Bewdley Trumped by Westfields in the Cup

Hopperational details
Date & Venue	Saturday 5 August 2017 at Allpay Park, Hereford.
Result	Westfields 3 Bewdley Town 1
Competition	FA Cup Extra Preliminary Round
Hopstats	Ground Number 612 on my lifetime list, and I am here because a tweet from President Trump contained the word West, which therefore uniquely determined that Westfields, which also contains West, would be my pseudorandom choice today from 102 unvisited grounds. The details are in the blogpost that immediately precedes this.  Reaction on Twitter suggests that around a dozen people were mildly amused by this match-choice methodology.  The President will in due course look back at this as one of his better “decisions”, I feel sure.
Advice for the Hopperatic Society	Plan your car parking and look at a map before you travel.  This ground is tucked away in open parkland.  There is some limited parking, but I parked in the city centre and had an easy 15 minute stroll. Go past the Edgar Street stadium and then turn left.
Context
First competitive game of the season for both teams.  Step 5 Midland League plays Step 6 West Midlands Regional so the home side will start as favourites, especially as they have the experience of a splendid giantkilling run to the First Round Proper last season.
In one sentence
In the end, a straightforward Westfield win once a second goal had gone in early in the second half.
So what?
Westfields will travel to AFC Wulfrunians in two weeks in the Preliminary Round.
Match Report
Westfields gradually gained the first-half ascendancy but were made to work hard.  Alex Hainault saw a long-range effort tipped over spectacularly.  They eventually took the lead just before the interval with a low shot across the keeper by defender Matt Sysum.  Hainault added the second a few minutes after the restart with another low shot when freed by a neat backheel from Richard Graves.  It looked as if that would be that, and it certainly was with fifteen minutes left.  Substitute Carlos Moreira hammered home the rebound from his own shot after he had received the ball on the edge of the box from a corner.  Three well-worked and well-taken goals without reply until Pountney’s persistence paid off and he scored a stoppage-time consolation goal for the visitors. Westfields 3 (Sysum 41, Hainault 51, Moreira 75) Bewdley 1 (Pountney 90+1)
The “If Only…” Moment
If only Bewdley striker Lewis Pountney could have found the net rather than firing over, after his excellent movement had created the first real chance of the game with 11 minutes gone.
Ground Pix
Those big steel tanks belong to Heineken and I suspect they contain a billion fermenting apples.  Hereford is big in the world of cider production.
Match Pix
On This Day in Hopping History
5 August 2014 saw Spelthorne Sports win their first game at Step 5 with a 2-1 Combined Counties victory over Bedford Sports featuring a gazillion Chironomid midges. http://modushopperrandom.blogspot.co.uk/2014/08/spelthorne-step-up.html
Goalkeeper Top Colour Stats
Today, orange beats green but neither has a clean sheet, and green still remains just ahead of  orange in mid-table.  For new readers, this is all because Petr Cech has or had an opinion that orange was best.  I will think about a statistical significance test at the end of the season. Results so far: 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 .1s and .5s are caused respectively by a non-matching sub keeper and a really annoying 50:50 top. P W D L GC CS Pts PPG Red 8.0 4.0 0.0 4.0 8.0 3.0 19.0 2.38 Blue 28.1 11.0 5.0 12.1 44.0 10.0 44.0 1.57 Maroon 4.0 2.0 1.0 1.0 6.0 1.0 6.0 1.50 Grey 39.5 19.0 8.0 12.5 64.5 11.0 55.5 1.41 Green 55.0 26.0 7.0 22.0 95.0 15.0 65.0 1.18 Orange 22.5 8.0 4.0 10.5 34.5 5.0 18.5 0.82 Purple 10.0 5.0 2.0 3.0 22.0 2.0 5.0 0.50 Yellow 24.0 7.0 6.0 11.0 46.0 5.0 6.0 0.25 Radioactive Bile 12.0 5.0 0.0 7.0 26.0 1.0 -6.0 -0.50 Pink 12.0 3.0 4.0 5.0 26.0 1.0 -8.0 -0.67 Black 5.0 1.0 3.0 1.0 14.0 0.0 -8.0 -1.60 White 1.9 0.0 0.0 1.9 4.0 0.0 -4.0 -2.11
What Next?
Watch @GrahamYapp on Twitter for details!  My priority grounds for this season will be AFC Fylde (to restore my 116 down to Step 1), Poole Town and Spennymoor Town (to restore my 160 down to Step 2) and then, at Step 3, Ashton United, Lancaster City, Merthyr Town, Shaw Lane, Tiverton Town, Warrington Town and Whitby Town to complete the 232 down to Step 3 for the first time.  I also hope, travel practicalities permitting, to go back to my blogroots and have as many random or randomish decisions as possible.  In the real world, I have now partly retired, at least for now (!), so I hope for more regular and reliable Saturday hopping time this season.

Wulfs Bite Country Rangers in the West Midlands

Hopperational details
Date & Venue	Saturday 30 March 2013 at the Castlecroft Stadium
Result	AFC Wulfrunians 4 Black Country Rangers 3
Competition	West Midlands Regional League Premier Division (Step 6).
Hopping	Ground 510 on the lifetime list and I am here because I have been in West Bromwich for lunch at the ancestral home!  My first game for a month as it happens.
Pre-match preparation
Frankly, not much beyond “Is the game on?”  I know that both teams have been among the league leaders in recent seasons and today is 2nd v 5th.  Also, as both teams have scored over a hundred league goals each this season, this match might help get my Hopping for Moorfields total back on track after I have missed several weekends for either weather or work reasons.
This match in one sentence
Not as exciting as it might appear from the scoreline – Rangers, by now down to nine men, got two goals in stoppage time to limit the damage to their goal difference.
So what?
No change in league positions (leaders Lye Town also won today and lead by one point) but the gap between fourth and fifth is getting significant.  Lye have already beaten Wulfrunians home and away so the title will come down to how the teams get on against lower-ranked opponents in the remaining fixtures.  Wulfrunians have the better GD.
The drama unfolds
Both sides started with attacking intent and both got into good positions in the early moments, but the first decent shots came after 8 minutes or so.  Wulfs’ Kyle Brady gave a sign of things to come with a left-foot shot just wide, and then home ‘keeper Matt Martin came out to block a Jason Chilton effort with his legs.  A superb through ball then found Brady again, and this time the other ‘keeper, Jamie Wood, needed the lower limbs to block a shot.  All good stuff on a surface which was much better than I had expected to see.  Here is my scene-setter clip from 15 minutes into the game.  AFC Wulfrunians are in the red. Five minutes later, the home side took the lead.  Brady pulled away again to the left of the front line, and a good diagonal ball sent him through on goal.  His left-footer across the keeper was good enough to find the far corner.  1-0 after 20 minutes Alex Hammond of BCR earned a yellow card for a shirt-pull that was to prove significant later on, especially as his team-mate Leigh Pardoe earned a red card for an out-of-control tackle with studs showing just before the break.  Half-time spectator chat suggested that the ref had upgraded a yellow to a red for something said.  1-0 at half-time Nathan Rose-Laing got a second for the home side against the ten Rangers.  Wood got a hand to his flick, but could not keep it out.  2-0 after 52 minutes Four minutes later, however, Andrew Price scored to keep the visitors in the game and the result in doubt.  2-1 after 56 minutes However, Hammond’s second yellow card, for a late tackle, made it an 11 v 9 game and Mike Robertson got a goal on the hour mark with a shot that Wood could only partially stop.  3-1 after 60 minutes Mike Robertson gets on the scoresheet Mid-way through the half, Brady got his second to open up a three goal margin and seal the win.  4-1 after 66 minutes However, either complacency set in, or they got careless, who knows.  The Rangers got a goal from Aaron Lloyd in the last minute and got another through Shane Parkes in stoppage time.  There was not enough time after the last one for anyone to get really jumpy.  Final score 4-3
The programme
A black-and-white programme as the fixture had been in doubt all week, but the club also gave away complimentary copies of a previous programme.  Nice touch.
Something random
The rose symbol on the wall of the main stand at Castlecroft is the sign of the ownership of the ground by the Rugby Football Union.  This venue is a former Wolverhampton Wanderers training ground that was more recently occupied by England’s “schoolboy” rugby sides.  The main stand is way ahead of anything else I have encountered in Step 6.
Hopping for Moorfields Update
Seven goals, so we are now up to 170 for the season.
Mars Bar Watch 2013
No purchases today, as I am working through one of my many chocolatey leaving presents from last Thursday.  (Regular readers of my tweetage will know that I am now between jobs, and I am shortly heading back into the wild and wacky world of secondary school science teaching.  This partly explains the reduction in my blog output this month.  Bear with me as I find a new position of equilibrium!  Which is in itself an A-level chemistry reference.)  Rumour has it that Asda has been selling a 4-pack of standard 58g bars for a loss-leading £1.  I will have to investigate.  Please tweet me if you can confirm.
What Next?
Hopefully crossing paths with a group of European friends as they head for Stamford v Kings Lynn tomorrow.