Five-One to the Albions

  

Hopperational Details
Dates & Venues	Saturday 6 January 2024 at The Vestacare Stadium Sunday 7 January 2024 at The Hawthorns
Results	Avro FC 0 Witton Albion 1 West Bromwich Albion 4 Aldershot Town 1
Competition	Sat: Northern Premier League D1 West (Step 4) Sun: FA Cup Round 3
Hopstats	Saturday finds me at ground 773 on the lifetime list, and here because Avro made an early Game On declaration giving me enough time to make the journey north. Mind you, I needn’t have worried – this is a 3G surface. Sunday is a rite-of-passage game for the Yapps. I take over the Grandad role (which means a pocket full of half-time sweets) and join my son and grandson for the latter’s first-ever game. Three generations staying true to the family roots.
Context
Avro are performing very well in their first Step 4 season but maybe of late have struggled to convert draws to wins. Witton Albion are mid-table. West Bromwich Albion are in the Championship play-off positions but are likely to field a side of squad players for the FA Cup game against National League Aldershot. Aldershot have seen off Lewes, Swindon Town and Stockport County in earlier rounds. The Swindon game was a remarkable 7-4 scoreline, with the Shots having been 7-0 up.
In One Sentence Each
Witton Albion edged a very close encounter with a first-half goal, but were pushed to the end. West Bromwich Albion had a comfortable win built on two early goals, Aldershot’s consolation coming at the very end of stoppage time.
So What?
Avro drop to 5th but remain in the play-off places. Witton are three points behind, in 9th. WBA will await the fourth-round draw and Aldershot will concentrate on the FA Trophy in the first instance with a trip to Bishop’s Stortford next weekend.
Match Report : Avro v Witton
The only goal of the game came after 14 minutes. It was a really good finish by Harry Brazel. The ball sat up nicely for a first time low shot into the left corner. These two evenly-matched and well-organised sides then largely cancelled each other out. Witton’s keeper Ollie Martin made one block with his foot and his opposite number James Coates prevented a second Witton goal with a spectacular flying save as the first half ended. The second half started with chances at either end, but gradually Avro’s urgency started to dominate. Witton looked very solid in defence until 69 minutes had passed when Martin made the first of two exceptional saves in quick succession. This was a diving stop with a strong left arm. Avro continued to get the ball into the area and there were a couple of games of pinball which could easily have produced the equaliser. With eight minutes to go the floodlights went out and I wondered whether I would end up having to make this long journey again. My personal groundhopping rules have not yet been tested with an abandonment! Fortunately, illumination was soon restored, the Avro pressure was renewed and the Witton defences did enough. This was a very hard-earned three points for the visitors.
Ground Pix
The Vestacare Stadium has a good deal of character about it, with various types of locations for watching the game. Watch the potholes in the car park if you are coming for an evening game in the dark, though!
Match Pix
Avro in the black and blue stripes.
Match Report : WBA v Aldershot
This game has been well-covered in the mainstream media so I will merely add that the main interest was in the promising performances of a number of young debutants and squad players. The result wasn’t really in doubt once the Baggies were three up after half an hour. Tom Fellows on the right flank had been doing most of the damage, albeit in lots of space that he was allowed by the defence. The first goal was a peach of a finish from Nathaniel Chalobah. The second was a gift for Jovan Malcolm, and the third was a powerful instinctive finish from an inadvertent loose ball by Daryl Dike. This was Dike’s return from serious injury and he did not reappear for the second half. The visiting fans, not unreasonably it has to be said, gleefully gave us a rendition of, “Is this a Library?”. Fellows had to wait until the 88th minute before getting his name on the scoresheet and there was still time for a consolation for Aldershot’s Ollie Bray which took a bit of gloss off the result. Much of the game was played at training ground pace, and Albion conceded a fair bit of possession in the second half, playing on the break. Caleb Taylor looked comfortable on the right side of the back three in his second appearance, and there were five WBA debutants all told. The only one who won’t want to see the highlights again is Layton Love, who skied a good chance when through on the break. Job done, though, and we were at pains to point out to my grandson that … It. Is. Not. Always. Like. This. At. The. Albion.
Ground Pix
Tony Brown, Albion legend of 60s & 70s Boiler Man, current Albion legend. Or laughing stock. Fair play to Aldershot who filled the Smethwick End with 5700 fans
Match Pix
Aldershot in red.
Goalkeeper Top Colour Stats Update
Usually accompanied by a pre-match prediction on Threads just before kickoff. Working towards being able to compute a respectable test of statistical significance, it looks like an Analysis of Variance (ANOVA) test will be appropriate. The full keeper top performance table from my last 289 matches is here, on this separate page, and I’ll organise the test when we reach 300 pieces of evidence. This weekend Pink lost to Yellow on Saturday and Grey beat Green on Sunday. Pre-match Prediction based on Keeper Top Colour: Predictions: Home Win & Home Win Was the prediction correct? No (Sat) & Yes (Sun) % of correct predictions so far 48% (69 from 144)
What Next?
Unsure because we are in the weather-dependent segment of the season. I have to be in the Midlands again next weekend and will look to pick off another one of my 21 target Step 4 grounds if I can. My next chance to tick off Plymouth Parkway to complete Step 3 is not until the following week.

Attaquons ... la perfide Albion

My groundhopping destination for tomorrow will be decided randomishly by events at Elland Road this evening.  Hopefully, my hometown team WBA will score at least one goal.

Possible scorers of WBA’s final goal of the evening can be linked to the twelve games on my shortlist if I allow one link for the possibility of a Leeds clean sheet.

The first ten games are linked in alphabetical order of home team to the ten starting outfield players, also in alphabetical order.  Game 11 is linked to the no-goal-for-WBA outcome (or an own goal) and Game 12 to the possibility that WBA’s final goal is scored by any one of their substitutes (or the goalkeeper).

It’s randomish.

Here are the links:

Game	WBA Last-Scorer Link
Atherton Collieries v Colne	Adarabioyo
Blackfield & Langley v Mangotsfield Utd	Barry
Carlton Town v Lincoln Utd	Dawson
Clitheroe v Chasetown	Gayle
AFC Mansfield v Pontefract Collieries	Harper
Melksham Town v Thatcham Town	Hegazi
Pickering Town v Cleethorpes Town	Holgate
Ramsgate v Three Bridges	Livermore
Street v Evesham Utd	Robson-Kanu
Radcliffe v Droylsden	Rodriguez
Ramsbottom Utd v Widnes	No WBA scorer or any Leeds player scoring an own goal
Whyteleafe v Ashford Utd	Any WBA substitute or Johnstone (GK)

I think we can all agree that this will liven up the occasion.

UPDATE:

Leeds scored a sensational goal in the first minute, and another before half-time, but neither of those changed the starting position of a trip to Ramsbottom United v Widnes.  In the second half, Leeds added a third but the substitutions of Gareth Barry and Rekeem Harper meant that I would not under any circumstances be headed for either Blackfield & Langley or AFC Mansfield.  Street was soon closed down too, as Hal Robson-Kanu also went off.  Albion's abject performance meant that the Ramsbottom game looked more and more likely as the game entered the final ten minutes.  In fact, the only other goal was a fourth for Leeds, in stoppage time.  Therefore, I will head north-west in the morning for the second successive Saturday.  (I'll be up there for the NW Counties hop the following weekend too!)

Baggie Decision

I’m going to let the players from my home-town team, West Bromwich Albion, decide where I will go for groundhopping on New Year’s Day.   I hope that other Albion fans might try out this idea for everyday decisions (where to go, what to wear, who to marry, which takeaway to order etc etc) and it certainly helps to make a typical Albion game just that bit more interesting.

At the time of writing, we are 15 minutes away from kickoff against Arsenal at The Hawthorns.

The key question is: Who (if anyone) will score West Brom’s latest goal in the game?

Notice the pre-match optimism, that there might be more than one.  This is also known as "misguided stupidity".

The players are in squad number order except for the “catchall” category at the end.  The fixtures are in alphabetical order of home team.  All of them are Step 4 in the world of non-league.

If a player is substituted, then the substitute takes over the responsibility.  So, if Gareth McAuley is thrown up front in the 98^th minute by Alan Pardew to replace Jake Livermore, then his 99^th minute winner (I wish) would still send me to Carlton Town.  To be fair, this is not strictly random in the sense that all outcomes are not equally likely, so any pre-match prediction will be sending me to Winchester tomorrow, and NOT because Ben Foster has scored his first of the season.

Squad #	Name	Linked Fixture
3	Gibbs	Alvechurch v Romulus
4	Robson-Kanu	Atherton Collieries v Trafford
6	Evans	Belper Town v Gresley
8	Livermore	Carlton Town v Lincoln Utd
10	Phillips	Clitheroe v Kendal Town
11	Brunt	Corinthian Casuals v Walton Casuals
18	Barry	Ossett Town v Ossett Albion
19	Rodriguez	Sittingbourne v Ramsgate
25	Dawson	South Shields v Scarborough Ath
26	Hegazi	Taunton Town v Bideford Town
1 or none	Foster (or no WBA scorer)	Winchester City v Totton

At the time of kickoff, we start at the default position of a trip to Winchester.  Since I would happily take a 0-0 at this point, it's not so bad.

Update: 15 minutes in and an Jay Rodriguez header has been Albion's best chance, but Petr Cech saved me (for now) from Sittingbourne.  Still headed for Winchester.

Update 2.  Half-time and nothing else to report.  I wouldn't be too upset by a trip to Winchester as long as we have a clean sheet too.

Update 3:  5.53pm and no new development.  Steve Claridge sounding very stressed in the radio summariser role.  Even his colleagues are chiding him for the number of times he has said "higgledy-piggledy".

Update 4: WBA have now used all three subs - Phillips, Brunt and Robson-Kanu replaced by McClean, Krychowiak and Nyom respectively.  The last in particular reduces the chances of a trip to Atherton Collieries.

Update 5: Arsenal's deflected goal makes no difference!

Update 6: Jay Rodriguez scores from the penalty spot!  All the controversy is irrelevant - I'm now headed for Sittingbourne v Ramsgate!

Remember the 1106

Tonight, my home-town team will decide for me, in a randomish manner, where I am going for FA Cup action this coming Saturday.  West Brom are at home to Hull City in the League Cup.  I have linked twelve possible scoring outcomes to the twelve ties at “unvisited” grounds that I am choosing from tonight.

It is not random in the mathematically strict sense because all twelve outcomes are not equally likely, but I have no control over what happens.  The Cup ties are in the order that the balls came out of the FA’s velvet bag in the draw, the last scorer outcomes (except for first and last) are in order of shirt number.

It’s randomish enough, and will keep my interest in a League Cup match going to the end, which with West Brom has been hard enough in recent years, as shown from my one and only WBA blogpost.

#Rememberthe1106

http://modushopperrandom.blogspot.co.uk/2010/12/no-quarter-final-effort-given.html

Anyway, here we go … it is the LAST person to score for WBA tonight either in regular time, extra-time or in a penalty shootout who decides.  Hull goals don’t count.

EDIT: own-goals by any Hull player don't count either (not yet happened at time of edit).

	HOME	v	AWAY	Last WBA Scorer
7	Warrington Town	v	Sheffield	EITHER None whatsoever OR one of the goalkeepers
8	Shildon	v	Stalybridge Celtic	3 Jonas Olsson
14	Ashton United	v	Salford City	5 Claudio Yacob
15	Chorley	v	Glossop North End	9 Brown Ideye
17	Cleethorpes Town	v	North Ferriby United	10 Victor Anichebe
19	Norton United	v	Spalding United	14 Jason Davidson
22	Ellistown & Ibstock United	v	Halesowen Town	16 Cristian Gamboa
67	Winchester City	v	Newport (IoW)	20 Liam O'Neil
69	Folland Sports	v	Frome Town	21 Youssuf Mulumbu
74	Blackfield & Langley	v	Willand Rovers	23 Gareth McAuley
75	Abingdon United	v	Dorchester Town	28 Sebastian Blanco
76	Shortwood United	v	Oxford City	Any substitute

UPDATE:
Here's what happened.  The initial position of Warrington Town v Sheffield was blown away after 15 minutes by Brown Ideye's first Albion goal, and for most of the evening it looked as if I would be at Chorley v Glossop North End.  Cleethorpes Town's chances evaporated as Victor Anichebe was subbed.  Hull City had by this time taken an irrelevant 2-1 lead.  Then, drama, as for a minute, and only a minute, Gareth McAuley tried to send me to Blackfield and Langley with a volleyed equaliser before sub Saido Berahino scored a late, late winner for the Baggies - and so it is Shortwood United v Oxford City for me on Saturday.  Gloucestershire, a county for which I have some ancestral connections.  Great stuff, and thank you as ever for your interest and good humour.