Boxing Day internationals

On an otherwise dull Boxing Day, there is nothing like a bit of international football. On the pitch, Prescot Cables' game at home to Colwyn Bay was not much like international football - the accents of most of the visiting players suggested they came from the traditional recruiting grounds for many North Wales coast clubs of Liverpool and Manchester. Then again, when going there, I notice a majority of the television aerials point to Winter Hill rather than Moel-y-Parc.

I arrived in plenty of time after a surprisingly smooth journey - the margin being added to by ten minutes' delay to kick off caused by a power failure to the dressing rooms and board room. Although the sunset has been getting later for a couple of weeks, at this time of year the light depends a lot more on cloud cover. The floodlights were on and I used shutter priority from the beginning. Some were keen to add a splash of colour to an otherwise grey day.

The eyes of the crowd are on Brian Richardson's socks

Holiday time often means changes are required, and couple of players were keen to impress on their first start for a while.

Andy Scarisbrick

Once again we made no delay opening the scoring, with a goal from Chris Almond after six minutes.

Chris Almond shoots for goal

The visitors replied about five minutes later. I followed my usual practice of spending about twenty minutes on one side of the goal, then swapping sides.

Jordan Wynne

During this period, I sensed I was being watched, and looked up to see a large dog, of friendly demeanour, with its paws on the pitch perimeter fence, carefully inspecting my exposures. The dog's owner introduced herself: Samantha Heaps of Cryotherapy Liverpool, who offers treatment for sports injuries. It is a similar principle to ice packs, but uses a more intense cold to improve recovery times from injuries. Josh Klein-Davies had been the first to try it, and Samantha was looking for a few pictures to promote the service.

On the field, Chris Almond continued his run of goals to restore our advantage.

With the poor light and late start, most of the pictures in the final collection came from the first half. For the second, I went straight to the side of the pitch.

Reece McNally

A headed goal from Lloyd Dean ten minutes from time made the lead secure. I thought I had not got a particularly good picture, but it worked out reasonably well.

In any event, I got the ball in the net.

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

Final score: Prescot Cables 3 (Almond 2, Dean) Colwyn Bay 1

Wot, no goals?

For the last few weeks, Prescot Cables have had a new design for the match day programme. The new editor, Gareth Coates, mentions on Twitter that he is a Vice President of Ashford Town (Middlesex) - he attends games wearing an orange and white bar scarf - and lives in Kirkby, so I must remember to ask how that combination came about. One change has been to put a photograph across the whole cover. Gareth is artier than me - I come from a line of technicians, or at least my mother was one - so is more willing to zoom in.

James Doyle joins in celebrating Dale Wright's goal

The weekend's opponents, Droyslden, usually present a robust challenge, and today was no exception.

Dominic Reid gets away from Droylsden's Clayton McDonald (who is as big as he looks)

It was another grey day, although the referee was happy without lights, unlike the previous week, when I thought the natural light was better. This sends the white balance all over the place: if I was creating one photograph, I would spend ages tweaking it and still not be satisfied, but making a collection and getting eleven players in, you make do with what comes out. The white of most of the advertising boards helps a bit.

Chris Almond f/4.8 1/500s ISO800

Danny Flood was warming up with the substitutes at half time, so hopefully a return to action is not too far off.

I usually use more frames from the first half in the final collection, but there have been a few games recently where I have used more from the second as the light has been a bit better. This may have something to do with playing towards the Hope Street End, although I am not sure why, as the light is coming from the side at this time of year.

Andy Scarisbrick

Both sides came out with redoubled determination. This made for plenty of runs that make for good photos.

James Edgar

Marcus Burgess was kept busy in goal.

With the pressure both sides kept up, the biggest surprise to most people was that the game ended without a goal.

Rogues & Rascals Barbershop Man of the Match Josh Dolling

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

Final score: Prescot Cables 0 Droylsden 0

Goal celebrations

Astute readers may have noticed that my collections have included a few goal celebrations recently. The management are decorating the home dressing room with action photos, and wanted celebrations too. I tend to stop once a goal has gone in, to join in the applause, and to view the pictures, so I have been training myself to keep snapping. At least I am not doing the video: Glyn, our camera operator, explained to me that the Pitchero software captures the 20 seconds immediately before he identifies the scorer and upload, giving realistically about 7 or 8 seconds to initiate the process. For Prescot Cables' game at home to Colne, I took my new approach one step further by missing all the goals and capturing all the celebrations.

The weather forecast gave us some concern, with an overnight temperature of -2ºC. The ground is often a degree or two colder than the rest of the town, and an overcast sky would mean a frozen pitch would not thaw. As it was, the temperature was nowhere near as low as expected, so there was no issue.

The cloud meant we had the floodlights on from the beginning. However, it was light enough for me to spend all my time behind the goal, rather than resort to the Gasworks Side, so I was able to get the advertising in the background for the sponsors.

Ben Cartwright

Team captain James McCulloch was injured, so joined the management on the bench, and modelled one of our new hats, which sold out on their first day on sale. These pages are of the #NoFlatCapNoParty persuasion, but they do look very smart.

The Management (and Andy)

We had a couple of missed chances in the opening few minutes, which we thought we might regret later against the team with the best away record in the league, especially when the visitors opened the scoring with a shot almost from the touchline after a quarter of an hour.

The visitors had the best of the game in the first half. but things looked up in the second. Dominic Marie got to an attempted clearance to open our account.

Dominic Marie celebrates his goal

The visitors restored their advantage a few minutes later, almost immediately cancelled out when Lloyd Dean headed home a cross. The visitors may have had cause to be aggrieved, as it looked as though the ball went out of play in the run up, but the linesman was closer than us and did not flag.

Dominic Marie congratulates Lloyd Dean

We secured the points fifteen minutes from time when Chris Almond looked to have accidentally deflected a shot away from goal, but had put it just inside the post.

Celebrating the third goal - Chris Almond is in there somewhere

After a good team performance, the Rogues and Rascals Barbershop Man of the Match award went to James Edgar, whose consistently good play was once again rewarded. This time I remembered to place the advertising board a bit higher so we do not give the player a haircut in cropping the picture for the website.

Club Secretary Howard Nulty presents James Edgar with his award

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

Final score: Prescot Cables 3 (Marie, Dean, Almond) Colne 2

Head for the Hill-Woods

There is often talk in English football of how we need a winter break. Those of us in the non League game know we usually have one, you just cannot predict when it will be. Prescot Cables' game at home to Burscough on the New Year bank holiday fell to a frozen pitch. About 90% of it looked fine in the pictures I saw, but one corner does not get the sun, and, if it has frozen overnight, air temperature is not usually enough to thaw it. Having not seen the game at Bamber Bridge on Boxing Day, it was three weeks since I had seen Cables play.

A lot can happen in that time, and three more players moved on, Rob Doran to Colwyn Bay, Michael Simpson returning to Runcorn Linnets, and Joe Nicholson joining his brother Josh in returning to Skelmersdale United, and also registering with Ashton Town in the Hallmark Security League. This blog wishes them all the best in their future endeavours.

Joe Nicholson

In the other direction, Marcus Burgess rejoins us in goal ...

Marcus Burgess

... Chris Almond joins us from Skelmersdale United ...

Chris Almond

... and Harry Cain from Altrincham.

Harry Cain is tracked by Pitchero's new video technology

Glossop North End's Twitter feed reported that another familiar face would be at the game, as Jonah O'Reilly had moved from Skelmersdale to our hosts. Jonah's father, a former regular on the Gasworks Side, was watching, although his dogs had wisely stayed at home in the warm.

Jonah O'Reilly

This was our Train Crew's first organised trip for a while, and Dr Phil and I joined Richie, our leader in beer and pub choices, in the Piccadilly Tap. We collected Phil's friend David, who was born in Glossop, where his grandfather had been the local undertaker. When we arrived in Glossop, I was about to point out the ground by reference to its neighbouring landmark (or blot on the landscape), but the large chimney has been demolished to make way for housing.

More supporters joined us in the Star, but I eschewed the chance to move with them to the Friendship Inn, preferring to read the paper before getting to the ground in time for a pie. Mettrick's pies are some of the best in the league, and have been sold at at the FA Cup Final, presumably due to the connection between Glossop and Arsenal through the Hill-Wood family. The pastry, unlike some, does not need a chisel to break the crust, and with commendable attention to detail, the hosts supply a spork, so you do not miss out on any gravy.

I am not sure whether the day was properly called foggy or misty, as different forecasters use different visibility criteria to distinguish them (at least on land, it is internationally agreed at sea). We could not see the hills, but there was no issue seeing the football. The hosts are in the playoff positions, and presented a strong challenge, despite losing two players to injury in the first few minutes, and were 2-0 up at half time.

For the second half, we were playing towards the former chimney end. As it was dark enough to have the floodlights on from the start, and they are in a side arrangement, I would not get much from the covered standing at the end, and would be better under a pylon. The pylon at that end is in front of the stand, the next is between the dugouts, so I found myself alongside our own half.

Danny Flood

The hosts scored a third shortly after the restart.

With Dominic Marie following up the form that won him the Warrington Motors Player of the Month award for December by scoring in this game, I was trying to get a decent picture where he was both recognisable and in action, but it can be pot luck with the light at this time of year.

Dominic Marie

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

Final score: Glossop North End 3 Prescot Cables 1 (Marie)

Dark afternoons

In recent years, a trip to Mossley has often involved a do. There was Flat Cap Day (long before I met Mr Matt, as he is known to his pupils in Slovakia, even though I thought they abandoned eastern name order on ceasing to be part of Hungary after the First World War), the evening with our German guests, and Dr Phil's 30th birthday. There was no such occasion this year, so I took the latest train to get me to the game on time. I did not realise Dr James was doing the same, meeting him when we alighted for our connection at Manchester "Victorior".

On arrival, we went straight to the ground. I made my usual observation about the hill being a mere bagatelle compared with Pitchfont Lane in Limpsfield, although it is 30 years since I ran up the latter, and getting on for 15 since I walked up. We were in time to watch the players warming up, although we had not tried dropping them at the bottom of the hill and getting them warm by making their own way to the top, but as the afternoon transpired, it would probably not have worked out much worse if we had.

This was the darkest afternoon (with the earliest sunset, at 3.53pm) of the season. With low cloud too, the floodlights were turned on at kick off. Knowing the best light would still be in the first half, I worked across the ground, spending a third of the time on one side of the pitch,

Rob Doran

a third behind the goal,

Danny Flood

and a third on the far side.

Michael Simpson

Whilst there was plenty of forward movement, it was in vain, as the important action took place at the other end, with Mossley looking dangerous on every attack. Michael Fish proved something of a storm (but definitely not a hurricane), scoring four goals in the hosts' five without reply in the first half.

Moving to the Lancashire end at half time, we found a couple of floodlight bulbs out, which left dark areas in unexpected places, and the back lighting from the white wall at the Yorkshire end more severe than usual.

Bram Johnstone

We feared what Mossley might be able to do when they scored again a couple of minutes from the restart, although their attack was blunted after Michael Fish left the field for a well earned rest a few minutes later.

We were still looking for goals, with the reliable James Edgar scoring just after the hour.

James Edgar

The hosts restored their advantage a quarter of an hour later, quickly met with a reply from Dominic Marie.

Dominic Marie

Had the second half been a stand alone game, it would have been a reasonable performance, but it was to no effect, as the damage was well and truly done in the first.

The importance of pursuing goals, even when the result is in no doubt, was made clear in the league table. We have gone from first place at the beginning of September to occupying a relegation position on goal difference. It is frighteningly tight this year, with eight points separating us from Bamber Bridge in tenth place, so every goal matters, for goals scored, not just goal difference.

Returning to the station, we found clouds of smoke pouring out of the shelter, as a group of users were smoking electronic cigarettes (steaming might be an appropriate description, as they looked like they were that as well). With our train delayed by the Rail Ale Trail attracting lager louts up the line, Realtime Trains was our friend, as we could see our connecting train was still behind it. At Stalybridge, I treated James to a virtuoso display of how anorak level knowledge of rolling stock and the layout of stations up the line helps you work out where to bag a seat - we headed to the back of the train, whilst everyone else made for the more crowded front.

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

Final score: Mossley 7 Prescot Cables 2 (Edgar, Marie)

Brian will be concentrating on the League this year

Travelling on campaign, it is a good idea to send out an advance party to reconnoitre the territory. Ramsbottom is not a difficult expedition, but Facebook updates from a fellow supporter who was combining our game at Ramsbottom United with a trip to the East Lancashire Railway told me that, due to late notice engineering works, there was no fast train to Manchester Victoria, and trams to Bury were off. The notice for the latter on the Metrolink website was posted on Thursday for a weekend closure, which is good for them, if not so handy for those who like to plan well in advance, I once turned up in Manchester to find the closure of the whole southern half of the system was not worthy of any mention.

Although the replacement bus had fewer stops, the normal 135 has a direct route, and, as I would be on a bus either way, I decided to pay a bus fare rather than the premium fare for the tramp, er, I mean tram. From the number of people on the ageing bendy bus, others had the same idea.

After stopping for blood based comestibles in Bury Market, I arrived in Ramsbottom just in time for the game, or would have if the referee had started on time. As it was, I heard the start from the bus stop, and reached the ground at exactly 3pm, with four minutes completed.

There was a light drizzle, so I took up position under the cover at the uphill end, behind the goal we were attacking.

Phil Bannister

We had announced in midweek that our new manager was to be Brian Richardson, the Assistant Manager at Skelmersdale United, so this would be Andy Paxton's last game in charge.

Danny Flood made a welcome return, having spent the last couple of weeks at Winsford United for game time.

Danny Flood

Captaining the hosts was Gareth Seddon, who received national attention playing for Salford City in the BBC's Class of 92 documentary.

Tom Brocklehurst gathers from Gareth Seddon and confirms his order for a dozen slices of Emmental and a quarter of  Shropshire Blue

We were not without movement in the right direction, but the hosts had the better of the game and scored their first after 30 minutes.

We were playing downhill for the second half, which usually makes for better pictures. The rain had stopped, but the sky was darker, and the speeds the sports mode was offering were dropping, so I switched, for the first afternoon game this season, to shutter priority at 1/320s.

Joe Nicholson

Gareth Seddon scored Ramsbottom's second after 65 minutes, and was almost immediately substituted, having completed the task his employers had in mind.

It was dark enough for the floodlights to spring noisily into action - I cannot remember whether Ramsbottom's lights have always been powered by a generator, or if their mains supply was damaged in the flood they suffered at the beginning of the year.

James Edgar under the lights

The most worrying aspect of recent performances is the trouble we have had scoring. In some games, there seems to have been a sense that when we have gone behind, it is as good as over, which goes some way to explaining our heavier defeats. It was therefore some encouragement that we improved in the last few minutes. James McCulloch was rewarded with a consolation goal, unfortunately with too little time for the chance of a second.

When we go out of a cup, I usually text my friend Roger, who first recruited me to the Cables interest in 1991, with the comment, "Concentrating on the league this year, Brian", because I like a good cliché, and Brian is actually his middle name. With the change of management, I felt the need to change the wording - "Brian's concentrating on the league this year".

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

Final score: Ramsbottom United 2 Prescot Cables 1 (McCulloch).

Let the camera do the work

Last Saturday saw another rain related postponement for Prescot Cables, with our chairman reporting the surface water was the worst in 15 years with other games having similar problems. By lunchtime the choice was down to football at Burscough or rugby union at Waterloo. I chose the rugby, as it was easier to get to, the game was less likely to be abandoned, and Birkenhead Park, who have used my pictures, were the visitors. There had been no games for a couple of weeks, so the grass looked rested.

I have posted before about saving files in jpeg and raw. The difference is camera dependent, particularly in the internal processing to create a jpeg. Despite having new kit, I will not revisit the question for non sports photography, the advantages of raw outweigh the disadvantages. However for sports work, it is more finely balanced. The extra processing for raw files on the computer takes time - about 45 seconds per photo, an hour and a half for 120. The D5300 introduces a new issue: even with a high speed SDHC card (80MB/s), the size of the file, about 25MB, is enough to cause an issue with buffering with exposures in quick succession, enough to get a run, but not the goal at the end of it.

"Test the application" is a watchword of these pages, so I decided to shoot entirely in jpeg, to compare results from previous games. I started with the sports mode, on the auto ISO setting. The colours lacked saturation, which had as much to do with the teams' colours as anything else, and was easily sorted with a tweak in Photoshop.

The home side made a strong start.

The auto ISO setting, with its maximum of 3200 lasted me for most of the first half, after which I worked up the scale, to 6400...

... to 12800.

Noise levels were better than the equivalent on the D5000 (where such existed), on a par with what I could obtain on the computer. For the last few minutes, as floodlights were unavailable, I went to 25600, where the full range of noise reduction is not available. There was a lot of grain, which I would have been able to reduce on a raw image.

Switching sports has moments when you forget what is going on - at one point I was thinking, "He's just run the full width of the pitch to join in that pushing and shoving", before remembering it was a maul, and joining it was the idea.

The visitors played more strongly in the second half, clawing back some points, but not enough to prevent a home win.

The game finished just before the next wave of rain arrived, an advantage on this occasion of the kick off time: Paul from our Train Crew went to Burscough and reported a good game in atrocious conditions.

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

Final score: Firwood Waterloo 36 Birkenhead Park 21.

A visit from the leaders

Before Prescot Cables' game against Northwich Victoria it had rained heavily during the week, but been dry on Friday. Our Chairman was in correspondence on Twitter on Saturday morning with the visitors, advising that the pitch was playable, but its continuing to be so would depend on the weather. A referee was on standby to inspect, although it was not forecast to rain until around 1:30. It arrived a little later than anticipated, when I was at the bus stop following reports on Messenger from the club bar, local public houses and from those stuck with shopping, whilst trying to grasp why so many buses disappeared into thin air on travel apps (they have not invented one whose predictions cope with a sudden traffic jam).

Arriving at the ground a few minutes late, I was surprised to see the places that normally accumulate standing water had drained reasonably well. Low cloud as well as the rain meant lighting conditions were poor, with floodlights required from the outset.

Marcus Burgess was unwell so we saw Ben Morrow return to action for Cables.

Ben Morrow

Andy Paxton's policy is not to have a goalkeeper on the bench, which seems a sensible use of resources, as you rarely replace a goalkeeper unless he is injured or sent off. Ben has been at Widnes - for a young goalkeeper, being on loan a division below and gaining for first team experience is probably more productive than watching from the bench.

I took up position on the gasworks side, quickly realising this was not such a bright idea. After some time of my rain cover flapping in the "breeze", I joined everyone else taking shelter under the stand, which also provided some shelter from the wind. I am still working on a balance between showing rain in a picture and a decent amount of noise reduction.

Danny Flood

I was able to emerge again after a few minutes, to find some water in the goalmouth, but with the pitch otherwise bearing up. I have to admit to losing track of when in the weather related proceedings the visitors scored their first goal (the record says 20 minutes, which suggests in the downpour), but they scored again a minute from time in the first half.

James McCulloch & George Mannion

The second half was drier, so I just had the wind to contend with. We had the chance to score when Rob Doran was fouled just inside the penalty area, but put the resultant kick over the bar. I do not think it made any difference to the outcome: whilst we had a good performance, Northwich are top of the table for a reason, and we did not look like denting their armour.

James Edgar

With the poor lighting conditions, I had a limited range of pictures that came out at print quality. Although the Echo no longer produce the Merseymart supplement, so the shape is not as important as it was, landscape format is still better for their website, where they report on the club most weeks. I try to keep the player libraries at the Echo and TheNonLeague magazine up to date, which is not helped when the most suitable images are of exactly the same four players I sent in from the last game.

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

Final score: Prescot Cables 0 Northwich Victoria 2.

Unseasonably warm

The first couple of weeks of November were unseasonably warm. I cannot remember getting so far into the month without the thermostat turning my central heating on. However, the rain was more seasonal, with some expressing concern before Prescot Cables' game against Clitheroe that it might be rained off. A number of other local fixtures fell to the weather, but ours survived with no sign of standing water. This probably helped our attendance: we certainly had a couple of visitors from Skelmersdale United - either to see how Andy Paxton was getting on or on a scouting mission.

We were joined by a German guest. Dr Mike, who watched Cables whilst researching at the University of Liverpool, had brought some relatives and friends for a short visit. He and most of his party procured tickets for Old Trafford via a method that sounded as dodgy as it was inconvenient, but his cousin Markus, a supporter of SpVgg Unterhaching, elected to join us in Prescot.

More heavy rain fell when we were in the pub before the game, but by the start the sun had returned temporarily. I made my way around the pitch in the opposite direction to my normal practice, going first behind our own goal. I was rewarded with some pictures of our defence with the sun behind them.

Jonah O'Reilly with Clitheroe's Sefton Gonzales

With the sun low in the sky, some pictures had a lot of back lighting, not necessarily from looking into the sun, but also from its reflection on the perimeter fence. This could be dealt with using the raw converter but would probably have been unsalvageable relying on the JPEG from the camera.

Antony Shinks - as captured on camera ...

... and the picture rescued

The rugby was on the television in the bar...

The game was goalless at half time. Rob Doran giving us the lead early in the second half. Clitheroe restored parity through Sefton Gonzales fifteen minutes from the end. Although both sides looked as though they could score, we were primarily working to retain the point. The defence performed well, with some sterling work from Marcus Burgess ...

... and good backup when needed.

Joe Herbert clears off the line

Another solid performance, assisted by some tactical timing from the crowd returning balls that had gone into the space on the gasworks side to purchase a few seconds breathing space, ensured we held on to a hard fought point against a team currently in a play off position.

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

Final score: Prescot Cables 1 (Doran) Clitheroe 1.