Ee-ai-ee-ai-ee-ai-oh, Up the Conference South We Go! Part 2

You can read Part 1 of this article here.

By the time all of the Bath City fans had resettled themselves behind the High Street Goal the match had already been underway for a couple minutes. There wasn't room for our gigantic white ensign, but the rest of the flags were hung as visibly as possible and we got down to the serious business of cheering the team on. We began with 'We are the Bath,' and 'We Love You City.' There was no response from the Welling supporters. It looked like we had the ground to ourselves, at least as far as noisemaking goes.

Things were not so one-sided on the pitch. Neither team looked very dangerous in the first twenty minutes. As it often the case, City's strong midfield was able to hold the oppostion at bay, but this was not resulting in many goal-scoring opportunities. I find in these sorts of matches I get kind of comfortable, but it is the sort of comfortable that makes me very uneasy when I realise I'm getting comfortable (I suspect if you are a football fan that makes sense. If you are not a football fan you probably think I need therapy. And you are probably right).

There was one worrying thing for City fans in the opening stages, though, and that was Mark Badman. It took several of us, including me, several minutes to realise the player getting onto the ref's naughty list was Mark Badman. His newly-shaven head made him very hard to recognize. I heard more than one supporter say, 'Who's the new guy?' But it wasn't a questionable choice in grooming that concerned me (I am no one to cast stones), but rather the attention he was getting from the official. He got an early yellow, and a few minutes later, in the presence of captain Jim Rollo, he appeared to get a 'final warning.' It would have been a disaster if he got sent off, so he was going to have to play cautiously for as long as he remained on the pitch. The concerning thing, and one of the reasons he is so popular with the fans, is that it is almost impossible to imagine Badman playing cautiously. Fortunately he did managed to go the rest of the match without another card (much to the frustration of the handful of vocal Welling supporters).

Despite our worries about Badman, City's attack became more and more threatening as the half progressed. Welling keeper Charlie Mitten was given several opportunities to show his skills. He was forced to block shots from both Darren Edwards and Kaid Mohamed. An objective observer would have probably surmised that City was on the verge of taking the lead, but I am no objective observer. I found Mitten's stops extremely frustrating. I could only see squandered chances and half chances, which City might not get again. I suppose it is hard to see the full picture when you are cheering yourself hoarse on the goal line.

As it turns out, cheering myself hoarse on the goal line made it hard to even see the picture right in front of me. Adie Harris found Mohamed wide on the right. I was standing on the fence between Mohamed and the net. Seeing that his angle was too tight to take a shot, I turned away from Mohamed to my right towards the goal, expecting to see a cross come into the six-yard box. Then, in my peripheral vision, I saw the ball come from my left, skirt along the ground, and go just far enough to the left to avoid Mitten's outstretched hands (but not so far left as to go wide of the post). I didn't understand what had happened at first, but eventually I realised that the angle was not too tight for Kaid Mohamed. It was a superb goal, and once I finished scratching my head I joined in the riotous goal celebration that was happening along the fence.

Halftime arrived and found the hundred or so Bath City supporters in fine mood. No one thought a single goal lead was sufficient, but it had been encouraging to see how well Welling United's attack had been contained. Needing to prepare for the second half, the Legion packed up and headed back to the 'far goal' side.

Halfway around the pitch, as we walked in front of the Erith stand, I was struck by a very strange sensation. The oddness of Park View Road felt even odder, but I was struggling to identify it. Then I realised what the problem was: total silence. There was no music coming of the sound system, no hustle-and-bustle-of crowds, no banter among groups of supporters. The smattering of Welling supporters seated in the Erith stand were sat quietly with their hands folded in their laps. Any noise the City supporters made was met with total silence. I would not have been totally surprised if a librarian had marched up to us, put a finger on her lips, and said, 'Shhhhhh!'

The major challenge that the Legion faced during the interval was how to hang our white ensign. It was too large to drape from the fence that skirted the pitch. The corrugated fence behind us did not offer anything to loop the ties through. Or so we thought, until one ingenious legionairre climbed up on top of it and somehow managed to fasten the flag in place. This took several minutes, and I wondered if any Welling club officials would come and try and stop us. To their credit they left us alone, although it may have just been due to a reluctance to disrupt the dreamy silence of the halftime interval.

The second half began, and much to our delight, City began where they had left off: threatening the Welling goal. Much more apparent to me this half was how valuable Adam Connolly was to City's efforts. He has a blistering shot from twenty yards or so (as Weymouth had learned the previous week), but he must be a very frustrating player to defend against even when he isn't shooting. He manages to completely control the top of the penalty box by, as far as I can tell, being everywhere at once. Or so it seems to me, anyway. He nearly had more dead-ball success as well, when two of his kicks reached the normally-lethal forehead of Chris Holland.

At about an hour into the match Welling finally began to rouse themselves back into a half-decent attack. They did in fact manage to hit the crossbar on a couple of occasions. I began to get worried because City appeared to be sitting very deep. Although before the match every City fan I spoke to said they would be happy with a draw, after an hour of watching City run Welling ragged we all felt differently. We would now all be crushed if City came away with less than three points. Crushed, I say, but not surprised. Football is notoriously unpredictable. The only predicable thing is that you will regularly get your heart broken.

Except not this time! Rather than just sit back and try to soak up the pressure for the last half hour, City still kept attacking when given the opportunity. For a split second it looked like City had succeeded with an attack: Adam Connolly's free kick bounced around for a bit before landing right in front of Darren Edwards a yard from the goal line. Under pressure, Edwards headed it forcefully, but it struck the post. This was only feet away from where we stood behind the goal. I don't think any of the City fans felt the disappointment any less than Edwards did.

Speaking of the City fans, the second half of the match was an important performance for us as well. Although we had been vocal throughout the first half, we sang almost without a pausing after the interval. Unlike most behind-the-goal terraces, the 'far end' goal at Park View Road is raised above the pitch. Standing all together in a group, shouting almost from on top of the Welling keeper, it felt like we were calling the City players forward into the goal. And I am sure with our flags waving and our non-stop chanting we probably annoyed the heck out of the somulent Welling supporters. Oh well.

In the closing minutes of the match Adie Britton made two substitutions. On came the newly signed Hector 'Yellow Shoes' Mackie, and the new loanee Dave Gilroy. Last season when Gilroy was a signed City player he was sometimes accused of complacency. Whether that was fair or not, you could not say that about him now. He strides around the pitch now like he is going to pop if he doesn't score a goal. In the closing moments of the match he earned a good reason not to pop for a while.

Welling won a corner and keeper Charlie Mitten decided to give up defending for a moment and have a go at scoring. Thankfully it came to nothing, but gave him a lot of acreage to cover when City cleared the ball. The ball was collected by a Welling defender, but Gilroy managed to pry it loose and pass the ball forward to Mackie.

Mackie now had the ball just over the halfway line, with only a quickly retreating keeper between him and the goal. It is one of those moments when you know your team should score, but as this is non-league football, you know it is far from guaranteed. Besides, Mitten had shown throughout the match that he is a cool-headed keeper who would not panic. And as Mackie was a new signing, no one really knew if he was a quality finisher or not. He wasn't billed as a striker, so it didn't seem like a sure thing. I thought to myself, as Mackie advance towards us, that at least this would take some time off the clock.

From just inside the penalty box Mackie executed a superb, unselfish cross past the flailing Mitten to Gilroy. Where had Gilroy come from? I had been too intent watching Mackie to notice him. He slotted the ball into the goal and made the whole thing look easy.

Forty-five minutes of cheering in hope consumated into thirty seconds of wild screaming in celebration. For the first time we broke into our new song:

Ee-ai-ee-ai-ee-ai-oh,
Up the Conference South we go!
When we get promoted,
This is what we'll sing,
We are City! We are City!
Britton is our king!

Sure, it's a variation of a song league supporters sing all the time, but for us, working out the lyrics of a song in advance and then singing it all together at the right time was a real accomplishment. The Legion are getting more and more organised.

The match ended moments later. We stayed in place until we had sung our new song several more times, and until we had had a chance to show our appreciation to the team. As it turned out, they came out onto the field to show their appreciation to us. Led by Adie Britton they all came out onto the pitch and clapped us until they reached the edge of the penalty box (and then they wisely stopped - we were all in a bit of a frenzy!).

Welling, who had been on an eight match unbeaten run beforehand, had been made to look ordinary. City's victory would surely, for the first time, lift the team into the playoff spots (third place as it turned out). It was also City's first victory at Park View Road since promotion to the Blue Square South two seasons previously. There were so many things to be excited about, it was hard to realise that we had to go home now.

Ee-ai-ee-ai-ee-ai-oh, Up the Conference South We Go! - Part 1

Bath City defeated Welling United 2-0 Saturday. It was a brilliant, and very important win for City. I have a feeling I'm going to struggle to write about it without gushing a lot. I apologise in advance. If any of my readers, especially the ones that are not Bath City supporters, bail out before they get to the end I understand.

But it was soooooo amazing! Really. Bear with me.

There were two big themes that made the day at Welling so special. One was that City finally cracked the top five in the league standings for the first time in two years. Considering that Saturday's victory was the eighth unbeaten match in a row, it seems to have taken forever for this to happen. That it did happen on a tough (so it seemed beforehand) away match is further testimony of just how much grit and determination Adie Britton's team have.

The other development that came to the fore was the emergence of the 'ultras' group of Bath City supporters. In a way this was nothing new, as it is a movement that has been gathering momentum for some time. The Welling match was perhaps our best performance yet, though, and there is a sense that we are getting loud enough, and organised enough, that we are beginning to have an impact on the matches themselves. There is now a formal name for the group, 'the Legion (after the inconsistently used club nickname, 'the Romans').' There is a logo. There are active discussions about how to develop our activities on a Facebook group. And, most excitingly, the Legion is becoming more and more inclusive as it becomes more prominent. Rather than it being a name for a rabble-rousing minority, almost every City fan I speak to seems to consider themselves to some degree part of the movement. Seeing how Bath City is known for having friendly and active supporters, this spirit of inclusiveness is not just desirable: it is appropriate. Way to go!

Heavily laden with flags, the Bath City supporters coach dropped several dozen of us off on Park View Road right in front of Welling's ground (which is unsurprisingly called 'Park View Road'). As there was nearly an hour and a half before kick-off, and (this is England) we headed for the pub. The lucky beneficiary of our custom was the Guy Earl of Warwick, mostly because it was very close by. Inside we found a couple Legionaires who had arrived by train, a handful of red-shirted Welling supporters, and (this being England) a German broadcast of the Chelsea v. Manchester City match on the overhead telly. We ordered our drinks and got down to the serious business of wasting an hour and a half doing hardly anything productive or memorable. We did take out our flags for a practice wave in the pub garden.

Once Manchester City had safely dispatched Terry & Co (much to the delight of the locals) it was time to head into the ground. This would be my first ever visit to Welling United's home ground, and I wanted some time to soak up the atmosphere.

Or I thought I did. I couldn't put my finger on the reason why at the time, but Park View Road just felt wrong to me. I feel bad saying this, because on paper it looked to be a very nice place to watch football. It benefits from a very old-fashioned location right on the main high street. Impressively, it has two 'main' stands (this is due to Welling's unusual ground sharing arrangement with Erith & Belvedere FC - each club has built and controls one side of the ground). There was a nice tea-bar, and old fashioned terraces on the ends. Everything was in place, but it still felt wrong. The best description I can give, I think, is to say it felt like a public park rather than a football ground. Perhaps it was the thick woods on the other side of the 'far end,' although that can't fully account for what I sensed. Somehow, though, Park View Lane is a ground that is less than the total of its parts.

But there wasn't time for such airy-fairy contemplation at the time. City had a football match to win, and the Legion had a lot of noise to make. At first we stood around in a rather purposeless way behind the 'High Street' goal. For reasons I did not understand, we then moved to the 'far end' goal. There we watched Lewis Hogg (suspended) and Dave Gilroy (on the bench) kick a ball around on one of the worst bit playing surface I've ever seen. If Park View Lane is like a public park, the area around this goal is the sandpit. It was laid on so thickly that City keeper Ryan Robinson might have been advised to use it to build a small wall in front of the goal mouth.

The City players came out onto the pitch to a great roar from the hundred or so travelling City supporters. The singing began immediately, with 'We Love Jim Rollo' (I hope Jim Rollo doesn't mind the line about him losing his hair, because he is going to hear this song a lot). We were still singing when the coin was tossed. City were selected to attack the goal on the other side of the pitch. This set off one of the most characteristic traditions in non-league football. Each side's supporters switched ends so that they could be on hand if their team scored. I don't mean the more sedate fans that had paid for seats along either side of the ground. I refer to the noisier supporters who had been standing in the terraces at each end. As we passed the Welling supporters along the narrow passage in front of the Erith stand I couldn't help but think how this would never be allowed at a League match. Let's hear it for non-league football!

Part 2 coming can be read here.

Three Points and Two Children

I was able to attend today's home match against Welling United for one reason only - I took both children. Oh sure, it is a bonding experience that some day I will look back on with a tear in my eye, et cetera, but really it was a chance for my wife to have some time on her own for the afternoon. Three weeks into the summer holidays and Mrs. Nedved needed a break. I was happy to oblige if it meant getting to see the City boys in action for the third match in a row.

My children have a sort of love/hate relationship with Twerton Park. Until the mid-point of last season I found it difficult to get them to come along. Then at the St. Albans match in January I got them to come along by promising to stuff them full of sweets and crisps from the tea bar. It worked, and they generally want to come now when asked. Unfortunately, they nearly spoil it each time by saying 'Mommy, mommy, we're going to Bath City and Daddy says we can have as many sweets as we like!' So, after yet another promise not to buy them any junk food (which I knew I would break but would try hard not to break very much), we donned all of our Bath City merchandise, loaded up the Nedvedmobile with cheese and pickle sandwiches for the ride home, and set off for sunny Twerton.

We made it with only minutes to spare. There was just enough time to get each of the boys a doughnut (okay, okay, but really that's all they are going to get) and settle down in the front of the popular side terrace.

My five year old went to his first match ever last year when we attended the home opener against Welling. City lost 0-4 in the most depressing display I have ever seen from a City side. The only source of levity was the way my son kept referring to Welling in their all-red kit as Liverpool (he insisted that City had played Liverpool up until a few weeks ago). After two spirited performances so far in league play this season, I know I was not the only supporter hoping for a little revenge from our guests today.

City did play positively, but not as attractively as they have in the previous two matches. Welling had come for a scrap, and although it never got dirty, and the City players remained calm, long passes in hope rather than with purpose became the order of the day. Overall, the balance of play was in City's favour. It looked like the scoring would be too when Mike Perrott, making his first start, made a neat pass to give Darren Edwards a one-on-one with the Welling keeper, Charlie Mitten. Four days previously he had finished such a chance neatly, but in this instance he appeared to be unsure of when to shoot and in the end sliced the ball wide to the left.

This was very frustrating, but fortunately a few minutes later a neat free kick from Adam Connolley was even more neatly headed into the back of the net by Gethin Jones. I jumped up and down and shouted and hugged both children. They needed me to explain what had happened because they had just previously been examining an interesting pebble they had found on the terrace. They were genuinely pleased, though, because for reasons I have not fully grasped yet they both say that Gethin Jones is their favourite player. I think my seven year old admires the way Gethin gels his hair. The fact that he is a very useful fullback who can on occasion penetrate opposition defences with his pace is also good.

My five year old began to complain of hunger, and I, being a responsible father, refused to buy him any more junk food. Not until half time at least. He began asking after every whistle if it was half time yet, so we had to rehearse what the half time whistle would sound like. 'Beep, Beep, Beeeeeeeep.' Finally it went, and we got in the back of a very long queue at the tea bar. My seven year old, desperate to show his maturity, said, 'Daddy, I think I might actually be having a good time, and I'm not actually begging for anything.' Progress!

Despite the lack of begging he was grateful for a packet of 'Ready Salted.' His younger brother settled on a lolly. I was a bit nervous going into the second half: Welling seemed more likely to score than the previous two oppositions (other than those fifteen minutes of horror), and neither boy has shown the ability to really pay attention to a match beyond the hour mark. I prepared for a session of scrapping both on and off the pitch. Welling did come back from the interval looking stronger, and true to form the boys began to squabble about who got to lean on a particular twelve inches of railing that was exactly the same as the other 300 feet of railing along that side of the pitch. Although I was able to fight a rearguard action consisting of scolding and separating, eventually I gave in and we left the popular side and headed for the nearly empty family stand on the other side of the pitch.

From the other side of the ground I was still able to get a good view of proceedings. The second half descended into more midfield ping-pong. City were able to mount the occasional co-ordinated attack, but controlling the ball into a meaningful position and converting these opportunities eluded them. I was also able to see the crowd on the popular side terrace well. While I had been part of it the terrace had felt fairly full. I could now see how sparsely it was populated. The announced crowd of 479 was a disappointment. Even though it was not the most attractive of games, the brave City boys deserved better.

With fifteen minutes to go disaster struck. Will Putty had made some excellent saves in the match thus far. Unlike in the Maidenhead match, Welling gave him several testing shots to handle. One looked so sharply hit I thought it might carry him with it into the net. His kicking had, again, been excellent. All this was all undone briefly, though, when a misjudged back pass caught him out of position and gifted a goal to Jake Hobbs of Welling. There has been some debate on the forum about how much of this was Putty's fault, but he did flounder helplessly as he tried to control the situation. I tried not to get angry, but I felt cheated and began privately to wonder if the season was going to be undone by such defensive lapses.

I did this, though, partly out of habits learned from matches last season. The collapse against Bishop's Stortford from 2-0 to 2-3 still haunts me. I was not giving City credit for the fact that although the last year's team is largely in tact, this year's squad has a new attitude and a new mental strength.

After two substitutions, new signing Kaid Mohamed penetrated down the right side to make a shot that was accurate, venomous, well placed, and unfortunately within reach of the reliable Charlie Mitten. It was an impressive piece of work nonetheless, and I know I won't be the only supporter hoping to see Mohamed start up front soon. Moments later City really showed its mettle. Midfield enforcer Lewis Hogg neatly set up a free kick for defender Chris Holland to reach the net with a deflecting header. After a minute of extra time (which lasted at least three minutes) City players and supporters rejoiced. Three valuable points had been banked.

I let out a cheer of relief. My seven year old, always the philosopher, asked, 'Why do you cheer louder when Bath City score than when they win?' A good question.

This was not City's best performance, but it is important that they have shown that they can without their best performance. I am convinced this is a better side than the one that placed eighth last year. It has more talent, more depth, and a stronger desire to win.

We were soon in the car and the boys were soon strapped in and tucking in to their sandwiches. I almost throttled them at a couple points this afternoon, but I know I will look back these experiences in years to come and smile. Well, as long as City keep winning, anyway.