VENUE #31 DERBY COUNTY Pride Park

Pride Park, Derby

N-POWER CHAMPIONSHIP

Derby County... 1  Burnley... 2

Saturday 22nd September 2012

@ Pride Park Stadium, Derby
            Kick Off 15:00


     Another relatively short journey this time to Derby to see them take on Burnley in a N-Power Championship game at Pride Park.  It was a lovely sunny afternoon but got a little chilly as the game neared it's climax
     On Tuesday night last Derby played host to Charlton Athletic beating the Addicks 3-2 while Burnley travelled to the King Power Stadium Leicester on Wednesday losing for the third time running away, this time 2-1.  Derby make one change from mid-week Jake Buxton comes in while James O'Connor takes to the bench.  Burnley make three changes to the side that lost at Leicester, Ben Mee replaces Joseph Mills, Ross Wallace takes the place of  Brian Stock and Charlie Austin returns from injury to replace Cameron Stewart up front.
     Burnley's keeper Lee Grant pulled off two great saves early on one from Will Hughes and the other from Craig Bryson as Derby went for Burnley's jugular and try to power their way in front in this game.  They took the lead after twenty minutes when Burnley failed to clear their lines from a Coutts corner, the ball fell to Jamie Ward who turned sharply to fire home through a crowd of players.  Minutes later Conor Sammon should have made it two but Lee Grant managed to tip his effort wide of the post.
     Burnley came into the game soon after when Martin Paterson broke on the counter attack and

Another Derby chance comes to nothing

forced Fielding in the Derby goal to make a save.  But there was nothing Fielding could do on 32 minutes when Ross Wallace's cross was blocked and fell to an unmarked Charlie Austin to smash the ball into the Derby net for the equaliser.
     Things were starting to go the way of Burnley now and they were unlucky not to take the lead just before half time when Kieran Trippler's right wing cross was met by the head of Mee but the ball crashed against the Derby crossbar and came to nothing.
     So Derby found their selves level at half time and I think that Nigel Clough would have been the more aggrieved of the managers as his side were streets better performance wise in the first half.
     The first quarter of a hour of the second half was end to end action but with no real chances for either side until the 60th minute when Conor Sammon was inches away from a Jamie Ward cross from the left and the same player missed an easy chance 15 minutes later shooting straight at the keeper.
     Craig Bryson had a chance from point blank range making the Burnley keeper earn his keep as he did amicably.  Ten minutes from time substitute Michael Jacob's cross found Conor Sammon but his header went just over the Burnley bar.
     But it was in the 89th minute when Derby paid for all their missed chances when a cross from Chris McCann was headed home by that man Charlie Austin to bag Burnley all three points.

     Derby moved to Pride Park in 1997 when it was opened by the Queen, they played their football at the Baseball ground prior to this since 1895.  Pride Park is a modern looking ground with an all seated capacity of 33,597.  The seats are black plastic with some painted white to form the words THE RAMS in the East stand and DERBY in the North stand and very impressive it looks as well.  I watched the game from the West stand which is two tiered where as all the other stands have one tier which gives the ground an unusual but distinctive look.  The North, West and East stands are for home supporters and so is a large portion of the South (Cawarden) stand with away spectators allocated the left hand side looking at it from the pitch though I would imagine that more seats would be made available to teams with a bigger fan base.
     In the area where you would look to find the block and staircase in which your seat is situated in there are lots of food stalls, bars and TV's so you can eat pie and chips, have a pint and watch Sky
sports up until kick off if you so wished.

Charlie Austin

     Where I was seated it seemed as though everyone knew each other which made things a little awkward because no-one knew my face, it was like a big community that had just had a paedophile thrown in it's midst, although they weren't physically or verbally hostile it is not a situation I would like to experience again in the future.
     The Burnley supporters were in good voice throughout and had a amusing chant which they sang to the tune of  'Sloop John B', an old Beach Boy number from the 60's.  It is in praise of their striker Charlie Austin the two goal hero of the day who used to be a bricklayer before becoming a professional football player and the song goes " And now he scores goals, and now he scores gooooals, he used to lay                                                                      bricks but now he scores goals".

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VENUE #30 TAMWORTH The Lamb Ground

The Lamb Ground, Tamworth

BLUE SQUARE CONFERENCE

Tamworth... 1  Barrow... 3

Saturday 8th September 2012

@ The Lamb Ground Tamworth                      Kick Off  15:00

     It was a glorious day in Tamworth a bit of an Indian summer with a temperature of around 22 degrees and the sun beating down from a clear blue sky.
     Both these teams played in mid week with Tamworth making the short journey to Mansfield and were on the end of a 2-0 defeat at the hands of the stags.  They make a couple of changes to the team from Tuesday's game bringing in John Dempster for Tom Marshall and Peter Till replacing Charlie Collins in midfield.  The Lambs are currently mid-table with ten points.
     Barrow make one change to the team that drew with Grimsby in the week Robin Hulbert takes the place of Gary Hunter.  The Bluebirds are currently third from bottom after a disappointing start to their campaign and are still looking for their first win of the season.
     The game started brightly with Tamworth pressing forward as expected but failing to make their early pressure into an advantage as Jeffers had a couple of chances thwarted by Hurst the Barrow keeper.  Then Cunnington broke through the Barrow defence laying the ball back to Till but his shot struck a defender making it easy for Hurst to collect yet again.  Jeffers then won a corner which Till took but his cross was intercepted and Rowe raced up field with the ball and saw Barrow have their first meaningful attack which resulted in a corner.  From the corner Joe Jackson found space and swept a curling shot with the inside of his left boot into Breedon's bottom right hand corner of the net.

Adam Cunnington Tamworth
Man Of The Match

     From the restart Tamworth continued in the manner before the Barrow goal pressuring their defence but without any reward as the Bluebirds always seemed to get the final touch and clear the danger.  Then about two minutes before the half time interval the Lambs won a free kick 25 yards out, the ball broke for Dempster in the box but Alfred brought him down and the referee had no alternative but to give a penalty which Adam Cunnington drove into Hurst's bottom right hand corner sending the keeper the wrong way.
     1-1 at half time slightly flattered the men in light blue but it was the only way really Barrow were going to get anything from this game for as Tamworth came flying forward they were leaving themselves vulnerable to the counter attack.  You would have thought they would have learned their lesson but 'NO', they continued pushing forward in the second half and you could see that they were pressing too high up the pitch.  They had another warning in the 75th minute when a through ball beat the offside trap and left Adam Boyes clean through on goal but his shot was pushed wide by Breedon for a corner. Boyes was put through again four minutes later racing past the last defender and this time his shot from inside the box hit the back of the net leaving Tamworth with it all to do again.
     Looking very tired and dejected the Lambs laid siege yet again on the Barrow goal but the result was the same as before as in the very last minute of the four added on Boyes found himself free again in the Tamworth six yard box and scored his second and Barrow's third goal of the afternoon.

     Tamworth's the Lamb ground so named because there used to be a pub called the Lamb Inn situated near the ground car park.  It has a main stand which runs up to the half way line and seats up to 426 people and at the castle end of the stand there is a club house which can be used by both sets of supporters, it also has the only toilets available in the ground.  Opposite the main stand is a small covered terrace known as the shed which runs almost the full length of the pitch.
     The castle end is where I watched the game, it is an open terrace mainly reserved for home support.  The away supporters are situated behind the opposite goal in the Meadow Street End, it is partially covered at the back of the terrace.  The pitch slopes down from the Meadow Street End to the Castle End.
     You can get food and soft drinks from stalls that are based outside the clubhouse, they sell all kinds of burgers, chips, pies, hot dogs and all quite reasonably priced

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