The Road to Wembley 2012!

[Panda]

Attendances:

Thurnby Nirvana: 46
Retford United 206


There were 1,149 at Ascot v Wembley last night.

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Thurnby Nirvana successfully made it through to the next round after winning their replay against Desborough Town 5-0.

The preliminary round takes place this weekend.

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Haven's teams are still in the FA Cup after yesterday's games.

Thurnby Nirvana beat St. Neots Town 2-0 and will be at home to Barrow Town in the next round.

Gresley drew 1-1 with Shirebrook Town. The winner of the replay will be away to Mickleover Sports.

[Tom]

Ummed and ahhed about going to the Herne Bay-Deal game yesterday and in the end didn't bother. Should have done as well as Herne Bay won 3-0, a good win.

Can't help feeling that on a Reading free weekend and good weather that was my best chance to go this season as well.. Hopefully i'll have another chance to go before Christmas, am aiming to go to at least 1 or 2 games this season, don't care about the league cup but they'll be competing on 3 other fronts, league, FA Cup and FA Vase, so should be plenty of options there.

[Panda]

Saw Marske United get knocked out at Whitley Bay yesterday. Much better performance than last week when we lost 4-0 there in the league.

We were the better side in the first half and missed some good chances but gave away two silly goals in the second half and lost 2-0.

Would've been away to Kendal Town in the next round...

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Gresley are successfully through to the 1st qualifying round after beating Shirebrook Town 3-2 in extra time in their preliminary round replay.

[o]

Yeah, nice to keep the same teams for another round...

[Panda]

Results from today's 1st Qualifying Round matches:

THURNBY NIRVANA 1-1 Barrow Town

Mickleover Sports 4-2 GRESLEY

[Tom]

Went to this game yesterday...

Herne Bay 2 Erith Town 3 Attendance: 222 (no more than 10 away fans i thought)

Marsden after 14 mins for Herne Bay with great lob from the left edge of the area - v similar to a goal that Gillingham scored yesterday.
Walker equalising for Erith on 60 mins and then scoring again on 77.
Perkins for Herne Bay 82 mins
Burgess winning it 85 for Erith with a pen.

Herne Bay losing their 28 match unbeaten record so I was clearly a bad luck charm! The result was disappointing, had expected a 1 or 2 goal win, but it was a good match. Felt odd going to this game when originally planned to go to Reading game, and with the Royals getting the first home win of the season combined with this result clearly went to the wrong game!

A couple of things had changed since my last visit in 1997. The side entrance off the main road no longer existed and the crowd felt noticeably small, there were certainly less people behind the opposition goal (they change ends at HT). There were several Erith fans in the stand where I was but I doubt there were more than about 10 in total in the ground.

Simon Halsey the Herne Bay manager said that the pitch suited the way Herne Bay play, which i assumed, correctly as it happens, was a sign that the Bay play a passing game. But it also suited Erith too as they tried to keep the ball on the deck, but with more pace in their attack, something that was to prove more significant the longer the match went on. 1st 15 mins HB started slowly but it didn't take long to see why they had been keeping clean sheets, solid in defence and comfortable on the ball. Then they scored a great goal as mentioned above which settled them down and for the next 10-15 mins were in control. But for the last 15 mins Erith were the better side with HB giving away free-kicks. Despite this they never threatened the goal, the keeper had nothing to do apart from claim a couple of crosses. The most impressive part of his game was his massive throws which were capable of reaching the half-line! 2nd half HB basically lost their control of the game and seemed content to defend deep and hit on the break. The equaliser came when the right-back was beaten the cross was put in low from the left and although the keeper got a hand to it he could only divert it to the attacker who slotted it in. Erith then scored again when the striker ran clear of the defence before slotting past the keeper. This sparked HB into life for the first time since HT and they scored at the 2nd attempt following a corner, the right-back scoring making up for his earlier mistake. The remainder of the game was rather to end to end with Erith sealing the victory with the pen after the player had ridden the challenges. Didn't seem to go down well in the stand, (being critical of the player that is not the decision itself) but he looked like he was going to score anyway. What stood out to me was how vocal the players were 1st half especially, something easily forgotten when you don't watch non-league often. That said i'm not sure the HB game I saw before or the Whitstable-Dover game in 2007 it was so noticeable but maybe with the bigger crowds at those 2 made it less apparent. HB were particularly vocal in the first half though, they looked a side that communicated well. But in the 2nd half when they lost control of the game they were noticeably quieter.

The ref made the odd strange decision, but generally had a decent game, always tried to play advantage and kept the play flowing despite some physical challenges coming in at times.

P.S sorry for the length of this post!

[Panda]

It's a Haven derby in the 2nd qualifying round!

Mickleover Sports will be at home to either Thurnby Nirvana or Barrow Town!

[Panda]

Sept 18, 2011 12:43:48 GMT 1 Tom said:

Went to this game yesterday...

Herne Bay 2 Erith Town 3 Attendance: 222 (no more than 10 away fans i thought)

Marsden after 14 mins for Herne Bay with great lob from the left edge of the area - v similar to a goal that Gillingham scored yesterday.
Walker equalising for Erith on 60 mins and then scoring again on 77.
Perkins for Herne Bay 82 mins
Burgess winning it 85 for Erith with a pen.

Herne Bay losing their 28 match unbeaten record so I was clearly a bad luck charm! The result was disappointing, had expected a 1 or 2 goal win, but it was a good match. Felt odd going to this game when originally planned to go to Reading game, and with the Royals getting the first home win of the season combined with this result clearly went to the wrong game!

A couple of things had changed since my last visit in 1997. The side entrance off the main road no longer existed and the crowd felt noticeably small, there were certainly less people behind the opposition goal (they change ends at HT). There were several Erith fans in the stand where I was but I doubt there were more than about 10 in total in the ground.

Simon Halsey the Herne Bay manager said that the pitch suited the way Herne Bay play, which i assumed, correctly as it happens, was a sign that the Bay play a passing game. But it also suited Erith too as they tried to keep the ball on the deck, but with more pace in their attack, something that was to prove more significant the longer the match went on. 1st 15 mins HB started slowly but it didn't take long to see why they had been keeping clean sheets, solid in defence and comfortable on the ball. Then they scored a great goal as mentioned above which settled them down and for the next 10-15 mins were in control. But for the last 15 mins Erith were the better side with HB giving away free-kicks. Despite this they never threatened the goal, the keeper had nothing to do apart from claim a couple of crosses. The most impressive part of his game was his massive throws which were capable of reaching the half-line! 2nd half HB basically lost their control of the game and seemed content to defend deep and hit on the break. The equaliser came when the right-back was beaten the cross was put in low from the left and although the keeper got a hand to it he could only divert it to the attacker who slotted it in. Erith then scored again when the striker ran clear of the defence before slotting past the keeper. This sparked HB into life for the first time since HT and they scored at the 2nd attempt following a corner, the right-back scoring making up for his earlier mistake. The remainder of the game was rather to end to end with Erith sealing the victory with the pen after the player had ridden the challenges. Didn't seem to go down well in the stand, (being critical of the player that is not the decision itself) but he looked like he was going to score anyway. What stood out to me was how vocal the players were 1st half especially, something easily forgotten when you don't watch non-league often. That said i'm not sure the HB game I saw before or the Whitstable-Dover game in 2007 it was so noticeable but maybe with the bigger crowds at those 2 made it less apparent. HB were particularly vocal in the first half though, they looked a side that communicated well. But in the 2nd half when they lost control of the game they were noticeably quieter.

The ref made the odd strange decision, but generally had a decent game, always tried to play advantage and kept the play flowing despite some physical challenges coming in at times.

P.S sorry for the length of this post!

It's always a bit disappointing when you play a team from the same division in the cup and it seems to have happened a lot more in the early rounds this season. But form goes out of the window in these games.

You're definitely right about how vocal the players are at this level, though I've noticed the better a team is doing, the more the players will talk to each other. Marske United are currently on a 7-game losing run (and we have Bedlington Terriers tomorrow ) and the players have been noticeably quieter, compared to last season.

[o]

I dont think our two teams have ever met this early in the competition have they?!?

[Panda]

Sept 19, 2011 16:15:50 GMT 1 o said:

I dont think our two teams have ever met this early in the competition have they?!?

No, nowhere near this early. I think the earliest might've been the quarter-finals or maybe last 16.

[Panda]

Thurnby Nirvana's cup run is at an end after they lost their replay 3-1 at Barrow Town.

[Tom]

Sept 19, 2011 16:05:09 GMT 1 Panda said:

It's always a bit disappointing when you play a team from the same division in the cup and it seems to have happened a lot more in the early rounds this season. But form goes out of the window in these games.

You're definitely right about how vocal the players are at this level, though I've noticed the better a team is doing, the more the players will talk to each other. Marske United are currently on a 7-game losing run (and we have Bedlington Terriers tomorrow ) and the players have been noticeably quieter, compared to last season.

You're probably right about form. Erith treated it as a special occasion by coming down by coach rather than the players arriving individually by car.

[o]

Would it be worth choosing another team from the Conference teams, or when the div 1 and div 2 teams come in, just to have another one in the Comp?

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Barrow Town pulled off a shock, winning 4-1 against Mickleover Sports, who are three steps above them in the pyramid, to become Haven's sole team in this season's FA Cup.

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Barrow Town go out after losing 3-0 at home to RUSHALL OLYMPIC.


There is at least one step 6 club through to the final qualifying round, after Hebburn Town won 4-2 at Radcliffe Borough.

[Tom]

Where are we up to with this? I'm planning on picking the Haven team/teams in the FA Cup predicta, so just want to be sure who it is before I select the fixtures (sometime tomorrow).

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Stourbridge is our remaining team.