Your reading a pre 2010-11 archived article
Maybe I have to adjust more, maybe the issue is one of scale, maybe I’m clueless, who knows? What is clear however is if Leatherhead’s Fetcham Grove is typical of the standard of Ryman League grounds I will be watching some football in tips!
Part of the adjustment I am making is not spending near-on £100 to travel to games, quite a pleasant surprise to be able to get from my “manor” to Leatherhead and back for £2 (and the journey was stress free also). After hunting down the best real ale pub in the town (luckily the nearest one to the ground), enjoying some decent beer and ok lunch (whilst on the fringes of a group of the infamous Table-1 Kings mob, toddlers to pensioners in that crew, best not mess they will drink you under) I set off for this new experience. Some things I was already anticipating, the trees around the ground, the white painted turnstiles (as pitched above) and the green home kit. Others I wasn’t and it’s those that become the glue to this write-up.
Now I don’t have that many demands of a step 4 football club but the ability to produce either a programme or a team sheet is one of them. Leatherhead FC (nickname the Tanners, symbol a swan??!!) didn’t feel the need to bother with such a detail for a local derby game against Kingstonian, unforgivable bad first impression in my book. After paying my fiver (fair price for pre-season friendly) I walked down the side of what was jokingly a main stand. Deciding this was a good time to check out the toilet facilities I was directed by signs through what looked like a disused function room to eventually find them, functional but hardly useful for a decent crowd.
Back out to the fresh air, I already sensed it was going to be a unique ground experience for me, and having been to Millmoor, the Dell, Layer Road, Underhill and Old Trafford in my time I know what shithole grounds look like! Found the clubhouse/bar which had a modern feel about it, you know the thing, lots of fridges behind the bar, no hand pull pumps, bugger all on the shelves, decided to leave that till half-time, slipped through the beer fence (more of later) and in to the main stand!
This is the point where the sheer scale of the culture shock hits you. The main stand seemed to be a collection of lean-to’s with a million metal round poles designed to ensure no one got a good view. The only other structure in the ground seemed to be a 90’s bus stop behind one goal, 3 sides of the ground had breeze block barriers tarred up the other was turned up metal sheeting top with decking! Also circulating around 3 sides of the ground was a new installed fence, the kind you put up in your garden, panels in plank style which seemed to be there to protect the tress that surrounded the place. The pitch looked bowling green, with one of the goalmouths raised like a grassy knoll in Dallas.
Before I had time to admire the Surrey yummy mummies with push chairs sitting on the grass bank that slipped around the bus stop the teams came out and another Sir Bobby Robson minutes silence was about to start, could Leatherhead set this up better than Kingstonian did the previous week? Yes and no, the announcer got in before the referee but decided to lecture us on the difference between a minutes silence and clapping. Now firstly is that really necessary in front of less than 150 people and secondly I could understand why people who were personal friends of Sir Bobby might prefer the latter but the chances of anyone at the ground having even met the man was remote (except no wait, isn’t that Martin Tyler over there on the K’s bench, yes it is, but I doubt he told the announcer to be so pompous).
Let’s leave the action on the pitch for now (but let’s just say not a lot worth reporting), come half-time and its back to the bar. At this point the club slightly redeems itself, sitting in the fridges is a range of about 6 decent ales including Masham’s (Google map it) finest Black Sheep, but the issue is they are in the fridge. My companion kindly asks if they have any Black Sheep at room temperature and nicely as pie the barman slips off to his cellar, produces a pack of 4 and tells us he will keep the other two out for later, nice one. Pint glass in hand, yes glass, lovely beer enhancing glass, we park ourselves in what was part walk through, part beer garden, part security barrier, basically an area where you could drink and see the pitch but not breaking any FA or police rules. Also hidden in this area was a small beach hut which passed for the club shop, it was closed.
The second half skips as unmemorable as the first and that motivates an early exit to get back to a boozer (back in the royal borough) in time for the footy results from the first day of the new football league season (2pm kick off you see another Leatherhead quaint custom?). On exiting I wanted to just scan the whole place to ensure I hadn’t missed some feature of note, something that showed where all the income from the 70’s cup run that made Leatherhead a name to remember went, alas not.
Now if I have been harsh on the club, well apologies in advance. I suppose the proof in the pudding will be when comparing with other step 4 grounds. To be fair I have another gripe about the day, the game, about as poor as I have ever seen (and that includes the lower reaches of the Rotherham Sunday League). Now given that K’s were the higher division team and this was a week from their first league game, if that is the standard to expect and the style they wish to pursue I’m going to have to re-consider how often I watch them. The tactic seemed to be lump the ball up to the big no6 (touch of a hippo, gob of a Rooney) and feed off that. The home club weren’t much better and that’s why the main memories were of fouls not shots.
I’m all for sensible refereeing at friendly’s but there is a limit. First half a Leatherhead player is moving at speed across the half way line when he is studded over knee height from behind, result a booking!! Now we are all aware of the modern tendency for dug-outs to get up and complain that others were trying to get their players in trouble but what the K’s bench thought it was doing complaining about the home sides’ reaction to that tackle I know not. Quite frankly they should consider themselves lucky their players didn’t break the others leg! Second half and the big centre-back for the K’s gets caught as last man, blatant tug, foul but not even a booking, supreme stuff.
In the space of 3 games in pre-season I have seen K’s go from sweet passing to mix it up to route 1 specialism. I can’t say I like the latter but equally I probably have enough to contend with coping with facilities over the next few weeks never mind worrying about skill levels. Time to see what a step 5 as to offer, Chessington & Hook at home in the FA Cup, god what frightening words, someone sell me a Wycombe ticket!
