End of Season Roller Round-Up 2016/17

WHITCHURCH UNITED: KRUSHA!

I've only told a few close friends this up until now, but I think it's about time a few more of you were made aware of my plans for this coming autumn...

I've decided to change my field of work. Enough of barely scraping by working for The Man. I'm striking out on my own. It's the only way I'm ever going to have a chance of getting rich. Enough of the crushing clockwatching tick-tock-tedium of 9 to 5. My dreams are going to become real!

In September, I shall be opening a new tattoo parlour on Shirley High Street. I'm going to call it "I TA-TA-TATTOO Ü". To this end, I've been interviewing potential tattooists. This afternoon, a lad called Ryan called in. I asked him to show me what he could do by giving me a temporary tattoo on my forearm. I drew a roller in my notebook and instructed him to add a wolf to the face of the roller. I sat back, closed my eyes, and let him get on with it.

I must have dozed off, because an hour later, I opened my eyes, glanced down, and this is what I saw:

Is that a toilet roll?!

I couldn't believe it! Not only had Ryan copied my notebook drawing EXACTLY, but he'd also used permanent ink! I now have the world's worst tattoo...

But life goes on, and my next task before the grand opening of I TA-TA-TATTOO Ü is to create an online catalogue of potential tattoos for my future customers. The market for mystical beasts, tribal symbols, messages of love, English roses, upside-down crosses, burning skulls, etc, is well saturated, especially in Shirley, so I needed an original angle.

I decided to try and create a new market for football club groundsmen. Wouldn't they just love a "sleeve" full of rusty rollers, turf prodders and line-marking equipment? I decided to look through my photos from the second half of last season for inspiration for the catalogue, and I think I've come up with a few winners.

Firstly, the life model for my own forearm mistake was Whitchurch United's fairly standard, but effective roller. I've called it KRUSHA! in the catalogue. It's a simple, classic design. For a few quid extra, we can add a wolf to the face of the roller...

HAMBLE CLUB: COCKALORUM.

If you already have a reasonably full sleeve, we can add a small (but perfectly formed) roller in to a suitable gap on your arm. The life model for this is what we've christened the Cockalorum from Hamble Club. I think the Cockalorum would look good with a cartoon wizard drawn on its smooth surface, but as the customer rules, we can add anything you like - perhaps a scorpion or a snorting bull or a pair of fish, inspired by your personal zodiac sign? Or would you prefer something a little more niche, like Jose Salomon Rondon's face superimposed on a crisp?

BANSTEAD ATHLETIC: SAUCY BOY.

If you want a roller design running the length of your forearm, we'll be recommending Banstead Athletic's rusty beast. I wanted to call this one Mr Sausage, but I was dissuaded from using this name, as my business partners considered it a bit risqué. We settled on Saucy Boy in the end. We can do the handles on this one in your own club's colours if you like, although we will insist that the main body is half grey, half rust, just like the original roller.

UPHAM FC: THE WICHITA ROPEMAN.

If you fancy something a little different from our regular roller designs, perhaps you'd like us to tattoo a rope-rolling machine on to your right shoulder blade? We found this one out in the Hampshire countryside at Upham. Our thought process for naming this one went something like this: Countryside > Country Music > Glen Campbell > Wichita Lineman > Wichita Ropeman. So, Wichita Ropeman it is...

It's a fairly complicated design, so it will be one of our more expensive tattoos. However, if you love both rope roller-uppers and country music, we're absolutely sure you'll love this!

COWES SPORTS: DIRTY DEN.

The roller we found at Cowes Sports on the Isle of Wight was seemingly used to flatten cow pats. It looked filthy, so we called it Dirty Den. East Enders fans will appreciate this one. But only because it's called Dirty Den. Although, come to think of it, if you'd like us to add actor Leslie Grantham's face to the cow pat, I'm sure we can do that for you.

SELSEY FC: THE GOOSEBERRY.

The saddest roller I've seen this past half-season was at Selsey in West Sussex. Not only is Selsey likely to be one of the UK's first casualties of extreme sea level rise...not only is Selsey the most likely place in England to be struck by a tornado...but this poor roller appeared broken in two. Perhaps its heart was rent in half due to a recent romantic break-up? And now it's the only roller in its social group who doesn't have a boyfriend / girlfriend. We've called this one The Gooseberry in our catalogue. You'll probably want to have this one tattooed somewhere difficult to see, such as between your shoulders, because you'll invariably feel miserable every time you catch sight of it.

ARUNDEL FC: THE CRUNCHY BAT.

Another roller spotted in Sussex was this curious fellow at Arundel. It reminded us of a gigantic woodlouse, so we called it The Crunchy Bat (an Olde English name for our tiny friends from the compost heap). We're working on further creepy-crawly-inspired designs. Look out for the Scary Spider and the Surprising Earwig in the New Year.

FORDINGBRIDGE TURKS: RICHTER PREDATOR 65.

Finally in our catalogue, we present our pièce de resistance, the mighty double-barrelled Richter Predator 65 from Fordingbridge Turks. The most incredible roller design we've ever seen, with the super-heavyweight one tonne barrel at the back, and the lighter, more nimble barrel at the front. Filled to the brim with accessories, such as the two-storey drinks holders, the car tyre safety bumpers, the fine adjustment wheely thing. Quite frankly, you'll never be able to afford this as a tattoo, so don't even think about it. I'd stick with the Cockalorum if I were you.

And in case you were wondering...No, Ryan didn't get the job.

If you'd like to see more rusty roller pictures, follow this link: Rollers etc.

Banstead Athletic v Eversley & California

Standing on a raised concrete slab to gain a better view of the players' arrival.

It's funny the things you remember. Back when I lived in Portsmouth as a late teen / early twenty-something, I knew this lad who just couldn't talk to girls. So tongue-tied, so shy. He would have done anything to get a girlfriend, but whenever a girl came near, he would effectively shrivel up and disappear. He might as well have been wearing an invisibility cloak. We would give him advice, try and help him out, but nothing ever worked.

Then one evening, he did the strangest thing. We were out at a gig, standing near the front, waiting for the main act to come on. It goes without saying that we'd had a few beers, but even so, I don't think I'd have ever had the nerve to do what he did.

Without warning, he laid down in front of a girl we vaguely knew from our little scene. He then covered his face with his overcoat and lay with his arms stretched rigidly down by his sides. We all looked at each other - this shrinking violet, this totally anonymous guy that never drew attention to himself in any way at all, was being weird.

The girl looked nonplussed at first, but then we noticed a little smile. She knelt down, gently drew the overcoat away from our chum's face, and he sat up, eyes wide open, arms rigid and horizontal in front of him, vacant thousand yard stare, mouth open, baring his teeth. He then turned his head slowly round to face her and said, poker-faced, "I'm a vampire!"

She cracked up, couldn't stop laughing. For the rest of the evening, they were inseparable. I don't remember what happened after that, but for all I know, they got married, had babies, and lived happily ever after.

I don't remember this lad's name, or anything else about him, other than he supported Crystal Palace, and had grown up in Banstead in Surrey.

Big fluffy clouds welling up behind Banstead Athletic's seated stand.

Details:
Banstead Athletic FC (3) 4 v 1 (1) Eversley & California FC
Saturday 28th January 2017
Cherry Red Records Combined Counties League Division One
Attendance: 35-ish
Admission: £6
Programme: £2
Colours: Old gold / black / black v Blue and white hoops / blue / blue and white hoops
National Grid reference: TQ2357

Where were we again?

Vampire Boy is the only person I've ever knowingly met from Banstead. I can never recall names of fleeting acquaintances or temporary workmates, but I do generally remember where people come from and the football teams they support. It's just the way I am.

I visited Banstead on Saturday. Not to look for Vampire Boy (who would now be an unrecognisable Middle-Aged Dracula), but to watch a game of football in the Cherry Red Records Combined Counties League Division One (step 6 in the non-league pyramid - equivalent to Wessex One).

I normally write about clubs in the Wessex and Hampshire Leagues, with the odd diversion higher up the pyramid to the Southern or National Leagues. But I always feature clubs from Hampshire, and there are a small number in the north-east of the county that play in mostly Surrey-based leagues, for example, Hartley Wintney, Cove and Eversley & California all play in the Combined Counties.

I've only featured Eversley & California once before (coincidentally, also against Banstead Athletic in that stupidly cold Spring of four years ago), so I thought it was about time I wrote about them again - and as they were playing the league leaders, this seemed like a good opportunity.

Two-goal hero AJ Morrison on the ball. Banstead's popular covered terrace behind him.

Three or four of my workmates usually ask where I'm going on a Saturday, and they invariably know the places I'm visiting, but Banstead, being out of my usual range, just drew blank stares. So, for those who don't know, Banstead Athletic actually play in neighbouring Tadworth. You would find them by exiting the M25 at junction 8 and driving towards Sutton for five minutes or so. You would veer left after three roundabouts, and then drive through sweet suburbia for another three or four minutes before reaching The A's Merland Rise ground.

Alternatively, the nearest train station is Tattenham Corner, approximately fifteen minutes walk from the ground. If Tattenham Corner sounds familiar, think back to June and the Epsom Derby. That's right, it's the final bend on the famous racecourse. It just so happens that I was almost an hour early arriving in Tadworth (I assumed I would probably get held up on either the A3 or M25 and allowed for that possibility by setting off before my AA app advised me to), so I stopped off on Epsom Downs to have a look at the racecourse.

You can park on the racecourse car park for free and wander over the large expanse of grass within the race track, joining dozens of dogs and their human companions. So I did. Down below you to the north, you can see London stretching off in to the distance, with teeny-tiny jumbo jets coming in to land at Heathrow every minute or so. In the foreground are the racecourse buildings, with a steep concrete terrace at the finishing line. I wondered why it's safe for behatted poshos to stand on that terrace guzzling champagne, and yet football fans at large stadiums have to sit down, shut up and not drink any alcohol whilst watching a game...

Banstead congratulate each other after their first goal, as a telecommunications mast / floodlight pylon stares down upon upon them from above.

After enjoying the view over London in the fresh air, I retraced my steps back to Merland Rise. You can live near Banstead Athletic's ground in a three-bedroom semi if you have a spare £463,000. How anybody can afford to live in this area of Surrey is beyond me, but live here they do, and 30 or so of the local residents had turned up to watch the table-toppers take on the team in fifth place.

Merland Rise is a very good ground for the level that The A's currently play at, but when you consider that Banstead were an Isthmian League side for around twenty seasons (with all the ground improvements that would have been required back then), then it's not so surprising.

The club car park is split in to two parts. By the back car park entrance is an abandoned turnstile block, which might come in handy again if the club regain their Isthmian status one day. Instead of paying at the turnstile, a woman sits at a picnic table by the entrance and takes your money, stowing it carefully away in an old ice cream tub.

Looking ahead and to your left, you will see three main structures: the popular terrace is directly in front of you, with a high roof; the less popular terrace is on your left behind the near goal, with a lower roof and less steps. Over the far side is a seated stand. Within this stand are four rows of backless red plastic seats, plus three cordoned off areas with more comfortable, blue plastic seats with backs, reserved for home officials, away officials and The Press. No "Press" here today, other than me and the home programme editor, who was busy snapping away and taking copious notes.

Excellent programme, by the way, very colourful and informative.

Ouch, wasn't that painful?! An Eversley defender crashes to the ground, but there was nothing he could do as Banstead score their third.

Eversley & California have been knocking on the door of promotion for several seasons now, only being denied through ground grading issues (floodlight arguments with neighbours, I believe) two seasons ago when they finished second in the league, whereas Banstead haven't finished higher than sixth in recent seasons. Indeed, the home club haven't won any league they've played in since 1965. It would be a rare and noteworthy achievement should they finish top this season.

However, they were shocked by their Hampshire-based visitors after just three minutes, when Eversley's James Osler shot home from close in on the right. Sam Jhonson-Freeman got a hand to it, but the ball trickled in to the far corner to put the visitors one up.

According to the programme, Banstead never know when they're beaten this season, and they proved as much after 15 minutes, when AJ Morrison scored from a similar position as Osler at the other end. This time, there was possibly a deflection off a defender which wrong-footed Charlie Lusty in Eversley's goal. Banstead celebrated under one of the imposing telecommunication masts / floodlight pylons which overlook the south side of the ground.

I have to assume that Banstead must make a few bob by renting out their floodlight pylons, as they play without any adverts, either on pitchside boards (very unusual) or on their shirts.

Morrison scored Banstead's second goal after 33 minutes when he headed a cross home from six yards. This was followed ten minutes later by the best goal of the game, as debutant Danny Penfold picked the ball up 30 yards out on the left and ran at Eversley's defence. There was no stopping him as he bore down on goal, walloping the ball home from the edge of the six yard box past despairing dives from Lusty and an unfortunate defender who appears to have landed on his neck in his desperation to keep the ball out of the net if the photo above is to be believed.

More fluffy clouds, glowing in Banstead Athletic club colours as the sun sets over Tadworth.

Banstead's most famous ex-player is arguably current Swansea City boss Paul Clement. One day, management team James Cameron and Rod Davis may well go on to manage at a higher level. If they do, they will never have an easier half-time team talk. All they had to do was to encourage their side to carry on as they were. Their tenacious appetite for victory was always going to be too much for Eversley.

The league leaders didn't even have to create their fourth and final goal for themselves, as an Eversley defender misplaced a pass straight to an unmarked Billy Frost, 25 yards from goal. One step forward, two steps forward, pick your spot and pass the ball into the net from eighteen yards. More celebrations for the team in old gold as the setting sun lit up the clouds above the stadium in club colours.

If Vampire Boy was in the ground (very unlikely with Palace at home on Saturday afternoon), he would have been impressed by the way that Banstead had scented blood and then proceeded to sink their teeth in to their opponents, with what may prove to be near-fatal consequences for Eversley's promotion chances this season.

Two rose-ringed parakeets squawked their appreciation as they flew over Merland Rise as the referee blew the final whistle. Banstead remained top of the CoCo Division One, one point ahead of Redhill. Three teams will go up this season to the Premier Division, but Eversley trail the final promotion spot by 11 points in sixth place. It's still doable, especially as they have games in hand, but sneaking in to third place will be tough for Hampshire's most northerly senior club.

I shall post another 40 or so photos on the HAH Facebook page on Tuesday teatime.

Next up, I shall be on more familiar territory, as I visit a Hampshire League club in the Portsmouth area on February 11th.

Well, there'll be no climbing up there this afternoon...

38. Eversley & California FC

Eversley & California's 1st team play on Pitch 1 (beyond the indoor cricket centre).

So, before travelling to Eversley, the only thing I knew about the village was that it was the childhood home of Laura Marling - and the only two things that I knew about Laura Marling was that she is the secret crush of all those serious twenty-something men that look like Mr Tumnus the Faun (minus the horizontal ears), and that the cheery chappy from Noah & The Whale wrote an entire album about their break-up.

I obtained the first fact from the book Never Mind the Bollards - A Road Trip Around England's Rock 'n' Roll Landmarks. The fact that the village of Eversley ("The glade of the wild boar" - described as a gathering of fourteen homesteads in the Domesday Book, and there aren't many more than that now...) made it in to this book was a little surprising, considering all the larger towns and villages that have no entry. In football fan terminology, Eversley is just a small town in Yateley, which in turn, is just a small town in Farnborough, which in turn, is just a small town in Aldershot...you get the idea.

Anyway, Southsea is in the book (the pier burning down during the filming of Tommy); Andover also (home of The Troggs); Southampton has Craig David; and Benny Hill is mentioned with his milk round in Eastleigh (hence his song Ernie, the Fastest Milkman in the West). Hampshire truly is a musical hotbed, and Eversley is now a part of this tradition.

Halfway line flag and official Combined Counties Football League ball. In the distance, hoppers and conveyors at an active gravel pit.

Details:
Eversley & California FC (1) 2 v 1 (0) Banstead Athletic FC
Saturday 30th March 2013
Cherry Red Records Combined Counties League Division One
Attendance: 27 (headcount, which would have included club officials, so paying customers probably less than 20)
Admission: £5 (included free programme)
Colours: Yellow and blue stripes / blue / blue v All red
Club shop: No
National Grid reference: SU7961

Eversley & California's seated stand.

Mercury Prize-nominated Laura Marling wrote the song Goodbye England (Covered in Snow) about Eversley. It's not the only pop music connection to the village, as the football team play in the Cherry Red Records Combined Counties Football League - Cherry Red being a record label and distributor. Created in the days of punk, and having made their money through selling shedloads of Dead Kennedys albums, Cherry Red are probably best known for their 750,000-selling Pillows and Prayers compilation, which sold for 99p and featured Everything But The Girl, amongst others.

As football lovers, they have released over fifty football-related albums, including clubcentric offerings for many British football teams, Pompey and Saints being amongst them. Saturday was my first ever Cherry Red Records Combined Counties League match (Cove and Hartley Wintney were visited for FA Cup ties). To celebrate, I did think about listing my ten favourite Cherry Red albums, but decided my readership wouldn't have the foggiest idea what I was writing about*.

Suffice to say that CDs by The Servants, The Chesterf!elds, The Flatmates, Felt, and various Cramps-inspired compilations are much-treasured around these parts. But names such as Van der Graaf Generator, Suzi Quatro, The Osmonds, 10cc, Isaac Hayes, Laurel Aitken also all feature on the Cherry Red advert carried in all Combined Counties League programmes, making it the coolest league in England.

*No change there then!

Not a great view from the seats!

Despite being in existence since 1910, Eversley FC only entered the Combined Counties League in 2009/10. Previously, they played in the Aldershot & District League. They merged with the California FC youth club in April 2012 to create the current Eversley & California FC combo (California being a suburb of nearby Wokingham - if you thought they'd merged with the gigantic American state, then you were wrong).

They are very much in Step 5/6 border territory, as a mile to the north, Finchampstead play in the Hellenic League. A couple of miles to the south and east, Fleet Spurs inhabit the Wessex League.

Eversley & California are the most westerly members of the CCL, but if they were in the Hellenic League, they would be the most southerly inhabitants of that league (and would face potential trips to Gloucestershire). If they were in the Wessex, they would be obliged to take expensive trips to the Isle of Wight at least a couple of times each season (which surely must put off Cove and Hartley Wintney from applying to join a league which contains most of their Hampshire rivals). It's a Bermuda Triangle of cost versus tradition decisions for the clubs in this area.

They have chosen to play in a league which mostly contains clubs from Surrey and South London, which probably cuts down on their overall travelling costs compared to the other two options.

A newly-delivered kit stand, all ready for action in Eversley & California's car park.

The Eversley Sports Association Ground is still very new. You certainly won't find it in any books of historic non-league stadiums. It's so new that their prefabricated terrace had only just been delivered during the week of my visit, and was sitting in the club car park, awaiting directions for erection.

The car park itself would be ideal for toy soldiers to play war games in. Hundreds of potholes, which could have been formed by miniature Airfix bombers dropping their small but deadly loads across the roadway, would make brilliant hiding places for 1:100 scale brave Tommy soldiers with their deadly plastic war machines to advance without fear on unsuspecting enemies. Ka-boom! Take that, you cruel and black-hearted non-nation-specific* adversaries!

Moving on from the car park, you pass the changing room/tea bar building and then a large indoor cricket centre on your left. The final structure before the football pitch is a small pay shed. Beyond this is the main, railed pitch that the first team play on (there are several more pitches to your right, one of which was being used by the A team on Saturday, playing against a team in black and white stripes).

The main features of interest can be seen in my photos. The floodlight poles are new, only erected in the past couple of weeks. The three poles on the disused gravel pit side are outside the rails, whereas the three on the stand side are inside, which means that the pitch has had to be shifted over towards the old gravel pits by a couple of yards to lessen the chances of players smacking into the poles (ouch!).

*Don't want to annoy any of my international readers! Incidentally, the only armies I have are hidden up my sleevies.

This concreted area is presumably where the new terrace will go? Perhaps the seats will be moved at the same time?

Coincidentally, considering Laura Marling's song about Eversley, there were a few flakes of snow in the air during the match against Banstead Athletic on Saturday. I stood over the more exposed side, although this did mean that the north-easterly wind was blowing on to my back, rather than my face. The fellow stood nearest me was dressed all in black, with his snorkel hood up, looking like a goth eskimo. He went to rescue a stray ball at one point during the first half. Booted over a low fence, it landed on some thick, clay mud, used to infill the former gravel pit on this side.

Next to the mud was a disagreeable brown pond, which nevertheless attracted birds from time to time. I had binoculars with me, so during breaks in play, I spotted five pied wagtails, a pair of Canada geese and a pair of mallards (and if the chap who was on Pointless recently is reading this, who thought that mallards were "ground birds", may I remind him that mallards are actually ducks).

Young, fast-growing trees have been planted all around the ground, so in a few years, it won't be quite so exposed. According to her song, Laura wants to come back to Eversley when she's old, so the ESA will have matured a bit by then, along with her.

Groovy moves! Banstead Athletic's keeper saved this point-blank effort.

I'm sure that if Mark "Lawro" Lawrenson was commentating on this match with Banstead Athletic, he'd adapt his "hilarious" joke about it not being fair that Liverpool had to play both Havant AND Waterlooville in the FA Cup to fit this game. You see, Banstead Athletic had found it hard to contain BOTH Eversley AND California during the first half (if Lawro ever considers retiring, I'm ready to step in). E&C took the lead through Chris Fox after ten minutes, and it looked like the floodgates might open (goal floodgates, not any floodgates attached to the dirty neighbouring pond, thank goodness).

But Banstead started to play better after this, and E&C then found it hard to contain them - if aliens had landed and watched this game during the second half (instead of kidnapping everyone present and conducting agonising experiments on our puny human bodies, which is far more likely), they wouldn't have known that E&C were third in the league (a promotion position) and that Banstead were third from bottom. Indeed, the away team equalised five minutes in to the second half - for E&C, the goal was akin to being caught walking out of Sainsbury's with an unpaid-for pizza in their shopping bag and not knowing about it, alarm going off and being summoned by a stern-looking security guard, such was the shock on the faces of the home team (it's okay though, the woman at the till had put one pizza through twice, so that the unpaid-for pizza had actually been paid for - the security guard put the alarm going off down to their magnetic charisma).

E&C eventually recovered from their pizza incident and won the game five minutes from the end, when Banstead's centre-half and goalie had an "after you, Claude"* moment, and Neil Williams nipped in to steal the ball and wallop home from six yards. You can see how pleased he was in the photo below, celebrating as if he was in front of a crowd of 30,000, instead of...well, it was just me standing at that end just then!

*Thanks to Lawro for that phrase!

Eversley & California's Neil Williams celebrates his late winning goal at the Active Gravel Pit End.

The only other match report I've seen resides on a CCL forum here. There was another groundhopper present taking photos, but I have failed to locate them anywhere on the internet.

All of which leaves me with just three more grounds to visit in the final four weeks of the season. I'm so close to doing this thing!