Skelmersdale Almost Force a Draw at Greenfields

Hopperational Details
Date & Venue	Saturday 24 November 2018 at Greenfields Sports Ground
Result	Market Drayton Town 2 Skelmersdale United 1
Competition	Northern Premier League Division One West (Step 4)
Hopstats	This is ground number 666 on the lifetime list and I am here randomishly because of the specific symmetric properties of a cat-feeding mat that was drawn to my attention yesterday.  All is covered in the preceding blogpost, and arises because I had exactly 17 grounds from which to choose.  There happen to be exactly 17 distinct ways of combining elements of symmetry (such as rotation and reflection) to create a repeating pattern in two dimensions – they are known as plane symmetry groups, or “wallpaper groups”.  I always wanted this blog to be "different", so there.  Here’s the mat in question with rhombic unit cell, mirror lines and centres of 2-fold rotational symmetry marked up. Many thanks to @ThrstleFantstic for playing along on Twitter yesterday, and @ianshillaker1 for another image a few moments later which became my reserve.
Context
Neither team in good form – 14th plays 20th.
In one sentence
The home side held on for the win after a late dismissal but they had wasted several chances earlier in the game.
So what?
MDT up to 11th, Skelmersdale stay 20th with a gap of four points.
Match Report
MDT took the game to their visitors in the early stages and the tone was set by Glynn Coney hurdling a flying Skelmersdale tackle and crossing the ball from the left.  Daniel Beddows was arriving from midfield headed the ball firmly but wide.  So it continued with plenty of home chances with the occasional visitor break.  One of these needed a magnificent old-school tackle to prevent a shot on goal – and to be fair to the attacker, he took a moment to recover before just getting up and getting on with it. MDT took the lead after 20 minutes.  I was at the other end at the time, but could see that Skelmersdale keeper Terry Smith had come off his line to block an incursion into the left edge of the area but was then unable to stop an incoming shot from a wide position by Charlie Knowles.  The home side were caught asleep defensively though within two minutes.  On their first attack from the restart, Will Dunne scored an equaliser with a crisp shot from the edge of the area, untroubled by any challenge. Incredibly, MDT nearly scored again immediately as Skelmersdale themselves lost concentration for a moment, but soon after, with 26 minutes on the clock, they cut through the centre of the defence to retake the lead through Jud Ellis. My half-time note was to the effect that MDT deserved their lead but had been somewhat wasteful in front of goal and might regret that later.  As it happened, there were no more goals in the second half.  Knowles hit the bar, and then shot wide having been teed up by Ellis.  MDT continued to press, but as the game wore on maybe they tired or started defending deeper, and Skelmersdale were definitely showing ambition for a second equaliser.  It was end-to-end high-effort stuff, but both sides lacked precision in their final pass. It also became somewhat tetchy and the card-count increased.  A foul on an MDT player was loudly proclaimed from the bench as an “assault” and they had the ball in the net, but disallowed, from the resulting set-piece.  With about ten minutes to go, something happened at the far end that led to raising of hands, pushing and shoving, and a delay of a few minutes.  The outcome of the officials’ conference was more yellows and a red for MDT’s Lyndon Campbell. This meant a few nervy minutes of hanging on for MDT, but they managed it.  Probably a fair result overall but other clubs would be unwise to think of Skelmersdale (under relatively new management) as on their way to relegation.
Pix
Interesting ground for the hopper fraternity – all neat and tidy with clearly labelled facilities (think 1970s Batman TV series - but with a "catapostrophe" for you to spot), good views, friendly people, nice clubhouse.  Well worth a Shropshire diversion even if at times the players and the dugouts between them were making all the noise.  MDT in red.
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. Today, as expected, Blue beats Orange.  However, no clean sheets and no change in the league table positions. Pre-match Prediction based on Keeper Top Colour: Prediction: Home Win Was the prediction correct? Yes % of correct predictions so far 68% (15 from 22) 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 41.1 19.0 7.0 15.1 57.0 14.0 77.0 1.873 Grey 48.5 23.0 10.0 15.5 79.5 14.0 69.5 1.433 Green 86.0 43.0 11.0 32.0 145.0 22.0 105.0 1.221 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 19.0 8.0 3.0 8.0 41.0 5.0 11.0 0.579 Orange 42.5 13.0 8.0 21.5 80.5 6.0 -3.5 -0.082 Radioactive Bile 21.0 9.0 0.0 12.0 45.0 3.0 -3.0 -0.143 Yellow 33.0 9.0 7.0 17.0 70.0 5.0 -11.0 -0.333 Pink 17.0 5.0 5.0 7.0 35.0 1.0 -10.0 -0.588 Black 6.0 2.0 3.0 1.0 15.0 0.0 -6.0 -1.000 White 1.9 0.0 0.0 1.9 4.0 0.0 -4.0 -2.105
What Next?
Follow @GrahamYapp on Twitter!  36 Step 4 grounds left to go until I reach my next personal landmark of “The 388” (everywhere in England in the top eight tiers of the game).

Skelmersdale Beaten by Chester Small Margin

Hopperational details
Date & Venue: Friday 29 April at The Skelmersdale & Ormskirk College Stadium
Result:  Skelmersdale United 7 Ossett Albion 2
Competition: The Northern Premier League Division One North (Step 4)
Hopping: I am here because this is the only league in action on Royal Wedding day, and Skelmersdale have a mathematical chance of sneaking through to win the league.  They were certain to be trying for a big seven-goal win over an already-relegated side and hoping for Garforth to do them a favour by beating Chester.


This match in one sentence
For a few second-half minutes it seemed that the unthinkable could happen as Chester went a goal down and the score reached 7-1 here in a one-sided game.


So what?
Skelmersdale will have home advantage in both semi-final and final for the playoffs and Fylde will be the first opponents on Monday.  Ossett Albion head for step 5 having conceded 134 league goals this season.  It was long-serving Eric Gilchrist’s last game as the club’s manager. 


The drama unfolds 
Some of the early action is shown in the first two clips.  The second captures the unconditional love from about nine young Ossett Albion fans, who pinned up their flag and sang more or less continuously and with good humour all afternoon






Skelmersdale, as expected took the initiative but needed a comedy own goal to open the scoring after 15 minutes.  A good through ball combined with an unlucky rebound led to a delicious moment of confusion between centre-back Mark Ryan and ‘keeper Ash Connor.  The ball was shinned towards the goal at just the right pace to trickle over the line and evade the defender’s lunging attempt to divert it out.  1-0

Mark Ryan ponders the injustice of the world after opening the scoring ... for Skelmersdale

Two minutes later Paul Woolcott, who had a good game all round, played a neat one-two just outside the area and finished superbly.  2-0  Ossett Albion pulled one back after 21 minutes.  A free-kick was given on the right wing and the ball came to Danny Toranczak who was able to find the net.  2-1

Shaun Tuck missed the half-chance in the above pic and was to feature on the score sheet later but on 27 minutes he acknowledged a poor decision to his team-mates as he shot at the near post with two colleagues in acres of space at the back post.  With the hindsight that is always perfect, it was the first “if only …” moment of the day.  The ref was already warning Ash Connor about possible time wasting to which he retorted, not unreasonably perhaps, along the lines of, “Are you mad? Why would I waste time when we are in the game at only 2-1 down?”


Skelmersdale had a couple more chances before half-time and then, just before the interval, Kyle Armstrong scored as shown on the third clip.  3-1 at half-time




We established that Chester had taken a one goal lead at Garforth towards the end of the first half, so it looked as if this match might prove irrelevant, but Skelmersdale started the second half full of intent.


Tuck got his first with a header very soon into the second half.  4-1  The home side sustained the pressure and the fifth followed after 53 minutes for Chris Almond.  5-1  The movement and passing around the box was impressive and Connor was repeatedly frustrated by his colleagues’ inability to hold the ball up field.  He got himself booked for kicking the ball away in frustration which meant his potential time-wasting capability was severely curtailed in the second half.


Here is another “if only…” moment, this time for Paul Woolcott.




Albion reminded their hosts of their presence with a half-chance for Richard Tracey (I think), saved by goalkeeper Tom Brocklehurst, but the general pattern of play was a tide of blue shirts heading towards Connor.  By now the noise from the home supporters had changed and it seemed that news of Garforth’s fightback was filtering through.  


Tuck curled a shot inches wide and Almond came close with two headed opportunities.  The goal of the day followed as Tuck ran on to a perfect through ball and finished with aplomb.  6-1  When he headed in a curling cross to complete a man-of-the-match hat-trick, supporters started asking round for the Chester score and studied the league table in the programme.  7-1  We now know that one more goal at this point could have done it, and there was a distinct ripple of anticipation.

Sadly, it lasted only a short time as Cornally (I think) scored for the visitors, meaning that Skelmersdale needed two more in ten minutes plus an enticing six minutes of stoppage time.  7-2  They resorted to shooting from longer distances as fatigue began to take over and it gradually became clear that this was going to be a “so near but yet so far” day for the club.  Great entertainment though for the passing neutral.  Final score 7-2


Alternative activity of equal excitement for visitors to Skelmersdale
I can’t imagine that there would be anything that would do the same for your heart-rate.  As a last resort, you could try turning up to Matalan’s head office in the town and announce that you are from OfPants, the government agency for underwear inspection, and here to carry out one of the new unannounced elastic stretchability verification visits.  If you have a suit and a clipboard you might at least get a cappuccino and a chocolate chip cookie in the reception area before you are rumbled.

A snippet from the programme
It’s a ranty programme in places, with comments about negative comments on the fans’ forum, the singling out of players for criticism during matches, the lack of support from townspeople for the club and the poor quality of the recent Real Madrid/Barcelona game.  (Though they are all points well made and backed up with evidence.)


Columnist Frank Hughes points out that in terms of budgets Skelmersdale would be in about 8th place in the division, and that Chester’s resources and support are massive compared with others in this league.  An anonymous accusation of lack of ambition has clearly hurt: “It costs a lot of money just to contemplate promotion, and if we lacked ambition we would just consolidate in this division.  It would be much easier than working so damn hard and suffering from all the heartbreak.”


What I learned today
Liverpool Ladies are playing their FA Women's Super League games here.


What Next?
Tunbridge Wells v Hythe Town in the Kent Premier League on Saturday. It's random.