I'VE MADE A decision not to follow the Road To Wembley in the traditional sense this season. Last year was a one-off. I started with the Extra Preliminary Round and followed the winner all the way to the final. The resulting adventure has just been sent off to the printers for my debut book The Road From Wembley, which should be available in mid September.
But as you can read in my recent report on VT FC versus Newport Pagnell Town, the FA Cup is a bug which has not only bitten me, but which is buried beneath the surface of my skin. And I've decided to continue covering the rounds and matches, but to do it in a different way. This season I'm going to simply pick a tie which I fancy for each round, rather than following the winners of the previous fixture. There are three reasons which have made up my mind:
- It takes away the pressure of having to get tickets for a specific match
- It means I can travel to a match which may be more appealing than the one on any specific route
- It wont devalue the monumental efforts of the original Road From Wembley last season
It also means that I can go to as many FA Cup games as I can logistically manage, and with a glut of replays on offer on Tuesday night from the Extra Preliminary Round ties at the weekend, I gleefully ran my eye down the fixtures pages of the Non-League Paper.
Tonight's diversion was a toss up between Hertfordshire-based Royston Town and Suffolk outfit Cornard United, in the end it was the former that took the decision and this because it would give me a chance to rekindle my acquaintance with Wembley FC - the team which inspired the title of my book The Road From Wembley.
The only thing I know about Royston is that, coming from London, you turn left off the M11 at Duxford Airfield - a former Second World War base for Allied fighters and now one of the twin homes of the Imperial War Museum. But after a quick reconnoitre of the Royston Town website, I found out that 'The Crows' are the second oldest club in Hertfordshire having first kicked a ball in 1872 - just nine years after the Football Association was formed.
I also found out from the Royston Town website that ITV have decided to cover the FA Cup from the earliest rounds, streaming matches live from ITV.com and showing highlights packages. And just like me in 2007/08, they had also decided to start one of their streams this season from Wembley's Vale Farm ground – I hesitate to use the word stadium and anyone who has visited Vale Farm will know why.
So in the run-up to this Extra Preliminary Round replay, I was able to watch a highlights package from the first one-all draw, along with the ties between Wantage Town and Brading Town, and Clapton versus Stewarts and Lloyds, played at the Old Spotted Dog ground in east London a pitch I have graced as a boy when playing for Gidea Park Rangers against Clapton Youth. Tremendous.
So after work in London on Tuesday evening, I made my customary journey north up the M11 and instead of turning right at Stansted, I continued another thirty miles up the motorway to the Duxford turn off.
I was excited to be seeing Wembley again. They were the first team that I had fostered any sort of allegiance to on The Road From Wembley, where I watched three games featuring their red and white striped strip before they fell victim to the Isthmian Division One North team Ware. I was keen to see which of their 2007/08 alumni had made it into this season's campaign, and after the nameless, anonymous clash between VT and Newport Pagnell Town, it would be good to see some familiar faces. You can read my historical notes on Wembley FC in the second sample chapter on The Road From Wembley website.
I arrived in Royston at seven o'clock having driven through a rain squall on the M11 which left me wondering if the game would even take place. But there was only high cloud and traces of an August sunset above me as I drove around the town looking for Garden Walk, Royston Town's home. After a brief interlude in an Esso garage where I mugged up on where to go in a map, I made the appropriate turns and pulled into the small side road that leads down to the ground.
I paid my six pound entry and bought a programme and was directed to drive between the clubhouse and the top end of the ground to park on the far side of the pitch just past the penalty area. Excellent, a terrace view from the sanctity of the car should the rain squalls follow us up the motorway.
Both teams were going through their warm-ups and I recognised some of the Wembley players from last year – Bradley Scott, Andrew Walker and Paul Shelton, and just emerging from the clubhouse, player-manager Ian Bates who had over six hundred appearances for Wembley under his belt when I last saw the team play in August of 2007.
Garden Walk is a nice little ground with a wooden fence surrounding the pitch and a cordon of established trees surrounding the perimeter. The floodlights had just come on and a sizeable crowd, possibly a couple of hundred strong was beginning to assemble. Straddling the halfway line were two wooden dugouts on one side and a small brick stand opposite. At the far end opposite the clubhouse and changing rooms was a row of residential houses.
The match kicked off at a quarter to eight sharp and within ten minutes Royston were ahead. A ball was only partially cleared from the Wembley box and following up was Crows midfielder Conor De Lacy to slam the ball into the back of the net.
Wembley were being denied space by the young Royston team and were struggling to play the ball out from the back, while long clearances were gobbled up by the home side and threaded down the slight slope towards the Wembley goal.
Worse was to come for the north London visitors shortly after when a mix up in defence found the ball at the feet of Crows Ryan Lockett who finished from the edge of the box. I got a picture (somewhat blurry) of the shot being taken and the despairing dive of Wembley keeper Richard McCabe.
At this stage things were starting to get too dark for any effective photos and so I packed up my camera and started to complete my circumference of the ground. As I walked around the bottom end of the pitch I noticed another snapper who I pegged must be from the local rag. Our eyes fell onto each others' equipment and the familiar nod took place.
'Are you getting any that aren't blurry?' I asked.
'Not really,' he replied, 'I've got it rated so low that anything I do get is really grainy.' At this point his technical description had completely lost me, so I just nodded, but he showed me a picture which looked sharp but very dark.
'Are you from the local paper?' I asked knowingly.
'Yes, the Royston Crow.'
'Your paper is called the Crow?'
'Yes.'
'And this team are called the Crows. So did the paper name itself after the team or the other way round?'
'You mean which came first, the chicken or the Crow. Actually I'm not sure, but the rugby team are also called the Crows, so we must just be a Crow sort of town.'
'Right well I'll let you get on with it.' I made my excuses and continued on around the ground, I was heading for the snack bar for a cup of tea, and arrived just as the rain started to fall and so headed for the car to watch the second period under cover.
Ten minutes into the second half and the game was effectively put to bed. A long ball was swung into the Wembley area and met on the volley by centre forward Craig Hammond – a delicious finish which brought a tumultuous cheer from the sizeable home crowd. Hammond collected his brace five minutes later, finishing sweetly from a corner.
At four-nil down and with a long journey back to London ahead of them, Wembley's heads dropped. The Crows were pecking at the remains of the Lions with delight and the chances were raining in. If the Wembley management were able to throw in the towel we would all have been going home half an hour early.
Once again I had witnessed a Hertfordshire team putting paid to Wembley FC's dreams of going from Wembley to Wembley.
Thanks for that, great read.
I'm a bit gutted for Wembley. They really won me over at the first leg and I think they're a cracking club.
Good luck to Royston in the next round. They also seemed like a good bunch and were the better team on Saturday as well as, obviously, Tuesday.
Posted by: Chris | August 21, 2008 at 20:37