Rain stopped photography

We hoped Prescot Cables' game at home to New Mills would be dry, but rain was forecast to start around kick off, and it followed my bus to Prescot. To say the visitors have not enjoyed a good season is an understatement, as they had played 18 games without gaining a point. Rod, our drummer, was tempting fate pointing out we were not planning to give them a Christmas present when they came in from warming up. I did not catch the reply, but one word sounded like "off".

The pitch had last been used three weeks previously, and looked as though it had benefited from the rest, but the rain was heavy enough for the possibility of the match being abandoned. I took up position on the gasworks side.

Andy Scarisbrick

The weather was warmer than usual, so I did not realise how wet I, and more to the point my equipment, was getting, which would cause a problem later. The match officials seemed to have read that week's You are the Ref, as the referee was responding to the condition of the sides normally used by the assistants by using the right diagonal.

The visitors showed no sign of overcoming their difficulties, and Rob Doran scored after about 10 minutes.

Rob Doran

We consolidated our lead with two goals in quick succession a few minutes later from James Edgar, who has worked hard to keep opposition defences busy but has not been rewarded with goals.

James Edgar celebrates his first goal with George Mannion and Joe Nicholson

New Mills pulled a goal back just before half time, and I headed to the bar with a reasonable set of pictures, although I am still working on not noise reducing away the rain.

I went back to the gasworks side for the second half, where the rain seemed a little lighter, which may have been my imagination. I was starting to have a spot of bother, as I was running out of cloth (a normal handkerchief) for drying the front of the lens, and was just moving the water around. I was just about operational, although I missed James Edgar completing his hat trick in a bit of a goalmouth scramble, and thought Phil Bannister had scored it.

Phil Bannister

Shortly after this I had to stop, as I was suffering from condensation, something I have successfully avoided in seven or eight years taking pictures outdoors, There are precautions, like keeping the camera dry, and putting it in the bag before I go indoors. However, the mild damp weather created a similar environment in the camera, with the wind blowing on to a wet front of the lens creating a temperature difference and condensation. Once I had it, there was not a lot more I could do in the photo department, so I watched the last 25 minutes without viewing through a small rectangular window.

James McCulloch in my last usable picture of the day, half an hour from time

The rest of the pictures from the game can be seen here.

Final score: Prescot Cables 5 (Edgar 3, Doran 2) New Mills 2.

Someone else scores some goals

Towards the end of Prescot Cables' game away to New Mills, I thought I might be in what would be a most unfortunate position position if I were just there to take pictures. There had been eight goals, and I was unsure I had a decent picture of any of them. However I was there to support the club, so there was a compensation: we scored seven, which always makes for a pleasant afternoon.

The first goal came from Phil Bannister, which was a relief as it was our first goal this season not to have been scored by Rob Doran. Not that I have any objection to Rob's goals, they are always welcome, and greeted with his trademark inscrutable demeanour. However, you cannot rely on one player to score everything. Rob had no intention of being absent from the score sheet, putting away one of his own a few minutes later.

We had the advantage of the slope in the first half, although that can be a mixed blessing: the hosts are quite good at sending the ball uphill and letting visitors tire themselves out chasing after it. In the circumstances, I felt it would have been a probably decisive advantage to have a third goal before half time. We achieved this when Rob Doran was fouled on the edge of the area, the referee played advantage and Phil Bannister duly obliged, and, as it turned out, I had a photo.

Phil Bannister shoots for goal as the referee indicates advantage

Playing uphill in the second half, we continued to attack with a second goal from Rob Doran after five minutes. In this situation where I have a picture of a player on the run that led to a goal, but not anywhere near the point of dispatching the ball to the net, I find the phrase "sets off for goal" quite handy.

Rob Doran sets off for his second goal

Just as Rob scored, it started to rain. One speaks of rain being of biblical proportions. although one cannot be entirely sure how hard it rained for Noah. This rain sent everyone scuttling for cover, but the duration was less than biblical by about 39 days 23 hours and 55 minutes.

Andy Harper

The hosts scored a consolation goal a few minutes later, although there looked to be little prospect of its affecting the result. Thus matters remained for about half an hour until a goalmouth scramble in which the New Mills keeper made a couple of saves before James McCulloch slipped the ball underneath him, and I managed to get a picture.

A further goal came a minute from time when Danny Flood put in a pass which perfectly found the advancing Joe Evans.

Danny Flood

The final goal came from a Joe Evans corner in injury time.

Joe Evans

The goal was attributed in the record as an own goal from New Mills' Jordan Cooper; however, I have looked at my own photograph...

... and the video from @owy67, taken from the opposite side, and cannot entirely make up my mind whether it was an own goal or was scored by our own George Mannion, but I am tending towards the latter.

This was a morale boosting performance that attracted a fair amount of attention, including being the non League Team of the Day on the BBC Radio 5 Live 606 programme.

The rest of the pictures from the game can be seen here.

Final score: New Mills 1 Prescot Cables 7 (Bannister 2, Doran 2, McCulloch, Evans, Mannion)

Team of the week

At Prescot Cables' game at home to New Mills, a working title for this post suggested itself less than a minute into the game - "Oops". Ciaran Gibson, with an opponent bearing down, confidently gathered the ball - unfortunately two yards outside his penalty area. I was level with the incident, but speaking to Jack Phillips' brother, Anthony, whilst also checking my equipment, and looked up just as Ciaran took the ball. Some said he looked down to check his location before catching the ball. It is possible, "looked but did not see", i.e. looking where you need to but misinterpreting what is in your vision, is a factor in about a fifth of accidents.

It is a popular misconception (held by me until Anthony and my refereeing friend James put me right) that a goalkeeper handling the ball outside his area automatically incurs a red card. The Guidelines for Referees state that the goalkeeper outside his area is subject to the same restrictions as other players, so a red card should only be shown if the handling denies a goal scoring opportunity. This was outside the corner of the penalty area, so getting the ball 25 yards to goal (geometry occasionally comes in handy) with other players nearby is not necessarily an obvious opportunity, possibly more a foul breaking up a promising attack, a bookable offence. Unfortunately referees often act as though the goalkeeper being that far off his line automatically creates a goal scoring opportunity, so we were down to ten men, with James Edgar taking Ciaran's rather large gloves.

James Edgar

New Mills are one of the two clubs below us in the table, and a win would open up the gap. Being a man down meant that a draw would now be a good result. Most of us were expecting the priority to be protecting our goal, with limited scope for much else. However, it was soon clear that attack was still very much on the agenda.

Mason Ryan shoots wide

Our fears seemed to have been realised when the visitors scored on the half hour, but a couple of minutes later, Joe Evans beat the keeper to a free kick from Neil Prince ...

... with James McCulloch making sure it went in.

James' father captioned this picture on the forum as "Kirk pinches Joey Evo's goal as Joe looks on" - I thought at the time that it had gone in from Joe's header, but remember the way a SLR camera works, anything that is in a picture, I did not see myself. All three parties to the challenge were hobbling for a bit, and the defender needed the attention of his injury assessor, who seemed to be equipped with nothing more substantial than a bottle of water.

It looked bleak again when the visitors scored two goals in quick succession after half time, but our team were made of sterner stuff. A further goal from James McCulloch getting on the end of a free kick and one from Jack Phillips in the last minute of normal time, ensured we maintained the points differential.

Jack Phillips celebrates his goal

In a game with six goals, attention will be on the scorers, but this was a complete team performance - some excellent saves from James Edgar, the defence working as a unit to protect him from the trickier stuff that might trouble someone who is not keeping goal every week, superb set pieces from Neil Prince, and the forwards keeping up pressure on the New Mills goal.

Neil Prince

Not only were the team's efforts rewarded with a point, but also with winning the Non League Review Team of the Week poll, which made for a much better title for the post.

Finally, we have a departure and an arrival to report. Phil Bannister, the well deserved winner of the club's Young Player of the Year award last season, has left us to join Dave Powell at Warrington Town. This blog wishes him well in his future endeavours.

Phil Bannister

Coming on from the bench in his first appearance for the club was Ben Greenop, from Chester FC.

Ben Greenop

The rest of the pictures from the game can be seen here.

Final score: Prescot Cables 3 (McCulloch 2, Phillips), New Mills 3

Scuba in the Betting League

I find it useful in sports photography to give the game in front of me my full and undivided attention. As I do not generally follow any professional clubs to the extent of wanting to know live scores, this is not too difficult. However, this weekend was the end of the season for Ykkönen, the Finnish first division, who play a summer season: imagine the frozen pitches if they did not. A few weeks ago, it looked as though the club I occasionally watch, HIFK of Helsinki, would have had a good season back in the division, but KTP of Kotka were 11 points clear at the top. By this weekend HIFK were only two points behind.

I was therefore combining watching Prescot Cables' game at New Mills with following HIFK on Twitter- in Finnish. Mr Google translates the name of the club (short for Helsingfors Idrottsföreningen Kamraterna) as SCUBA, and Veikkausliiga (the Premier League, sponsored by the Lottery operator) as the Betting League. Readers will gather from the surreal title that a 4-2 win for HIFK and a 1-1 draw for KTP put HIFK in the top division, in which they last played in 1972, having played in Nelonen, the fifth level (equivalent in standard to county league football) as recently as 2005.

At our game, one or two thought our new kit looked very smart, until they realised it was the home team's. Their goalkeeper had a shirt of a similar design, in a slightly garish colour combination.

Goalmouth action in the second half

We welcomed back Antony Shinks, who had briefly been at Warrington Town, and who added experience to the defence, in which we can safely say we have been looking for the best combination for the last few games, particularly with Liam Dodd still injured.

Antony Shinks

As in the past, we were playing downhill in the first half. I am not sure who won the toss on each occasion, and whether the home team prefer this arrangement, but they are well able to take advantage, and make sure that visitors expend plenty of effort chasing the ball uphill.

The weather was better than we were expecting - after a mild and dry September, normal Autumn service resumed literally overnight - the Met Office app showed the temperature dropping at a degree an hour. There had been heavy rain in the morning, but the pitch seemed to have drained well enough. We had been expecting it to rain all day, but the clouds cleared in time for the game.

The trees on the stand side provided some uneven shadows.

Joe Evans

With games in Finland finishing at our half time, I could then concentrate on the game in hand. New Mills had a good chance to score just after half time, which could have delivered a decisive advantage, but they hit the post. After this, we seemed to take more control. Older readers will reminisce about the days you were allowed to score from this situation.

Sam Corlett is denied by Ryan Pugh

My mother always used to say that if you want a job doing, do it yourself. I was never convinced by this, and it is not the best way of thinking in a team game. However, we were pleased to see Neil Prince once again has the option of playing himself, as he scored some good goals in pre season before dislocating his shoulder. He wasted no time in opening the scoring.

Neil Prince sets off for goal

The Laws of the Game specify shin pads as a mandatory part of the player's equipment. I am not aware of any regulations on the strength of materials to be used, or the area to be covered, so there is a variety available, from simple plastic through to something from Isambard Kingdom Brunel. Callam Gardner uses a design that looks as though it provides a lot of protection for a fairly small part of the shin.

Callam Gardner is watched by Neil Black, and by James Cairns supporting the team

Whatever he was wearing, he added to the score a few minutes later to make the result secure.

Although the first half could have gone either way, the second half was a good performance, coming back after the disappointment at Brighouse, and pulling ourselves ahead of or hosts in the table.

The rest of the pictures from the game can be seen here.

Final score: New Mills 0, Prescot Cables 2 (Prince, Gardner)

New Mills, old hills

I was unusually gung-ho this weekend about the prospects of Prescot Cables' game away at New Mills going ahead: with not much rain having fallen during the week, I had no inkling there would be a pitch inspection shortly before midday, by which time I was on a train climbing towards the Derbyshire hills.

I decided to make the best of the scenery, so I got off at Strines, and walked to a pub I had found on the CAMRA WhatPub site, the Fox Inn in the hamlet of Brookbottom.

The Fox Inn - 50 yards outside Greater Manchester

The entry suggests the pub is close to a railway station, which is true, it is about half a mile, although one needs a modicum of fitness to make the trip, up a steep bridleway. Once inside its foot thick walls, I enjoyed an immaculately kept pint of Robinsons' Dizzy Blonde, in what I might also describe as immaculately kept surroundings. I may have been sitting in one of the regulars' seats, as an elderly couple came in, and the gentleman was casting rather confused looks in my direction until his wife chose a table.

Had the weather been less pleasant, I would have stayed for a while, but I decided exercise was in order, and walked to the Pack Horse, a mile away up and down another hill, then on to the ground, another mile or so, involving descending to the level of the River Sett, and up another hill. I was glad to reach the town and its pavements: whilst I am used to walking country roads, I am used to a hedge in which to shelter from any passing cars that get a bit close, whereas dry stone walls look a bit less yielding.

I arrived five minutes before the scheduled kick off to find warming up still in progress. The match referee had not been happy with some areas of the pitch, and was minded to call the game off, but was prepared to accept sand being spread on the affected areas. Unfortunately, there was no sand on the premises, and a trip to the nearest builders' merchants in this part of the world is not as quick as you might at first think. Still, at least I got pictures of Manager Dave Powell and Assistant Manager Carl Furlong taking training.

Dave Powell

Carl Furlong

The original date for this fixture was the first of January's postponements. Quite a few of our Train Crew planned to travel on that occasion, but our numbers were depleted this time by some of our regulars jetting off on foreign holidays, and some taking the train to what might be a foreign holiday next season - in Scotland.

Not that we were short of supporters who travel on the coach or by car.

Dave, Cliff, Ken and Peter keep a close watch on Dave Dempsey

Players move between clubs all the time, so it is no surprise to encounter former players in the opposition line up. Mike Smith moved to New Mills earlier in the season, and was as energetic, and appeared as much in the frame, as he did when playing for us.

Connor McCarthy gets away from Mike Smith

With so few games over the last few weeks, we have not experienced the gradual extension of daylight, instead jumping from a dark second half to full daylight in a couple of jumps. Even with the delay for purchasing sand (kick off eventually occurring at 3.25), there was a decent amount of daylight right to the end.

The floodlights were on on one side for the first half, and both sides for the second. As is often the case, this gave some pictures a blue cast, which in the more extreme cases I tried to remove, you can judge for yourself how natural the end result looks.

Robert Gilroy - colour not adjusted

Phil Bannister - colour adjusted

We were disappointed not to come away with the first away win of the season, although, when we had not been able to score downhill in the first half, I thought we might find it even more difficult to do so uphill in the second. Still, all points are useful, and we kept a clean sheet and therefore avoided a defeat that would have improved the hosts' position at our expense.

The rest of the pictures from the game can be seen here.

Final score: New Mills 0 Prescot Cables 0

Putting the score in words

I often think of tangential material for these posts on the way to the game. This is sometimes overtaken by events, and heads to the back burner. So, my musings on my way to Prescot Cables' game at home to New Mills on the subject of sports jackets being used for sport, illustrated by a picture of a match official so attired, will have to wait until next time the weather is changeable with a hint of autumn, but not cold enough for a coat. So, that is next week's post sorted.

An early observation was that New Mills' number 5 bore a passing resemblance, in hair at least, to the Entertainments Secretary at Liverpool University in 1987.

Other considerations were soon overtaken by seven of what George Green, the football artist of the Liverpool Echo in the 1930s called "jolly little goals".

Looking at New Mills' form, we should not have been surprised at a high score: they lost 5-0 at Cammell Laird, but were also able to score, having won 5-4 at Kendal. It looked as though we might be on the receiving end of the visitors' scoring abilities when they went ahead after 9 minutes. Connor McCarthy levelled the scores after 26 minutes.

When the player takes a shot from the edge of the penalty area, and you are standing behind the goal, you never get the ideal combination of player, goal and ball, so if you were not there, you will have to take my word for it that he was shooting for goal.

Connor scored a second before half time: here I could have done with capturing the whole of New Mills' goalkeeper Peter Collinge rather than just and arm and a leg.

So, the second half began with an unexceptional score line, which was augmented within a minute by another goal from the edge of the area by Rob Doran. In this case I captured a bit more of the goalkeeper.

Seconds after the restart, Rob Doran again posed a threat, with Peter Collinge mistiming his attempt to deal with it...

... leaving the way open for Connor McCarthy to complete his hat trick.

With the ball heading to the open net, I had lowered the camera, so did not capture Connor's cheeky dive to help the ball in with his head. I am fairly traditional when it comes to goal celebrations, the time for them is when the ball is in the net, but the fact Connor was able to celebrate with impunity probably served to demoralise the New Mills defence still further.

I have to admit to missing goal number five, which is not something I get the chance to say very often, but I got another chance when Isaac Kusoloka came on for Carl Furlong, who had done an excellent job, and had been unlucky not to add to the score himself.

Carl Furlong

No sooner had Isaac joined the fray than he produced one of his aerial kicks in front of goal. At the time of writing, the time of Isaac's goal is listed on the league website as 90 minutes, suggesting it was the seventh goal, when it was the sixth, closer to 70 minutes.

Then there was a question I have never had to consider before. The scorer of a hat trick is traditionally awarded the match ball (probably in most cases a clean one that has not been kicked around) to commemorate the occasion. So, given that the game is played, nominally at least, with one ball, what does the scorer of a second hat trick get?

The question was broached by Rob Doran with a goal that looked remarkably similar to his first.

This result will have been a great boost to team morale: the New Mills defence did have a particularly bad day at the office, but our team was clinical enough to take advantage of it, and our defence kept a potentially high scoring New Mills team at bay.

Frank, one of our Train Crew members (or Air Crew, he works in aviation) came to the game suited and booted between the ceremony and reception of a friend's wedding. George Green's "jolly little goals" were from another high scoring game, a 10-0 win against Harrowby in the FA Cup in 1935. The person coming from a wedding on that occasion played a larger role in both events - the groom was Horace Whalley, Cables' goalkeeper.

Finally, I texted the score to my friend Roger: it seemed appropriate to follow the practice of the old teleprinter with a high score and give it as "Prescot Cables 7 (seven) New Mills 1". These days do not come round often, the last time we scored as many was in a 9-0 win against Flixton in 2002-3. Having enjoyed the day, the priority is in midweek away to Lancaster City who have made a good start to the season, and a testing FA Cup game at home to Buxton at the weekend.

The rest of the pictures from the game can be seen here.

German tourists

It is fair to say Prescot does not attract a large number of tourists. Being not far from Liverpool, we occasionally get visitors who have come to watch a professional game, and want to take in a game at a local club as well. We had a visitor from Germany at our home game against New Mills at the weekend, although Michael was not really a tourist, more a returning regular, having watched Cables whilst studying for a PhD at the University of Liverpool. He and a number of other supporters went for a night out in St Helens after the game. I elected not to join them, but I believe they had a good time. I was hoping they would come back with a story of an elderly person, prompted by a German visitor in their midst, regaling them with tales of Bert Trautmann playing for St Helens Town.

He picked the right weekend to travel, as this was the first game on the pitch since the Liverpool Senior Cup, played in very wet conditions in the middle of November. The team were keen to put in a good performance to bounce back from a heavy defeat away to Skelmersdale United in the Doodson Sport Cup in midweek. Being out of all the cup competitions has a silver lining, as it will reduce the use of the pitch (and the electricity consumed by the floodlights) over the winter, that so often makes league cup games a net loss for clubs.

Joe Evans returns from injury

The conditions were those of a proper December day. We started with gloomy light, much of the play being at the other end of the pitch, and two goals conceded. Things started to improve towards half time, with a goal from Jonathon Bathurst at 43 minutes. I have commented before that he often gets goals that are difficult to capture. At least this time I captured Jon with the ball heading for the goal.

Jonathon Bathurst scores Prescot's goal

However, this made it in to the collection on the "goal is a goal" principle - if we look closely, we can see it is a little out of focus, and it did not make into the Merseymart partly for that reason, and partly because there is too much space between player and ball for a print photo.

By this time it was raining, and getting on for sunset, so the grain on the pictures from the low light gave quite a good reflection of the weather.

Jack Webb

It looked as though the rain would continue for the second half, so I put the cover on the camera before taking up a position on the gasworks side (opposite the stand) for what turned out to be a much better second half performance. I do not like using the cover if I do not absolutely have to, as it restricts the movement of my fingers, and the part that fits over the eyepiece has a habit of slipping, meaning I lose sight of the action at the most inconvenient moment.

So, when the rain appeared to be easing off, the cover came off too. Unfortunately, it had not stopped, but turned to a mist, that did not settle on my clothing, but left a wet coating on any hard surfaces, including my glasses, so between cleaning I was having trouble seeing anything, and the wind was blowing a fine mist on the front of the lens. Throw in the floodlights, and some of the pictures took a bit of darkening to recover.

Callum Hoctor

The rest of the pictures from the game can be seen here.

Travelling hopefully and arriving

To the passenger who is lucky enough to get in and out in a few minutes, Manchester Piccadilly station can seem a model of light and efficiency. However, spending any longer soon brings to light its deficiencies. A small delay in the incoming service, a cancellation, and non interchangeable fares between Manchester and the two New Mills stations, meant that hour earmarked for a pub terrace looking at the Derbyshire scenery was instead spent waiting by an open sewer. Up north, there is still a high proportion of trains with toilets that decant on to the track. The toilets on the concourse charge, so passengers use those on trains waiting in the station. Using Piccadilly late in the evening on a hot day is not an edifying experience.

Fortunately, you do not need to go far out of Manchester to get to the scenery - and fresh air. Even around places like Romiley, which a friend who lives there had assured me was fairly urban, the hills looked only a short walk away. New Mills claim the most picturesque ground in the League, a claim with some justification.

The game was on a Monday night, which is quite unusual, Tuesday has become an almost universal midweek match night. Although it is only 43 miles from Prescot, it takes longer than you might expect to get there, so we were missing some players from Saturday due to work commitments. This is inevitable with an amateur squad, Dave Powell is keen to have options for all positions. Some players who impressed in pre season therefore made their first appearance of the League campaign.

Joel Igenoza

Davison Banda

The pitch had a distinct slope, which I think players are less used to dealing with than 20 years ago. FA regulations and modern earth moving machinery make a new ground with a slope unthinkable. New Mills demonstrated how to make use of it in the first half, keeping possession and making the ball do the work going uphill, and making us do the work following it.

They also did something I have never seen in a game before, but which worked well. About 20 minutes into the game, they turned the floodlights on, but for the first 20 minutes only on one side. This was the south westerly side, where the remaining sun was blocked by the stand and a row of trees, and the result was an even light over the whole pitch, with the sun still reaching the north easterly side. This picture of Cables' Jack Webb was taken at 1/320s, and needed very little adjustment to the lighting.

For the second half the lights gave a wide band of light down the middle of the pitch, so, unusually for a night game, I was taking pictures behind the goal. I was therefore able to catch a few well lit goalmouth shots, like this one of Luke Edwards getting his head to the ball for Prescot's goal before New Mills' goalkeeper could get a hand to it.

I was particularly pleased to capture the next moment, when they (especially the goalkeeper) appear to hover in the air to watch it go in.

It was a disappointing night, with what looked as though it would be a point falling to a late new Mills goal. The disappointment was tempered for me, however, as I won the half time raffle.

The rest of the pictures from the game can be seen here.