'Appen us do like to be beside t'seaside

When Prescot Cables' fixtures were released, one point that jumped out was three trips to Yorkshire in January, including to Scarborough Athletic, playing at Bridlington Town. This fixture turned out to be useful with the weather, as the pitch, sitting, as the British Geological Survey tells us, on superficial deposits of sand with a white chalk bedrock, drains very well. Scarborough and Bridlington have largely escaped the postponements that have affected the rest of us.

I have never been a great fan of bucket and spade holidays, especially not in January, but a few of the Train Crew stayed over for a night or two, booking early to pay for the hotel with savings on the fare. I decided to wait to be sure the game was on, settling on a day trip. I met Dr James as he headed for the Liverpool to Scarborough train, and explained I would take the fast train to Leeds, buy a separate ticket and join him there, saving £15. I inspected the southern entrance to Leeds Station, whose pristine appearance and smell of fresh paint indicated it was recently opened, and which brings three or four Good Beer Guide pubs five minutes closer to the train.

In Bridlington we adjourned to the Telegraph, where I enjoyed an Anglers Reward from the Wold Top Brewery, making up in taste for what it lacked in punctuation. You cannot beat water filtered through chalk for making beer. We were concerned about the time to get to the ground, but we looked around and realised from the attire of the other customers that they were mainly the home support, and we just needed to leave when they did.

We were missing a couple of players. Team captain James McCulloch is likely to be out of action for some time due to ligament damage sustained in training. Marcus Burgess was suspended, replaced by new signing Tom Brocklehurst, returning to playing, having most recently been with Skelmersdale United.

Tom Brocklehurst

Andy Nugent also made a first appearance.

The hosts had an early chance, but we opened the scoring from a free kick by Rob Doran. We thought at the time this was from 25 yards, although looking at Scarborough's video and my pictures, it was some distance further than that. I was the wrong side to capture the kick very well...

... but I was perfectly placed to see the ball go into the net.

Returning from Skelmersdale United after a short spell with us earlier in the season, was Sam Staunton Turner, who wasted no time adding his name to the score sheet with a superb long range shot.

Sam shoots for goal ...

... and watches it go in.

With sunset in Yorkshire a quarter of an hour earlier than back at home, it was starting to get dark at the end of the first half. The floodlights came on for the second.

Our third goal came from another long range shot from Phil Bannister.

Phil shoots for goal ...

... and Richie updates the Twitter feed

A feature of these trips is meeting the locals. Leaving the ground, the rest of our party were some distance ahead. From around the corner I heard some sort of commotion. A local lady had asked the score, and on hearing that we won, loudly and colourfully expressed her satisfaction as a Bridlington supporter who had little time for Scarborough.

Back in Scarborough, the rest of the party headed for what by all accounts was an enjoyable evening, with some after effects in the morning, whilst I went for the train home. The journey is always improved by a win, although I have yet to find the scoreline that improves the comfort of TransPennine's buttock-numbingly firm seats.

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

Final score: Scarborough Athletic 0 Prescot Cables 3 (Doran, Staunton Turner, Bannister).

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.

Farsley - for a family day out

I planned to catch the 1022 to Prescot Cables' game at Farsley Celtic, but as soon as I woke up I thought this might not be a good idea. I was suffering from the after effects of a bug I picked up over Christmas. So, I was relieved when my travelling companions decided not to go for the drinks we had planned in Leeds, and I could have an extra hour in bed before catching the team coach. When I arrived, informal segregation was in place, with the players looking bright eyed and bushy tailed on one side of the street, and the travelling spectators looking slightly less so on the other.

The coach was a little delayed, as most of the vehicles had been out of use for a couple of weeks, and had trouble starting. I was half expecting the game to be called off, although Farsley's pitch drains well, and the area seemed less affected by rain than at home. There was a sign on the motorway warning of fog patches: it seemed a rather large patch, roughly the size of Yorkshire.

I was pleasantly surprised to be joined at the game by Dr Luke and his parents. Luke was returning to work in Nijmegen the following day, so Farsley seemed a good family day out (I know his father enjoys his football, something Luke only picked up when he started to watch Cables, so it made sense). I was starting to wonder how wise I had been leaving the house, as I did not even feel up to one of Growlers' pies.

We were playing towards the uncovered end, so, following events a couple of weeks ago, I made particular checks on my cover, and took up position level with the edge of the penalty area, near a floodlight pylon. I was definitely under the weather, and knew I was not going to keep up with adjusting my settings every few minutes, so I used the sports mode at ISO 6400 for the first half.

Charlie Duke makes his first start

I still did not get nearly as many frames as usual. We had held our own against a team on a good run of form, and the game was goalless at half time.

The home goalkeeper denies Darryl Patton

For the second half, I sat in the stand, which gives a decent view, and, with the tea bar, toilets, etc being the same side as the covered standing, not much foot traffic in front. I notched my ISO up to 12800, which served for most of the half, only needing to go up to 16000 in the last ten minutes or so.

Lloyd Dean

I do not generally attribute match losing decisions to the officials: what the players do is far more decisive, even when decisions go against you. However, the referee put the game out of our reach when he dismissed Marcus Burgess. My view of the foul was blocked by other players, but I saw the ball cross the line directly afterwards. I also only heard the whistle, but taking into account the speed of sound (worth a quarter of a second to where I was sitting), I am sure the referee blew it after the ball went in the goal. That would be consistent with his performance all afternoon, with free kicks frequently given after the ball had been played three or four times after the original foul.

On the basis of play being stopped by the whistle rather than the referee thinking about it, Farsley's goal should have stood, as the ball was in play when it went in. We would have been 1-0 down with a full team to try and get a goal back. As it was, the goal was disallowed. James Edgar went in goal, giving a creditable performance, but conceding the resultant penalty and two goals in quick succession at about 80 minutes meant the hosts continued their current good run of form.

James Edgar

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

Final score: Farsley Celtic 3 Prescot Cables 0.

The waters recede

For Prescot Cables' Boxing Day game away at Burscough, Merseyrail were running trains for the first time, so we were looking forward to going. The weather had other ideas, with severe flooding in a number of areas. We were on the edge of the rain, with games such as the Runcorn derby going ahead without a problem. Indeed, I would have gone to watch on a bank holiday with transport.

For Bank Holiday Monday, our game at home to Lancaster City was on. Richie, our leader in beer and pub choices, suggested a pre match drink at the Cricketers' Arms in St Helens. Pubs with sporting names seem to go more with cricketers than footballers, possibly because half the participants in the former have time to discuss what the establishment should be called. A couple of people decided not to attend, being unsure of the location, and concerned about being left wandering around St Helens for all eternity. They need not have worried, as it is a hundred yards from a stop for the 10A. Our visit coincided with one of their quarterly beer festivals.

At the game, I had new equipment. I reported at the previous game that my kit had got wet: it got worse when my D5000 gave up the ghost. I had my eye on the D5300 for some time, and planned to upgrade in the new year. I am not an early adopter: unless I really need what the newest technology can offer, I am happy to be a model behind, with a stable iteration. The release of the D5500 last year brought the D5300 into that category, and knocked a bit off the price. I brought my plans forward, although if there is a week of the year I would prefer not to replace electronic equipment ...

James McCulloch

I started using the sports mode, which works as I am used to, giving preference to shutter speed, but not allowing you to set a minimum, and going up to ISO 3200 on the automatic setting. Once this started giving slower speeds than I wanted, I switched to shutter priority, which behaves differently from the previous model, going straight to the most sensitive ISO setting (25600) to maintain the smallest aperture.

Joe Herbert

This was not what I was looking for, so I explored more, and found I can set the ISO manually in the sports mode, so, combined with much easier menus, I could work my way up as the light fell.

Shane Glean at ISO 4000

Jonah O'Reilly at ISO 12800

Amongst this testing, there was a game going on, with Cables having put in a lacklustre performance in the first half to go in a goal down.

A much improved second half did not initially yield results, with a further goal from the visitors, but we swiftly answered back, with one from Joe Nicholson ...

Joe Nicholson (at ISO 16000)

... and a debut goal from Darryl Patton, not wasting a moment after coming on from the bench.

Darryl Patton (at ISO 25600)

Throughout the half, I was getting good results from the lighting with better speeds than I was used to. The sensor, as well as giving me 22MP rather than 10 (and a 25MB file, but that is another story), was importing a lot less noise at the more sensitive settings.

For the last 10 minutes or so, the sports mode was taking me below 1/200s, so I went to the shutter priority, where I was still getting well lit images.

Marcus Burgess - 1/250s, f/6.3, ISO 25600 - and at the opposite end of the pitch from me

Unfortunately the performance could not quite match the durability of my exposures, with the visitors snatching all three points with almost the last kick. 

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

Final score: Prescot Cables 2 (Joe Nicholson, Patton) Lancaster City 3.

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.

Nice cigar, but no try

Prescot Cables planned to make a special occasion of the game at home to Warrington Town, with local Mayors and the Member of Parliament being invited. Unfortunately, whilst the week had been reasonably dry, it rained overnight on Friday, and by Saturday morning the pitch was no longer playable. With most football in Liverpool being postponed, I decided to head for Birkenhead Park. The opposition of the day was Wirral RUFC, from a couple of miles down the road, so they could take a late decision on whether to play. A slippery pitch in football can lead to broken ankles, whereas rugby players are likely to end up flat on their faces in the mud, which is in many ways the idea. Standing water is, however, a problem for everyone.

At the time I needed to leave home, the game was still on, so I bought a ticket. Some refer to Merseytravel's Walrus card as "Oyster style", presumably meaning it is small and plastic. The essential component of Oyster is pay-as-you-go, whereas Walrus is pay-before-you-go, so you need the day planned before you first use public transport, and changes are either wasteful or expensive.

No sooner had I got on the bus, I found the game was postponed. However, Waterloo (one less zone on the Walrus) were still playing. This was against Sheffield, so if there was an announcement, it would have been made by then, although it was still raining heavily. I presented £10 at the turnstiles, and was pleasantly surprised to receive a programme and £7 in return.

I took a position on the terrace side, where there were pools of water: the pitch looked soft but playable. Waterloo were playing into a stiff breeze, with low cloud, and, with the floodlights being under repair, it was fortunate both sides' kit included some white

That did not last long, particularly for the forwards. although some of the backs tend to stay standing for longer.

Soon, mud was starting to merge with facial furniture.

For the second half, the hosts took advantage of being at home, and changed into dry kit, of a colour to do no favours to my exposures.

The referee also changed into something drier, although he was more visible.

This was a low scoring game, more rare in rugby of either code than a few years ago. Better pitches and rule changes have reduced the incidence of matches with pushing and shoving in the mud for 80 minutes finishing 3-0. This was not quite such a game, but the scores came from a penalty apiece in each half. I only attend three or four games a season, but I think this is the  first I have been to where both sides stayed in single figures, and the first where neither side scored a try.

As for the cigar, I was not actually going to attempt to smoke one (the last time I did was when you could do so indoors), it was far to wet for one to stay alight.

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

Final score: Firwood Waterloo 6 Sheffield 6

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.