Police Nick the Win at Blackfield and Langley

Hopperational Details
Date & Venue	Saturday 17 August 2019 at Gang Warily
Result	Blackfield & Langley 3 Metropolitan Police 4
Competition	Southern Premier League South
Hopstats	Ground 701 on the lifetime list. I had originally planned a simple coin-toss to decide between here and Radcliffe today, but the latter’s 10am pitch inspection was too late for me to travel realistically. The M25/M3/M27 combo did its best to thwart me with a longer-than-expected journey but I was safely installed, with programme, in the main stand at kick-off time.
Context
Blackfield & Langley had a second successive promotion at the end of last season, and have started well with two wins from two games. Met Police missed out on promotion to Step 2 at the super-playoff stage last season and have one point from their first two games.
In one sentence
The late winner will hurt the home team, who failed to manage the last phase of the game having built a 3-1 lead.
So what?
Still too early in the season to make any sensible comment. Therefore, unlike MotD and Sky and their ilk, I will not take up any more of your valuable time with speculative punditry.
Match Report
Let me start by saying that this is a very friendly, welcoming club. It has climbed the leagues in recent years and has the space to develop further if they can establish themselves at this level. It has good facilities and a very decent playing surface.  The stacks and vents in the background are from the Fawley Oil Refinery. The home side took the lead on 11 mins through Hisham Kasimu. He ran powerfully and directly from the right flank, eased past the keeper and found the net. The equaliser came from the penalty spot just before the half-hour mark. I was at the other end so can’t comment on the decision that there had been a push. Jack Mazzone was the taker. Blackfield & Langley restored their lead after 36 mins with a goal from Joshua Harfield.  The first-half had been played at a good tempo, with direct running and a few bruising tackles. It was only five minutes into the second half before we had a two-goal margin. A very neat placed header did the job, and unfortunately it has gone into the annals as an own goal by Jeremy Arthur. I suspect most people thought that the result was now more or less decided.  Met Police had other ideas. On the hour, a floated free-kick drew the home keeper out of position and the visitors pulled a goal back with a looping header by sub Hani Berchiche back into the far corner. With fifteen minutes to go, a loudly disputed freekick was hoisted into the area and this time Oliver Robinson was in the right place to head home and level the match. By this time there was a certain amount of dissent and frustration being shown and had there been sin bins at this level we would have needed revolving doors. I exchanged tweets with the home team to the effect that this was great stuff for the passing neutral and the visitors might yet get a fourth.  So it proved only seconds later as the game entered stoppage time.  It was an excellent low left-foot shot from just outside the box from another sub, Bilal Sayoud, and a worthy winning goal. Acknowledgement: League Website for checking the goalscorers
Other Pix
Blackfield & Langley are in green.  "Take our picture!", they said. Well, would be rude not to! Hello Malcolm in the background getting better photos as usual!
Goalkeeper Top Colour Stats
Today, Orange loses to Yellow and there are no clean sheets.  No change in rank order but the prediction success rate continues to regress back towards 50%.  The table is based on the last 202 games watched. Pre-match Prediction based on Keeper Top Colour: Prediction: Home Win Was the prediction correct? No % of correct predictions so far 53% (30 from 57) 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 half-and-half tops or 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 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 11.5 6.5 1.0 4.0 11.0 4.5 32.0 2.783 Grey 53.5 25.0 12.0 16.5 84.5 16.0 82.5 1.542 Blue 49.1 22.0 8.0 19.1 78.0 14.0 66.0 1.344 Green 110.0 55.0 12.0 43.0 191.0 25.0 111.0 1.009 Fire Cracker 3.0 1.0 0.0 2.0 6.0 1.0 2.0 0.667 Purple 22.0 8.0 5.0 9.0 45.0 6.0 14.0 0.636 Maroon 5.0 2.0 1.0 2.0 9.0 1.0 3.0 0.600 Orange 60.5 21.0 13.0 26.5 106.5 11.0 24.5 0.405 Radioactive Bile 24.0 9.0 1.0 14.0 51.0 4.0 -3.0 -0.125 Black 6.5 2.5 3.0 1.0 15.0 0.5 -2.0 -0.308 Yellow 39.0 10.0 9.0 20.0 88.0 7.0 -14.0 -0.359 Pink 18.0 5.0 5.0 8.0 37.0 1.0 -12.0 -0.667 White 1.9 0.0 0.0 1.9 4.0 0.0 -4.0 -2.105
What Next?
Follow @GrahamYapp on Twitter! Atherton Collieries, Horsham and Radcliffe are my remaining Step 3 grounds and of course I am waiting for a chance to get in at Tottenham Hotspur’s new stadium. Then I will turn my attention to 19 remaining Step 4 venues.

Police Raid in Chatham

Hopperational details
Date & Venue	Saturday 26 February 2011 at Maidstone Road
Result	Chatham Town 2 Metropolitan Police 3
Competition	Isthmian League Division 1 South (step 4)
Hopping	Lifetime venue #377, and I am here because of an early-enough declaration of “game on” on another wet Saturday.  The crowd included a number from Whitstable, whose game was off due to a deplorable theft of all the copper pipework from their changing rooms in midweek.
This match in one sentence
A last-minute heartbreaker of a goal secured the points for the visitors after the Metropolitan Police Managerial Hairdryer* had been used to good effect at half-time.
So what?
Met Police are in 2nd place, back to one point behind Bognor Regis Town but with a game in hand.  Chatham are 16th in the division and can count themselves unlucky not to get a point today.
The drama unfolds
The teams changed ends after the coin toss and I wonder how significant that turned out to be.  Whether by choice or imposition I don’t know, but the home side were defending a very muddy and treacherous penalty area for the second half.  I was quite surprised to see such a difference at the two ends – a new meaning for a game of two halves. Chatham had the temerity to take the lead against their high-flying visitors with a goal from Jason Barton, and despite a few close scrapes like the one in the first clip, they held on till the interval.  1-0 at half-time. To general amusement, the stadium PA microphone picked up the screaming sound of unhappy management emanating from the changing rooms.  We could only imagine that it was the visiting manager questioning the ability, commitment and possibly parentage of his players.  This certainly had some effect, as the Met came out as a flying squad for the second half. It was only a matter of time before the equaliser came, a poacher’s effort in the mud by Matt Gray for 1-1, followed by a second from captain Steve Sutherland. 1-2.  The home side was not retaining the ball at all and they were gradually pinned back by wave after wave of attacks from the boys in blue.  Adam Molloy was kept busy in the home goal, sometimes as a result of clearances that were coming straight back at him.  Chatham regrouped, to their great credit, and they equalised (again through Barton) with just over five minutes to go. 2-2 The Met had one more set piece up their sleeve in stoppage time, and James Field was in the right place at the right time.  As it happens, I caught all three of the Met Police goals, which all came indirectly from set-pieces.  Final score 2-3.  Great entertainment for the neutral, but a tad harsh on the hosts.
Alternative activity of equal excitement for tourists in Chatham
Withdraw all your savings and use it as money for old rope at the Historic Dockyard. There is more spinning, closing and laying in the ropery than in the Chatham Town midfield.
A snippet from the programme
The club have been supporting a fundraising effort for a local 7yo, Max Walsh, who has cerebral palsy and “needs to raise £43k to have a revolutionary operation – selective dorsal rhizotomy – to save the use of his legs.” Players and supporters raised £914 at their game against Whitstable.  Aaron Firth and Paul Foley have grown sponsored beards and have raised another £2,600.  A facebook search for “Max in America” will lead you to the family’s group which includes the bank details for anyone wanting to make a donation.
What I learned today
http://www.scope.org.uk/help-and-information/z-therapies/selective-dorsal-rhizotomy
Something random
Chatham Town were the first team to take a league point off the Met Police this season in a 2-2 draw at Imber Court back at the end of October.  Up to that point, the Met had reeled off eight wins to start an unbeaten run of fourteen games.  Bognor Regis Town are also going well in this division and won their home game against Met Police 1-0 last month. * For my overseas readers - "hairdryer treatment" has come to mean something along the lines of "severe telling off by the manager".  It apparently comes from Manchester United players, in a phrase coined by Mark Hughes, describing an in-your-face screaming admonishment in fluent Glaswegian by Sir Alex Ferguson.
What Next?
It will depend on the weather, but the sheer number of fixtures to be rearranged in all leagues this season should give plenty of midweek hoppertunities if the weather improves.