To the Manor Farm

Hopperational details
Date & Venue	Saturday 27 January 2018 at The Creek
Result	Bristol Manor Farm 1 Swindon Supermarine 1
Competition	Southern League Division One West (Step 4)
Hopstats	Ground 633 on the lifetime list. No Step 3 possibility for me today so I shortlisted every unvisited Step 4 ground and waited for an unambiguous “Game On” announcement on Twitter. Manor Farm were the first up, with plenty of time for me to travel.  Hoppers are strongly advised to read the clear travel directions on the club website for the best way of approaching the entrance.  SatNavs may take you to a location on the wrong side of a dual carriageway and the shortest approach from there is not at all obvious.
Context
Bristol Manor Farm are in their first season at Step 4 and are performing really very well, sitting in third place in the division.  Swindon Supermarine are respectably mid-table but are in a transition with a caretaker manager in place today.
In one sentence
First half dominated by Supermarine, second half by Manor Farm, ending up in a somewhat fractious draw on a difficult day for the referee.
So what?
The teams end the day in 3rd and 9th place respectively.
Match Report
If I don’t tell it as I see it and experience it, then I might as well give up as a blogger.  Having drafted this last night, I've decided to go ahead with it.  I’ve now watched football in 633 different places, over 500 of them as a passing neutral.  Any credibility that I have is based on the evidence of the 400 match reports in this blog.  I’m a fan of the game, the places, the volunteers and the occasion rather than a referee or a coach – my Class III ref certificate has long since lapsed and I only ever got to look after the odd school team early in my career.  This particular report has been hard to write, and words have been chosen carefully.  The behaviour of some players and fans (as opposed to club officials and volunteers) was unusually disgraceful. The first twenty minutes or so was pretty dire, albeit on a tricky surface.  Plenty of commitment and effort, but often with all twenty outfield players clustered within a quarter of the pitch as shown below.  The ball pinged backwards and forwards around the midfield area with not too much in the way of width or goalmouth action. On one occasion, the Supermarine keeper Josh Hill was caught out of position after a scuffed clearance, but a shot from 40 metres or so failed to find the unguarded net.  I was on a walk around the pitch when the first signs of player dissent began to emerge.  I was amazed that the referee tolerated a BMF player yelling in his face from point-blank range – I heard every word at the other end of the field.  A deserved yellow card there and then might have prevented the later developments.  If that wasn’t dissent then I don’t know what is. It took a penalty to break the deadlock, and I can only assume it was handball.  The assistant also flagged decisively.  It was somewhat unlucky for the home keeper Ashley Clark who had made a good initial save before the infringement happened from the rebound.  Bradley Hooper made no mistake from the spot to give the visitors the lead. For much of the first half, Manor Farm were penned back in their own half and struggled to make any attacking impact.  However, they defended well enough to hold Supermarine to the one-goal lead at the break. Troy Simpson came close to an equaliser just after the restart, bursting through the middle and shooting narrowly wide.  He would go on to have several near misses, but the atmosphere was largely soured by an incident just before the hour mark.  It had been getting niggly, and players on BOTH sides crowded the ref from time to time.  Manor Farm had strong penalty claims turned down.  This time I was close by, and I’ve seen those given, as they say.  The appeal was for a trip on Dean Stamp, and he was outraged at the decision, even though the ref was in a good position.  There followed several minutes of pushing, shoving, abuse and ref-crowding.  Stamp and a defender chest-bumped each other, more close range in-your-face yelling-at-the-ref took place, particularly from the home striker, and meantime some grown men spectators around me screamed repeated abuse at the official, questioning both integrity and parentage but with shorter words.  If I’m that ref, I’m packing this game in tomorrow once my report goes in.  Why would you do this for fun, week in, week out?  Once more, lots of adults on and off the pitch confusing “passion” with low personal standards and lack of self-control, but as usual I will find myself in the minority view.  Could the ref have handled it better?  Maybe you could argue that the players perceived that they were in control of the interactions after that first half. Manor Farm equalised from a set piece.  The referee correctly gave a freekick for a mistimed tackle.  The delivery was good and Stamp neatly headed the equaliser to cement his place as the club’s top scorer.  It was a well-taken goal, and by now deserved on the run of play.  A home supporter loudly informed the ref that he was still going to let his tyres down. I rather lost interest after that.  Simpson was unlucky not to score after chasing down a bouncing ball down the middle, and he so nearly caught out the high defensive line played by Supermarine.  They came back into the game in the last few minutes and I think, from player reaction, that they shaved the woodwork at one point.  Simpson had one more late chance to win it for the home side, but Hill got into a good position to make the save as he shaped to place the shot.  The final whistle arrived with honours even. As I made my final notes, a home supporter walking past me, a smartly-dressed mature man in his 40s or 50s I would guess, shouted at the ref that he was a “useless c**t”, and his friends laughed.  I can only hope that the ref, if he looked round, didn’t think it was me.  I regret the fact that I didn't say anything, but I felt outnumbered.  Time to go home, and think about how many more blogposts there might be before I give up too.  Just don't come back at me after this with any "it's a man's game" rubbish.
Ground Pix
A ground with character, an extremely adjacent railway line, a very good clubhouse, and slopes in all directions.  Well worth a visit.
Match Pix
BMF in red & black.
Transports of Delight
This ground gives a passing view to passengers on both train and bus.  You don't get that in the Premier League.
Goalkeeper Top Colour Stats
A draw between yellow and green, which leaves the rank order unchanged once again Results so far: Based on conventional 3pts for a win, 1pt for a draw, but also -1pt for a goal conceded (GC) and +5pts for a clean sheet (CS).  Colours ranked on a points per game (PPG) basis. For new readers the odd .5 was caused by a shocking half-and-half shirt and the .1 was due to a substitute goalkeeper in a different colour.  The Fire Cracker colour was confirmed with the help of the social media team at Dulux UK, and it deserves to be last, trust me.  All of this arises from a comment attributed to Petr Cech that orange is the best colour for a goalkeeper because it changes the behaviour of other players around the box. P W D L GC CS Pts PPG Red 10.0 5.0 1.0 4.0 11.0 3.0 20.0 2.000 Maroon 4.0 2.0 1.0 1.0 6.0 1.0 6.0 1.500 Blue 31.1 13.0 6.0 12.1 49.0 10.0 46.0 1.479 Grey 43.5 20.0 9.0 14.5 72.5 11.0 51.5 1.184 Green 72.0 35.0 10.0 27.0 122.0 18.0 83.0 1.153 Orange 29.5 9.0 6.0 14.5 49.5 5.0 8.5 0.288 Purple 11.0 5.0 2.0 4.0 25.0 2.0 2.0 0.182 Radioactive Bile 13.0 6.0 0.0 7.0 26.0 2.0 2.0 0.154 Yellow 29.0 8.0 7.0 14.0 59.0 5.0 -3.0 -0.103 Pink 15.0 4.0 5.0 6.0 30.0 1.0 -8.0 -0.533 Black 5.0 1.0 3.0 1.0 14.0 0.0 -8.0 -1.600 White 1.9 0.0 0.0 1.9 4.0 0.0 -4.0 -2.105 Fire Cracker 1.0 0.0 0.0 1.0 4.0 0.0 -4.0 -4.000
What Next?
Follow @GrahamYapp on Twitter for details!  Next week’s destination may well be determined again by the weather.  I also need to add Dorking Wanderers to the Step 3 priority list for later this season as a move to a new location is now imminent.