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sarahxBlackburn Rovers Supporters 4, Aberdeen Supporters 2nd XI 1
8 January 2006
When I'm watching footy on wet, cold, miserable days, I sit smugly under cover looking at the poor players out on the pitch getting soggy, extremely glad that I'm nice and dry (if not exactly warm).
Unfortunately, when I'm the referee, I get wet.
It was definitely one of these days when the only adequate response was 'What the f**k am I doing here?'
As the third match on an already cut-up pitch on a rainy day, the conditions underfoot were never going to be good. In fact, they were filthy: very wet and sticky, with little evidence of grass in a 20 yard radius of the centre circle or in the vicinity of the goals. The centre circle was a myth, and locating the centre spot involved standing somewhere between the two extremely distant visible extremes of the largely absent half-way line, and taking a guess where the middle of the goals were.
And as a match, it was a classic example of the glorious genre that is Sunday league football. Any vestiges of skill vanished in the mud, with studs being insufficient to stop the players sliding all over the place. Blackburn started with 10 players as the 11th was still on the tube, along with their one and only substitute. Aberdeen started with 11, but were sub-less – which proved a distinct disadvantage when one of their number wandered off the pitch to vomit, before vanishing into the dressing room, not to be seen again.
I pity the washing machines of the poor souls who got to wash the kit.
I got to share the refs' changing room with two other (male) refs, but commandeered it for my sole use to get changed. There are even ladies' loos. All mod cons, eh?
However, they're far from exotic, and hide down a dark, dingy, dirty corridor.
It doesn't get any better at the end of the corridor. In the five years I've been frequenting the ground, the only change has been the lovely new double-glazed windows they put in 18 months ago. Everything else is the same. Including the non-functioning light. The cleaners evidently don't grace the place with their presence very often, and there's rarely any loo roll.
And the sink – ick. It's evidently been used for a spot of boot-cleaning. I wonder how many weeks that mud has been there?
Score: 2/10. And they only get that many points because I've yet to see the loos actually blocked, because the loos at Wandsworth Common are, amazingly, worse, and because the parky is nice and friendly and lets me thaw my fingers out after the match on the fan heater in his office!
8 January 2006
When I'm watching footy on wet, cold, miserable days, I sit smugly under cover looking at the poor players out on the pitch getting soggy, extremely glad that I'm nice and dry (if not exactly warm).
Unfortunately, when I'm the referee, I get wet.
It was definitely one of these days when the only adequate response was 'What the f**k am I doing here?'
As the third match on an already cut-up pitch on a rainy day, the conditions underfoot were never going to be good. In fact, they were filthy: very wet and sticky, with little evidence of grass in a 20 yard radius of the centre circle or in the vicinity of the goals. The centre circle was a myth, and locating the centre spot involved standing somewhere between the two extremely distant visible extremes of the largely absent half-way line, and taking a guess where the middle of the goals were.
And as a match, it was a classic example of the glorious genre that is Sunday league football. Any vestiges of skill vanished in the mud, with studs being insufficient to stop the players sliding all over the place. Blackburn started with 10 players as the 11th was still on the tube, along with their one and only substitute. Aberdeen started with 11, but were sub-less – which proved a distinct disadvantage when one of their number wandered off the pitch to vomit, before vanishing into the dressing room, not to be seen again.
I pity the washing machines of the poor souls who got to wash the kit.
I got to share the refs' changing room with two other (male) refs, but commandeered it for my sole use to get changed. There are even ladies' loos. All mod cons, eh?
However, they're far from exotic, and hide down a dark, dingy, dirty corridor.
It doesn't get any better at the end of the corridor. In the five years I've been frequenting the ground, the only change has been the lovely new double-glazed windows they put in 18 months ago. Everything else is the same. Including the non-functioning light. The cleaners evidently don't grace the place with their presence very often, and there's rarely any loo roll.
And the sink – ick. It's evidently been used for a spot of boot-cleaning. I wonder how many weeks that mud has been there?
Score: 2/10. And they only get that many points because I've yet to see the loos actually blocked, because the loos at Wandsworth Common are, amazingly, worse, and because the parky is nice and friendly and lets me thaw my fingers out after the match on the fan heater in his office!
