Of Course There Are Hops in Kent

Hopperational Details
Date	Saturday 8 October 2022
Results & Venues	Staplehurst Monarchs 1 Rochester United 0  (Jubilee Field) Bearsted 2 Fisher 1 (Otham Sports Club, Honey Lane) Larkfield & New Hythe 2 Greenways 1 (Taray Group Community Stadium)
Competition	Southern Counties East Football League. First and third games in Division One (Step 6) and the second game in the Premier Division (Step 5).
Hopstats	Games 760, 761 & 762 on the lifetime list.
Context
The Saturday of the inaugural SCEFL hop. A mid-table contest, a mid-table v bottom side, and a playoff position contest respectively. Thanks, as ever, to the organisation and background direction of Groundhop UK.
In One Sentence Each
A game that was heading for a 0-0 start to the day before a well-taken goal sealed the win. Three good goals in a competitive game in which the visitors looked better than their league position would suggest. The hosts were made to work hard to hold on once the visitors responded well after being two goals down at the interval.
So What?
Minor changes to league table positions, the biggest being Larkfield & New Hythe climbing to second place in Division One.
Match Report
These will be brief on the basis that many hoppers have already been active on social media so there isn’t much left to say that is newsworthy. It’s more of an “I was there!” post. The result of all three games was in doubt right up to the final whistle, very good for a passing neutral. Staplehurst’s style of playing out from the back meant that the keeper was completing as many passes as anyone on the pitch. The ball spent a lot of time in their defensive third, and the closest to a first-half goal would have been good comedy from a wayward backpass. The winning goal, from substitute John Osagie was well taken and the moment is pictured here. He rode a couple of tackles, the ref played advantage, and the ball rolled nicely into the corner. The ballgirl knew. Ollie Freeman’s header pictured below opened the scoring for Bearsted, and it took a great double block from their keeper to protect their lead. A deserved equaliser did come from a good turn and shot by Jacob Katonia, but parity was brief as a great sliding far-post finish for Freeman’s second (think Haaland v Man U but with less hairgel) secured the points. However, not before Fisher had tried hard to get a share of the points. They lost a player to a late sin-binning but still hit the woodwork late on and forced Bearsted to make an off-the-line clearance. Larkfield & New Hythe went two up by half-time with goals from Luke Burdon and the set-piece header pictured below from Flavius Petrisor. Greenways made a game of it after an early strike from Oscar Saxton after the restart. His shot from right to left across the keeper made a very satisfying thunk off the post as it went in. Game on. Either side could have scored again as the tackles were also flying in, but the hosts held on for the win.
Other Pix
Three neat and tidy grounds, three clubs making an effort to raise some money from a bigger-than-usual crowd. Sunshine for most of the day. Staplehurst in red ...     Bearsted in white & blue           Larkfield & New Hythe in Yellow & Black ...
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 263 matches is here, on this separate page. The only mover is Maroon – it’s a small sample size and one result can make a big difference. Game 1: Green beats Grey and has a clean sheet Game 2: Grey beats Green, no clean sheets Game 3: Blue beats Maroon, no clean sheets Pre-match Predictions based on Keeper Top Colour: Predictions: Away, Home & Home respectively Was the prediction correct? No, Yes & Yes % of correct predictions so far 45% (53 from 118) 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! No firm plans for next weekend’s destination at the time of writing.

Deal Dealt a Late Blow by Whitstable

Hopperational Details
Date & Venue	Wednesday 15 August 2018 at The Belmont Ground
Result	Whitstable Town 4 Deal Town 3
Competition	FA Cup Extra Preliminary Round Replay
Hopstats	Ground 650 on my lifetime list.  Not random or even randomish, as in practice this was the only unvisited ground that I could get to in time for this midweek replay.
Context
Whitstable’s first competitive game of the season was the 2-2 draw last Saturday.  They came back from 2-0 down and needed a last-minute equaliser to seal this replay.  They will start their Step 4 Isthmian league season at the weekend.  Deal Town play at Step 5 in the Southern Counties East. They took four points from two league games earlier in the month before the stalemate with tonight’s hosts.  Whitstable will now start as favourites with home advantage, but as regular readers of this blog will know, #keepertopcolourstats might tell us differently!
In one sentence
A fantastic advert for both clubs and the FA Cup competition itself, as Deal’s never-say-die spirit was eventually overcome with a late winner.
So what?
Whitstable Town travel to CB Hounslow United in the next round.  Deal Town will have to concentrate on the league and the FA Vase.
Match Report
As a neutral, I initially feared for Deal when they went behind in this game.  You wondered whether they had missed their chance for a giant-killing when being pegged back from a 2-0 lead in the first game.  They had held out under considerable pressure for 36 minutes or so until a high cross was headed powerfully into the net by Josh Burchell.  Deal had created a couple of half-chances of their own, but also owed a debt to their orange-clad keeper James Tomkin for a couple of smart saves.  Still, with only one goal deficit at the interval, the game was still alive. Or was it?  I noted, “Was that the hinge point?” when Whitstable scored their second immediately after the break.  The scorer, from distance, was Brett Ince.  All the signs were that Whitstable would be strong and organised enough to get the job finished.  Ben Cardwell had other ideas.  The Deal striker powered down Route 1, shrugging off a challenge or two, and kept the game alive with a superb strike into the top left corner of the net.  Game on! The teams traded half-chances before Deal equalised from a direct freekick.  Whitstable would say from a controversial direct freekick, but then again they had kept up a tirade of pressure and questioning of the officials all evening.   The ball was put in the same top corner by sub Charlie Walsh and so it was 2-2.  What a goal. 2-2 any moment now ... Whitstable restored their lead soon enough after a good move down the left had created an unmissable chance for Jordan Wright.  For the second time I wrote down, “hinge point”, and for the second time I was wrong.  With 15 minutes left, Deal were level through Sam Wilson and there was suddenly a real prospect of extra time. The final goal of the evening came after 80 minutes, and this time a direct free-kick worked in Whitstable’s favour, the scorer again being Ince.  Deal were forced to send men forward in numbers, and they almost got caught on the break.  A last-ditch clearance prevented the goal, which to be honest would have been harsh.  The hosts chose to implement a few minutes of “game management”, and held on to the win with no more alarms.  A superb game for the passing neutral.
Pix
Goalkeeper Top Colour Stats
New this season – a pre-match prediction based only on keeper top colours as a preliminary test of the data.  Proper statistical significance test to follow in due course.  Table is based on my last 151 games seen. Green (albeit fluorescent) beats Orange, as expected, but no clean sheets. Pre-match Prediction based on Keeper Top Colour: Prediction: Whitstable win. Was the prediction correct? Yes % of correct predictions so far 5 of 6 (83%) 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.  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.  It may not be statistically significant as yet, but football coverage ignores this point as a matter of routine. 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 Blue 38.1 16.0 7.0 15.1 54.0 14.0 71.0 1.864 Grey 46.5 22.0 10.0 14.5 73.5 13.0 67.5 1.452 Green 80.0 40.0 10.0 30.0 135.0 20.0 95.0 1.188 Fire Cracker 3.0 1.0 0.0 2.0 6.0 1.0 2.0 0.667 Maroon 5.0 2.0 1.0 2.0 9.0 1.0 3.0 0.600 Purple 15.0 6.0 3.0 6.0 35.0 4.0 6.0 0.400 Orange 34.5 11.0 7.0 16.5 59.5 6.0 10.5 0.304 Radioactive Bile 16.0 7.0 0.0 9.0 34.0 2.0 -3.0 -0.188 Yellow 31.0 8.0 7.0 16.0 65.0 5.0 -9.0 -0.290 Pink 16.0 5.0 5.0 6.0 31.0 1.0 -6.0 -0.375 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
What Next?
Follow @GrahamYapp on Twitter!  On Saturday, there are four possible Step 3 ticks from the seven that I need.