And your goalkeeper this week is ...

When I arrived in Goole, I visited a Polish food shop for a bottle of water. I was not familiar with the brands, but the flavoured one with a lime on the label caught my eye. The manufacturers' drawing was as good as my Polish, and it turned out to be apple, but quite pleasant anyway. Once at the Victoria Pleasure Grounds, I headed to the tea bar to make sure I did not miss out on their excellent steak pie. Whilst I was tucking in, club secretary Dan Roberts briefed me. Our goalkeepers have been somewhat injury prone since stand in Charlie Whittingham was unable to complete his game with the club a few weeks ago. With Marcus Burgess recovering from a knee injury, Ben Barnes looked to be settling in well, but he was injured at work in the week, so we had another replacement in the shape of Ben Purdham from Curzon Ashton.

Ben Purdham

Before the game, I discussed camera positions with video camera operator Josh, who is with us for the video analysis module of his sports science degree. For video, particularly for analysis, the ideal position is looking down on the pitch, which is not really possible at Goole, so he set up on the edge of the grass just inside the running track. For me, it is a case of the lower the better, so I sat on the running track by the side of the pitch.

Jordan Southworth

Although I thought this would be a better surface than the grass, as it was not damp, it is quite rough, which makes it difficult to turn with the action, necessary when shooting from the side.

After 15 minutes I went behind the goal, where I had to sit on the grass, better surface or not.

For the last fifteen minutes of the half I swapped sides. The home goal was kept busy.

Joe Herbert has an attempt on goal

Lloyd Dean opened the scoring.

Lloyd Dean shoots for goal

Baba Conteh is first to join in the celebrations

A goal from Jordan Southworth gave us a good cushion at half time.

It is not often you see a ship peeping above the clubhouse.

The sun had set by the start of the second half, but with little cloud there was enough light for me to spend the first ten minutes behind the goal.

Jordan Wynne and a Class 158

I then moved in front of a floodlight, where I found the light to be surprisingly good - the pylons were outside the running track, so I was sitting in more light than I am accustomed to. The hosts were playing well in the second half, and were rewarded with a goal twenty minutes in. Places at the top of the table are often decided by the efficiency with which teams deal with those at the bottom. Over the last few seasons we have inflicted a few surprises on those at the top. However, our current form has put us in a playoff place, and it looked for a while as if Goole might be able take their turn to snatch a point. However, two goals in quick succession from Jordan Wynne in the last couple of minutes secured the result.

The rest of the pictures from the game can be seen on the club website here, and on Google Photos here.

Final score: Goole AFC 1 Prescot Cables 4 (Dean, Southworth, Wynne 2)

Splat

I could picture my late mother's reaction, "It's your own fault for not picking your feet up", as I removed my face from the pavement on which it had come to rest on the way to Prescot Cables' Liverpool Senior Cup Semi Final against Litherland REMYCA. I do not normally shuffle, but there must be something about Sefton Council's pavements, I caught my foot on a paving slab twice more, staying upright this time, before I achieved the level ground of Litherland Sports Park. I arrived gently dripping blood from my face, but no-one seemed to bat an eyelid. We have an unusual number of Doctors supporting us, but with most being PhDs in Pharmacology, recently joined by Dr Tony, PhD in Politics, none are any good with minor injuries. Fortunately, Richie, our leader in beer and pub choices, turned out to be our leader in First Aid too, as he procured some antiseptic wipes and plasters.

Dr Phil and Dr Tony - a rare sight seeing the latter with something not cask conditioned, but needs must!

The game was the semi-final of the 2015-6 Liverpool Senior Cup, the amount of water that fell on our pitch playing a part in ensuring the competition remained unfinished last season. Everton beat Skelmersdale United in the other semi-final, so we would face their Under 23 side if we won. That game had been an opportunity for a friend of these pages, Anthony Phillips, to watch his brother Jack in action for Skelmersdale. There would be nothing unusual in that, but Anthony had been discharged earlier that day after four months in hospital recovering from life threatening pneumonia, so this blog wishes him well in his ongoing recovery, and looks forward to seeing him at Cables soon.

I have visited the hosts on a number of occasions since they joined the North West Counties League, their Wednesday match night attracting a number of additional spectators, and their sandy soil meaning a game is likely to be on when others are off. This would be my first time taking pictures. I could probably have obtained permission to don high vis and go on to their running track, but I was not sure who to ask. I therefore took up position level with the corner flag on the back straight, only six lanes from the pitch, unlike the home straight which would be eight lanes and a long jump pit.

Some were following the game from afar. Phil Bannister was on holiday somewhere hot, and Lloyd Dean was at a wedding. We can picture the latter, "I now pronounce you husband and Gooooooaaaaaaalllllll!"

Prescot enjoyed a two division advantage over the hosts, but this is not necessarily any guide, as REMYCA had put out Southport in a previous round. The likelihood of a contest was considerably diminished when the home goalkeeper was dismissed inside 5 minutes for a foul just outside the penalty area denying a goal scoring opportunity. Rob Doran converted the resulting free kick.

Rob Doran, supported by Joe Herbert and Michael Simpson. For those addicted to business jargon, THIS is "going forward"

We have been able to keep most of last season's team, and there have been a few additions over the summer. Nathan Quirk has looked promising, and confirmed this with a hat tick in his first competitive game.

Nathan Quirk

When Andy Paxton became our manager eleven months ago, he mainly started work with the players we had. However, he brought with him the Nicholson brothers, products of their father's Skelmersdale United Youth setup, who have proved useful and reliable. Both scored in the second half, Josh with two and Joe with one.

Josh Nicholson

Joe Nicholson

For the second half, I again chose a position level with the goal line. Unfortunately, I did not notice the breeze, making the corner flag partially obscure the first goal from Andy Scarisbrick, who has half a season's experience in the First team, but still is only 17 for another month.

Andy Scarisbrick

For Andy's second goal, whilst there are Cables supporters who, at this point, would be muttering, "We can still throw this away you know", I was already packing up, and anticipating our first cup final since the North West Counties League Cup in 2002. Unlike that competition, for which the League usually used a Football League ground, we will be able to host Everton at home.

Our canine chums are part of the non League game, and this one was definitely posing for the camera. He (if it is a he) looked straight into the lens, showed his teeth in what I can only describe as a grin, and then struck this Bismarckian pose.

The rest of the pictures can be seen on the club website here, and on Google Photos here.

Final score: Litherland REMYCA 0 Prescot Cables 9 (Doran, Quirk 3, Josh Nicholson 2, Joe Nicholson, Scarisbrick 2)

Into the spiders' web

You often see pictures from places like India of trains that seem to have as many people outside as there must be inside. One of the most alarming I have seen was of people sitting on the roof ... of an electric train.

We do not see such scenes in England, but when I travel across the Pennines at the weekend, I am convinced that is only because there is nothing outside on which to cling. Trains are at half their weekday length, for what feels like nine tenths of the demand. Still, starting a journey in Liverpool makes it more likely I will get a seat, and a sunny day in the Hope Valley, on the way to Goole AFC, gave views of dry stone walls, farm animals in the fields, and a village football pitch, the best way to describe its slope being that it is not as vertiginous as the hill behind it.

Prescot Captain James McCulloch keeps the ball from Goole's Captain

There seemed to be an exceptional number of spiders active in the ground. Not big daddy long legs, but the small ones that quietly wrap you in silk before you know they are there. I spent much of the game in between frames removing threads from my face, clothing and lenses, often with an attendant spider furiously climbing up. There were one or two insects that may have made too much of a meal for the spiders - this little chap seemed to quite like my jacket.

A forest bug (I think)

I removed it quite gingerly, although looking it up later, I think it eats dead wood, and was somewhat out of its normal territory, this end of the traditional West Riding (now put in with the East Riding for local government purposes) not being particularly forested. Indeed, the most prominent structures for some miles around were the water towers for the docks, behind the main stand.

The ground itself had a running track, only 4 lanes, apart from in the home straight, where there were 6. Unfortunately, given the direction of the sun, the home straight was the best vantage point.

 

When I take pictures from the side of the pitch, I take more frames than from behind the goal. Not that I have any more difficulty choosing those to process, I find getting a good shot is a bit more hit and miss.

A lot of the pictures have the players with their back to me, which does not necessarily preclude them coming out as a good image.

Luke Edwards

We also see a lot more of the opposition goalkeeper facing the camera ...

The Goole keeper kicks the ball away from Jonathon Bathurst

... and it is a good position to get a few decent shots of our own goalkeeper.

Xavier Parisi

It is also nearer to the throw ins.

Joe Fielding

I still have not, however, figured out the best position to be sure of getting some decent pictures of central defence, short of going behind our goal, which just does not seem right somehow.

 

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

Pies to Wigan

I was sitting in the stand at Wigan Robin Park, whom Prescot Cables were visiting for their first midweek pre season game, munching the snack I had bought in Liverpool, when I realised the incongruity of my position. I had come to Wigan, and brought my own pie. Not that I would imagine many bakers would have been open at 7pm, and as the humidity meant a downhill walk from the station to the ground was unpleasant enough, I would not have been inclined to go looking for any. It was an evening, at least in the early part, where the conditions make you glad you are not playing.

The club play at the Robin Park Arena, part of a sports complex next to the DW Stadium, the home of Wigan Athletic FC and Wigan Warriors Rugby League Club. The arena is a full athletics stadium, with an 8 lane running track, the normal installations for field events, and a decent sized stand.

I have never worked out what the gates are for on the enclosure, as they do not seem to be at an angle that would catch any hammer or discus accidentally released in the wrong direction that would not have been caught by the fence. It was, however at a very convenient location to reduce the time needed to retrieve stray balls.

Brown is not a common colour for football kits, with the only clubs I can think of off the top of my head who use a significant amount of the colour being Corinthian-Casuals and FC St Pauli of Hamburg - even Sutton United seem to have reduced the amount of one of their traditional colours to trim on an otherwise yellow kit. So, a brown kit with a red front to go with the name would have been too much to hope for, but in line with many modern kits, they have a plain red back.

I fully agree with having a plain panel on the back of a striped shirt, as it makes it easier to read the numbers, but I have never been keen on the front and back of the shirt being a completely different pattern.

Having full athletics facilities makes it difficult to find a vantage point close to the pitch. By the stand, you are looking across a running track and a long jump pit. Behind the goal, the curve of the track takes you away from the action. So, I went for a position opposite the stand, by the hedge, where the midges live, and where I found ... another long jump pit.

The lights were designed to illuminate the track, with three pylons along each side and three on each curve, which, when it was time for them to come on, made for well illuminated wings, being fairly evenly lit  all along, with the darker patches in the middle of the pitch. I am not sure whether they use the stadium for field events at night, the light looked good enough for safety, but I am not convinced about measurement, particularly with a discus that bounces when it hits the ground.

I like to include the ball in an action shot (as distinct from a portrait), but I sometimes wonder how far away the ball can be from the players and still make for a good shot. When players are chasing a distant ball, we can get away with quite a distance.

I am not sure how much you can get away with when it is a header and still give the sense of what has happened - I put this picture in the published collection, so viewers can judge for themselves.

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