One Step Beyond Last Season

 

Hopperational Details
Date & Venue	Saturday 14 August 2021 at Bury Road
Result	Stowmarket Town 2 Canvey Island 2
Competition	Isthmian League Division 1 North (Step 4)
Hopstats	Ground 721 on the lifetime list. My nearest unvisited Step 4 ground hosting a game today.
Context
First league game of the new season, and first at this level for Stowmarket who were (deservedly) promoted in the end-of-last-season reorganisations.
In One Sentence
Stowmarket refused to be beaten, equalising twice in a very entertaining game with the result in doubt right to the final whistle.
So What?
Too early to say very much except that Stowmarket showed every sign that they will be competitive.
Pre-match Entertainment
A walk (and a few nettle stings) along the banks of the River Gipping and then back through the town centre. Not as rural as I’d thought, as it turns out that it runs directly behind an industrial estate. The river itself is bursting with reeds and buddleia, and therefore bees and butterflies. Good enough exercise for working up the appetite for the pre-match visit to the club’s excellent refreshment bar. The stadium seemed to have Madness’ Greatest Hits playing on a loop which was an unexpected bonus.
Match Report
The visitors dominated the possession in the early stages but it took them 13 minutes to create their first real chance. A fierce shot from the right by Matthew Price was parried by home keeper James Bradbrook. The hosts’ first chance was on the half-hour. On the break, with the gusty wind making it tricky to judge the flight of the ball, George Bugg got to the ball before keeper Bobby Mason, but with an open goal beckoning he rolled a left-foot shot into the side netting. The away supporters went quiet for a moment, realising that had been a narrow escape. The breakthrough came after 34 minutes, as Canvey took the lead through Evans Kouassi. He had been causing problems with pace and footwork already and had switched to the left. Connor Hubble showed good anticipation to win the ball on the right flank. It was efficiently switched to the left and Kouassi, who dribbled into the area and got a shot across the keeper into the far corner from a narrow angle. Probably a deserved lead, but one that could have been defended. Both sides had chances in a flurry of activity before the interval. Stowmarket scuffed another one, and Bradbrook and his defenders had to make some timely blocks. A 0-1 score at half-time felt just about right on balance of play. Who knows what words were said at half-time, but it only took five minutes for Stowmarket to equalise. A superbly floated cross from the right was met on the run by Josh Mayhew who scored with an excellent header. Canvey responded and re-took the lead with another good header ten minutes later. This time Price was in the right place to despatch the cross after good combination work down the left flank by Jay Siva and substitute Tobi Tinubu. It is to Stowmarket’s great credit that Canvey were unable to see out the win from there. Evan Collard received the ball on the left of the area and scored his side’s second equaliser of the day, still with about twenty minutes to go. The rest of the game remained very entertaining for the passing neutral. Both sides had a chance to win it, neither side seemed to be settling for the point. Not a bad result for either side for the first day of a new season. Acknowledgement: the club Twitter timelines for confirming a few names for when the action was at the other end!
Match Pix
Ground Pix
The ground seems to have benefited from work done ahead of the step up, and the e-programme explains the use of a £25000 prize grant (and some work that is still needed). It’s neat and tidy and looked-after, with economical use of recycled material to provide the pitchside barriers to fill in the Step 5 rail. The clubhouse and refreshments area are better than many, and it felt safe enough. I’m choosing to maintain social distancing for a while longer as yet, and it was easily done with no problems. The pitch itself was good enough to allow a passing game.
Goalkeeper Top Colour Stats Update
Usually accompanied by a pre-match prediction on Twitter just before kickoff. Working towards being able to compute a respectable statistical significance test by the end of the season. The full keeper top performance table from my last 222 matches is here, on this separate page. Today, we have two shades of green facing up to each other. Pre-match Prediction based on Keeper Top Colour: Prediction: Draw Was the prediction correct? Yes % of correct predictions so far 49% (38 from 77) 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. The odd decimal places were caused either by undeniable half-and-half tops or lower league sub keepers in a different colour.  The Fire Cracker colour was confirmed with the help of the social media team at Dulux UK.  All of this arises from a comment attributed to Petr Cech (and supported by anonymous scientists of some description) that orange is the best colour for a goalkeeper because it changes the behaviour of other players around the box. It is supposedly because of an innate primeval human reaction to the colour and the colour “spreads” more in the vision of a striker at the key moment of decision. Genius or garbage? The evidence is gathering here, and is leaning towards the latter.
What Next?
Follow @GrahamYapp on Twitter! Destination as yet undecided for next Saturday but likely to be an FA Cup tie.