Slick City Open Up Newmarket's Defences Twice

Hopperational Details
Date & Venue	Saturday 1 March 2025 at FWD-IP Community Stadium
Result	Cambridge City 2 Newmarket Town 0
Competition	Isthmian League D1 North (Step 4)
Hopstats	Ground 795 on my lifetime list. Here for pragmatic reasons – I needed a relatively short journey after having been overnight at a conference in Hertfordshire. Since the last blogpost I also managed a midweek trip to Wembley to watch England Women 1 Spain Women 0 in the Nations League, and what a splendid evening’s entertainment that was.
Context
Upper mid-table plays lower mid-table. May just about qualify as a “local derby”. The home side are known at this level as “Jamie Cureton’s Cambridge City” in the same way that we have recently had “Frank Lampard’s Coventry City” and “Wayne Rooney’s P45”.
Match Report
City’s new ground is still a work-in-progress but it’s a good one for this level. The pre-match food was among the best I’ve ever had at Step 4 but as these pics show this is a place where the words carbohydrate and low are unlikely to appear in the same sentence. My choice was a Twix Blondie.   On the pitch, these two teams of “big lads” faced up to each other on a good surface. Cambridge took control with two first half goals. They had already won several corners and forced one good save from the visiting keeper before Samrai Gebrai rolled the ball into the net after Newmarket had lost possession in their own half. Jack Thompson added the second from close range after a very neat build-up. Newmarket did their best to get back in the game and should have scored at least once, but promising approach play often broke down at the last. Cambridge held firm at the back and in the end took the points comfortably enough.
So What?
City could still conceivably make a play-off spot if a team above them falters, and Town looked good enough not to be drawn into a serious relegation scrap.
Pre-match Entertainment
What happens at staff conference stays at staff conference. However, at Wembley a couple of days earlier, I found myself in the level 2 tier where the food outlets include M&S and there are artistic representations of lions.
Pix
Cambridge City in White.
Goalkeeper Top Colour Stats Update
The background to this, and the latest keeper top colour league table, is here on this dedicated page. Today, Red (as expected) beats Blue and keeps a clean sheet. This is enough to restore Red to the top of the table. Pre-match Prediction based on Keeper Top Colour: Prediction: Home Win Was the prediction correct? Yes (87 from 175) % of correct predictions so far 49%
What Next?
Despite the best efforts of the nation’s transport infrastructure to prevent it, I will try to get to Saracens RUFC in north London at the weekend to see the Oxford v Cambridge rugby union games (women and men).