preliminary round and it is the first time that the clubs have met in any competition.  Grays have won this trophy twice, winning finals at Villa Park and Upton Park against Hucknall Town (2005) and Woking (2006) respectively.
This match in one sentence
An interesting game because the outcome was always in doubt rather than due to the quality of the play, and probably a fair result even though it messes up a Shaded by Grays title opportunity.
So what?
A replay on Tuesday.
The drama unfolds
Drama may be a bit of an overstatement here in its popular meaning anyway.  If this were a stage play, we might be in the "Waiting for Godot" territory. Interesting and strangely compelling for the purists, yet not as exciting as the more downmarket stuff.  Only 122 turned up to see it. The Rush Green Stadium has a very good playing surface maintained by the Premier League partners.  I was chatting pre-match to a couple of Grays supporters who have followed the club for over 60 years, and they explained that Grays were handing a debut to a loaned West Ham keeper, Jake Larkins.  Ashford made the better start though, and on a couple of occasions Junior Baker needed to be strong and alert in central defence.  It could be said that this goal was against the run of play.  Grays are in blue.  1-0 The scorer is Danny Bunce, and there were 21 mins on the watch.  Here is a more general scene-setter clip after the goal.  It was now very even overall, with Grays playing with more confidence after their goal. Ashford had their first real chance to equalise just before half-time.  Alex Duffy reached the byline and from the resulting corner a clearance off the line pinged to  Bairoh Conteh but the defender's first-time shot went high.  1-0 at half-time I started the second half with an anticlockwise (from above) circuit of the ground and so here are two clips from other standpoints. After 63 minutes Jack West headed the ball on to Joao Carlos whose shot rolled just wide.  It could so easily have been 2-0, but on 70 minutes an equaliser came at the other end.  Mark Bitmead's first time finish was beyond the reach of Larkins.  The ball had fallen nicely for him after a long throw from the right.  1-1 Grays were unlucky when a long range dipping volley by Bunce resulted in a corner.  From that corner, Baker came running in for a perfectly timed and unchallenged header.  I took several short clips in the last few minutes as both sides looked for a winner.  By this time I was back in the shelter of the main stand - it was colder than it looks!  The trademark green woolly hat will soon be needed this season, I fear.  Today it remained in the rucksack (yes, I know) but it was close. However, nothing doing on the goals front, so a draw and a replay it is.  Final score 1-1 Good game at the back for Junior Baker apart from this near-comedy-og moment
The programme
(and a very good one it is too, by the way)
Something random
The last time I saw Jack West play (for Tilbury) I bumped into his dad at the tea bar ... http://modushopperrandom.blogspot.co.uk/2011/03/my-eats-meets-west-moment-at-tilbury.html
Hopping for Moorfields Update
Two goals added to the tally, but nothing else of particular interest to the sponsors.  Please join in if you haven't done so already.  Previous posts explain all.  Look for the Hopping for Moorfields tag in the cloud on the right.
What Next?
Not a clue, though I am up in the North West for other reasons next Saturday.  I may try to sneak off to a match for a few hours during the afternoon.  Follow @GrahamYapp on Twitter for my hot flashes.

What's Shawe View?

Sack the roofpreader

 

Hopperational details
Date & Venue	Saturday 22 September 2012 at Shawe View
Result	Trafford 5 Spennymoor Town 3
Competition	FA Cup 2nd Qualifying Round.  Trafford are in the step 4 Northern Premier League Division One North, and Spennymoor Town have stayed at step 5 having won the Northern League for three seasons in a row,
Hopping	I am here because “Trafford v Spennymoor Town” has 23 characters, and this was enough under the complex rules of the new discipline of threeandtwentyism to select this game for me from a list of … 23.  If this makes no sense, you are normal in all respects but you can catch up with previous blogposts for the explanation.  Go for a wee first – it may take you longer than you think and laughter on a full bladder can be problematic.
Pre-match preparation
Trafford are here after two away wins in earlier rounds, against Winsford United and Runcorn Town.  They are going well in the league too, scoring almost four a game and sitting second, conceding only one goal.  So are Spennymoor Town, who have an unbreached defence in the league and in three home FA Cup wins against Scarborough Athletic, West Allotment Celtic and South Shields. Something has to give!
This match in one sentence
More comfortable for Trafford than the scoreline suggests after an early three-goal burst created a mountain too big for Spennymoor to climb.
So what?
This is a knockout cup competition so Trafford are in the hat for the next round and £4500 better off and Spennymoor Town are not.
The drama unfolds
Pie, peas n’gravy at northern outposts is always a treat and today was no exception.  Then the significant matter of an unannounced minute of silence – but we all knew why given the news from Manchester this week of the murder of two police officers – observed impeccably before the announcer caught up.  The game started in bright sunshine on a pristine surface, and all the pre-match signs had been that Spennymoor Town and their voluble and voluminous travelling support were “up for this”.  Wayne Phillips was an early threat on the left as they took the game to the hosts. The art of the stepover Trafford, however, got themselves three goals after only 18 minutes to put the stunned visitors back in their place.  The first was Shelton Payne’s penalty after 8 minutes.  He himself had been tripped at the end of a run into the area – perhaps fortunate with the bounce of the ball along the way, but a well-placed spotkick as caught in my penpic.  1-0 Then Michael Oates got past Michael Laws and reached the byeline on the right before rolling it across the 6-yard box.  Paul Ashton would have had time to change his name to Michael for the purposes of symmetry but instead, he just tapped it in.  16 minutes gone.  2-0 As if this wasn’t unexpected enough, Payne smacked in a third just two minutes later and it really looked like game over.  3-0 My scene-setter clip therefore starts rather tediously with nothing whatsoever happening in the 23rd minute.  (23 has been the number of the week and it has changed my life.)  Trafford are in white. Fair play to Spennymoor who kept their heads up.  Phillips switched to the right so his crosses were curling the other way, so to speak.  Anthony Peacock met one of them first time and just missed.  There were two other near misses and the northeasterners sang, “We’re gonna win 4-3” in the time-honoured tradition.  If only they had taken just one of these chances. Encouragingly, full-back Chris Mason got to the ball just ahead of home keeper Tom Read and headed home in first-half stoppage time.  3-1 at half-time Spennymoor, as they should, came out strongly after the break and only took three minutes to close the gap.  The ball broke to full-back Kallum Griffiths in a central position on the edge of the area and his well-placed curling shot hit the net.  Read had been taking abuse all afternoon and now it stepped up.  3-2 Trafford’s response was immediate if a little fortunate.  Smart’s free kick deflected off the wall and left goalkeeper Robert Dean on the other side of the goal.  A loud voice from the visitor side told the referee exactly where he could shove his “Respect”, and all the youngsters here present laughed.  The ref was to be the scapegoat for the rest of the afternoon.  4-2 In the 64th minute, Trafford passed their way beautifully into a scoring position and Ashton got his second.  5-2 Spennymoor still kept playing.  I took a second clip after 82 minutes and caught them winning, and missing, a penalty kick.  Read made the save from Mark Davison.  He was entitled to look smug, and he did. This became even more significant a few minutes later when Spennymoor sub Andrew Stephenson belted in a quite splendid goal from about 25 metres.  5-3 There was time for Trafford to hit the post and in truth their win was pretty comfortable for all but a few minutes of the match.  With a tighter start and better finishing, Spennymoor might have made their hosts play with more nervousness.  Final score 5-3
The programme
Something random
This post is dedicated to PC Nicola Hughes and PC Fiona Bone of the Greater Manchester Police who lost their lives this week while carrying out their public duties.  Thoughts are with families and friends.
Hopping for Moorfields Update
Eight goals all in one game – that is a good day for the tally.
What Next?
Not a clue.  Look out for @GrahamYapp on Twitter to see what happens.

Threeandtwentyism Decides

Quick recap: I have invented threeandtwentyism to decide which one of 23 ties in the Second Qualifying Round of the FA Cup next Saturday to go to next weekend.  I have associated each match with a letter of the alphabet by choosing the 23 most common letters in the English language (both in words in general and for the initial letters of words).  Therefore Q, X and Z are omitted.  This means I can associate each match with the surname of people that can share or exhibit 23ness in their lives this week, up to 2323 (11.23pm) on Sunday.

Here are the final results, combining the themes of football, travel and groundhopping with friends' suggestions and personal links.  The numbers on the right are the total number of links I have been able make with the number 23  for each letter.  I have 120 links with the number 23 altogether.  There are more for the letter S than any other - but S is a very common initial letter in the English language.

1	Ashton United	v	Marine	A – 8
Shola Ameobl wears 23 at Newcastle (thanks @PayasodeMierda), as does Andrey Arshavin at Arsenal and Armand (Accrington).  On 23/04/11 in the Faroe Islands I saw AB lose 2-3 at home to FC Suðuroy.  Australia beat Argentina 23-19 in rugby union yesterday.  BA Flight 23 will take you to Atlanta.  Yasser A was in block Z3, which looks like 23, for QPR v Chelsea on Saturday.
2	Bamber Bridge	v	Guiseley AFC	B – 14
William Burroughs believed in the enigma of 23.  Peter B likes the fact that 23 is sending me mad!  Bolton Wanderers won the first match at Wembley Stadium, the 1923 “White Horse” FA Cup final (thanks @HoundofMeath).  I hopped to Bury Town on 23/11/10.  Berkley (Colwyn Bay) scored in the 23rd min yesterday.  Bristol Rovers are 23rd in League One this morning.  Blackstock (Nottm Forest), Bennett (Doncaster), Bradley (Aldershot), Bell (Burton), Burgess (Port Vale), Barker (Southend), Boyle (Dundee), Barron (St Mirren) all wear 23.
3	Bishop Auckland	v	AFC Fylde	C – 14
Clark is the name of the two captains in Borroughs' tale of the 23 enigma.  Jim Carrey is the star of the film "The Number 23".  Sol Campbell wore 23 at Arsenal (thanks @cordelan) as does Seamus Coleman (Everton), Jamie Carragher (Liverpool), Tom Cleverley (Man U) and Carlo Cudicini (Spurs).  Also Craney (Rochdale).  Charlton is the 23rd team on my chronological groundhopping list.  I saw Crawley draw at York on 23/11/08, and Crawley is reached via the M23 motorway.  On 23/10/11 I was at Celtic Park.  Coventry are 23rd in League One.  Cambridge City are the home side in tie number 23 in this round of the FA Cup.
4	Buckland	v	Bath City	D – 1
Alou Diarra (West Ham) wears 23.
5	Carlton Town	v	New Mills	E – 1
Etuhu (Barnsley) wears 23.
6	Chorley	v	Frickley Athletic	F – 7
On 23/01/10 I saw Farsley v Northwich Victoria and the score was 2-3.  My Grandma F’s birthday.  I was teaching at Fearnhill School in Letchworth when I was 23.  Frecklington (Peterboro), Freeman (Derby) and Faye (Hull) all wear 23.
7	Dereham Town	v	Chasetown	G – 1
On 23/08/11 I hopped to an FA Cup game at Greenwood Meadows.
8	Fareham Town	v	Blackfield & Langley	H – 11
Kathy H’s parents were both born in 1923.  Huddo Hudson pointed out to me that 23 is the number of players in a World Cup squad.  David Hoilett (QPR) and Ian Harte (Reading) wear 23.  Also Hector (Shrewsbury).  I hopped to Histon on 23/08/08.  It took 23 years for a report on the Hillsborough incident to be accepted as the truth.  Hyde are 23rd in the Conference this morning.  You’d need M6 J23 to go to the races at Haydock Park.  Hayes & Yeading have moved their FA Cup tie to the 23rd.
9	Frome Town	v	Weston Super Mare	I – 1
Ipswich Town are 23rd in the Championship.
10	Gillingham Town	v	Sholing	J – 1
23 was Michael Jordan’s shirt number for Chicago Bulls in the NBA.
11	Gosport Borough	v	Bideford Town	K – 3
I hopped to Kentish Town on 23/09/09.  Kabamba (Uxbridge) scored in the 23rd min yesterday.  Keegan (Southend) wears 23.
12	Grays Athletic	v	Maidstone United	L – 6
On 23/03/10 I hopped to Leverstock Green.  Lopez (Stevenage) and Lustig (Celtic) wear 23. On 11/09/01 (now known as "9/11") United Airlines' Flight 23 to Los Angeles is believed by many to have averted a hijacking because of the captain's actions on the runway.  Virgin Atlantic Flight 23 also flies to Los Angeles.  Notts County's Joss Labadie was the only substitute deployed in the 23rd minute in the weekend's games.
13	Merthyr	v	Hungerford Town	M – 13
Virgina Madsen is the co-star in the film "The Number 23".  Elaine M’s wedding anniversary.  Broadcaster Aasmah Mir just tweeted a link to a video of her at age 23 (thanks @putajumperon).  James McClean (Sunderland) and Gareth McAuley (WBA) wear 23.  Also McArdle (Bradford C) and Mohamed (Cheltenham).  My visit to Eastlands to see Man City 0-0 Portsmouth was on 23/08/06.  There is an enormous Morrisons depot next to J23 on the M5.  Nathaniel Mendez-Laing (Peterborough) scored in the 23rd minute today.  Maynard (Cardiff) and McKeown (Kilmarnock) wear 23.  M is the 23rd letter of Numbers chapter 23 verse 23 in the King James version of Old Testment, ("Surely there is no enchantment ...)
14	Newport (IoW)	v	Salisbury City	N – 1
Nantwich lost a match 23-0 to Manchester United in 1952 (thanks @richard242).
15	Nuneaton Griff	v	Hednesford Town	O – 2
O'Shea (MK) and O'Brien (Oxford U) wear 23.
16	Salford City	v	FC United Of Manchester	P – 1
23 is a Prime number.
17	Shildon	v	Altrincham	R – 3
Gerda R likes the number 23 because it is her son’s birthday.  Rochina (Blackburn) wears 23, also Randall (Chesterfield).
18	South Park	v	Harefield United	S – 16
Joel Schumacher directed "The Number 23" and the central character is Walter Sparrow.  @putajumperon was 23 when he saw an Aussie Rules game, won by St Kilda.  Daniel Sturridge (Chelsea), Luke Shaw (Southampton), Darnel Situ (Swansea) and Ronnie Stam (Wigan) wear 23.  Also Spector (B'ham), Speiss (Notts Co), Simonsen (PNE).  My visit to Sunderland’s old ground (Roker Park) was on 23/10/93.  On 23/10/10 I saw Sheffield v Tipton Town and wrote my first piece for @therealfacup.  Shepshed Dynamo are located near M1 J23 and the South Mimms Services are located at J23 of the M25.  Rifca Stanescu of Romania appears to have become the world's youngest grandmother, at age 23.  Slough Town have moved their FA Cup tie to the 23rd.
19	Tadcaster Albion	v	Skelmersdale United	T – 6
@TravellingFan is 23 and the last time I saw him was at Three Bridges.  Marc Tierney (Norwich) and Michael Tonge (Stoke) wear 23.  Toomey (St Albans) scored in the 23rd min yesterday.  Thompson (Wycombe) wears 23.  Throbbing Gristle sang a song (in the loose sense of the term) about Flight 23.
20	Trafford	v	Spennymoor Town	U – 1
“Trafford v Spennymoor Town” has 23 characters not including the spaces.
21	West Auckland Town	v	Harrogate Town	V – 3
Rowan Vine of St Johnstone wore the 23 shirt AND scored the winning goal against Celtic.  There are 23 protons in the nucleus of every atom of the element Vanadium.
22	Whitby Town	v	Droylsden	W – 4
Wabara (Oldham), Woodall (Dag & Red) wear 23.  "Whitby Town v Droylsden" has 23 characters if spaces are included.  "23 Minutes in Hell" is the title of an utterly loopy book written by a religious fanatic by the name of Bill Weise about which I will say no more.
23	Yate Town	v	Oxford City	Y – 2
Yussuff (AFC Wimbledon) wears 23.  "Yate Town v Oxford City" has 23 characters if spaces are included.

However, since most of the links are surnames, we need a significance test otherwise the decision is made by the distribution of first letters and not by 23ness at all.  To find out what the "expected" distribution is, I took a telephone directory and counted the number of pages devoted to each initial letter, to the nearest column (or 0.25 of a page).

For example, there were 11.25 pages of Ks out of 398, which would be 2.83%  ( 11.25 x 100 / 398 ).  We found 3 out of 120 links of 23ness for K, which is 2.50% of them  ( 3 x 100 / 120 ) which shows that we found a very slightly smaller % than we might expect.  We can calculate a simple significance factor by simply working out the ratio of the actual percentage to the expected percentage.  The bigger the number, the greater the significance - we found more 23ness examples than we would have expected to find if it were just due to the initial letter.  All of this is moderately reasonable and plausible so far.  There are other more sophisticated significance tests, but the simple one will give me an answer that is good enough for this pointless purpose.

So ...

Letter	Directory No. of Pages	Expected % (E)	23ness Score	Actual % (A)	SIGNIFICANCE = A / E
A	13.00	3.27%	8	6.67%	2.04
B	40.50	10.18%	14	11.67%	1.15
C	34.00	8.54%	14	11.67%	1.37
D	18.50	4.65%	1	0.83%	0.18
E	8.25	2.07%	1	0.83%	0.40
F	14.25	3.58%	7	5.83%	1.63
G	20.50	5.15%	1	0.83%	0.16
H	32.75	8.23%	11	9.17%	1.11
I	1.75	0.44%	1	0.83%	1.90
J	10.25	2.58%	1	0.83%	0.32
K	11.25	2.83%	3	2.50%	0.88
L	17.00	4.27%	6	5.00%	1.17
M	33.50	8.42%	13	10.83%	1.29
N	7.25	1.82%	1	0.83%	0.46
O	6.00	1.51%	2	1.67%	1.11
P	22.25	5.59%	1	0.83%	0.15
R	19.00	4.77%	3	2.50%	0.52
S	37.25	9.36%	16	13.33%	1.42
T	16.25	4.08%	6	5.00%	1.22
U	0.75	0.19%	1	0.83%	4.42
V	3.00	0.75%	3	2.50%	3.32
W	29.00	7.29%	4	3.33%	0.46
Y	1.75	0.44%	2	1.67%	3.79
Total	398.00	100.00	120	100.00

There are more initial Bs in the directory than anything else, so the number of 23ness links to B were about what would be expected.  We found more links to S than any other letter, but the significance factor is not that high.  The clear winner by this spurious methodology, with a result of 4.42, is the letter U, which was linked to Trafford v Spennymoor Town.  On the face of it, this is a fluke result caused by the fact that the expected % was so low that it is surprising that we found any 23ness for this game at all ... but it is delicious and wonderful that the one that I did find is that it has 23 letters.  You just can't argue with logic.

Trafford v Spennymoor Town will be my randomish FA Cup hop for next Saturday.

Small print for real and partially real mathematicians:
The way that the games were linked to letters was as fair as anything can be with alphabetical order.  I have been consistent about searching for and recording examples of so-called "23ness".  The telephone directory listing used was the residential section of the St Albans Phone Book, and there is no reason to believe that it is unrepresentative.  Page counts were done to the nearest column, or quarter of a page.  The significance test is fair up to a point - it is true that it shows the letters that showed up more or less than "expected".  However, the variations are large and the true statistical significance is dubious, especially for those letters which appear the least.  Another significance test involving differences from expected rather than ratios (i.e. subtraction rather than division) would have kept S at the top.  I could probably have devised plausible sounding tests that would have put Y or A at the top had I wished to be devious.  I didn't know that this method would favour the low frequency letters until I completed it.  But I don't care - I'm going to Trafford v Spennymoor - it has 23 letters, I have spent the weekend with 23 and I am not letting go now.