Saturday 24th April 2010 - Cambridge City 0 Hednesford Town 3 Zamaretta League
For a number of reasons I found myself at Milton Road - the home of Cambridge City rather than at Newcastle United watching Ipswich.
First of all I didn't fancy watching 50,000 plus Geordie's celebrating a trophy which they had won easy, and also I thought at one time that this would be the last ever game of football played at Milton Road.
What went wrong? Well Ipswich played well in the North East and got a draw and Cambridge City have been given a further season at Milton Road , so the proposed ground share with Newmarket Town is now on hold.
The ground itself is more than adequate enough for City with one excellent stand that includes the changing rooms and the social club, trouble is the land is much sought after, so Cambridge still are not sure where they will eventually end up.
What they know is after this defeat that they will not be in the play offs and they now have a local derby v Bury Town to look forward to as they were promoted today. 613 was the attendance today, City's highest of the season, funny how clubs can take take separate paths and end up so far apart.
In the 1930's, it was Cambridge City not Norwich who were our fiercest rivals, as we were two of the 3 top teams in the Southern Amateur League, but we decided to go professional and ended up in the Football League after short stay in the Southern League (the league City are in now) so since being rivals in 1930, we have gone onto win the League, win in Europe and lift the FA Cup and today saw us hold Newcastle in front of over 50,000 whilst City find themselves now only the third best team in the vicinity of Cambridge.
The programme was a good read and had an Ipswich connection ( and not just because 5 of the City players once played for Ipswich) it included scans of the Cambridge v Ipswich programme from the game in 1930, where the police had to draw their truncheons after tempers flared between the rival fans after Ipswich won 5-3!
A good football day out, also a good day for a picnic by the river!
