Playing to the whistle

Saturday 12 October 2013, Halstead Town 2 March Town United 1, Thurlow Nunn Division One - Rosemary Lane

Malcolm Root is an Essex born, artist who specialises in painting steam trains, and many are set in scenes close to his Colchester home. Behind the bar at Halstead Town is a large print of one of his pictures - not one his more well know prints. So why on display at Rosemary Lane? the reason is the ground acts as the backdrop to the steam train - the painting is titles 'Playing to the whistle'

Hard to find a good copy of the print on the internet, but the painting has been used for Christmas Cards and more well known as the scene for a 1,00 piece jigsaw.

Take a visit to Rosemary Lane, a giant non-league stand - sit in it and you can almost imagine that steam train slowing down as it passes the ground so the driver can see how Halstead are getting on.

Getting back to the match - both teams attempted to play football and Halstead had some very young and skilful players (mainly out wide) but also a carthorse up front (but he did score both Halstead goals!) I think Halstead will find it harder as the season goes on as their pitch is certainly not one of the best - making it harder to stick to their passing game.

The Programme shop, damp, dark but full of great reminders of local football

Arbroath to Cornard - a one man show!

Saturday 15 December 2012, Cornard United 0 Halstead Town 2, Thurlow Nunn Division One, Blackhouse Lane

I was expecting goals, last time I saw Cornard they let in 14 goals and before the game they had a goal difference of minus 74

But it was closer game than expected with a young Halstead team only putting two past Cornard. One of the reasons is that Cornard have a number of new players including the keeper who was outstanding, making a number of superb saves. Halstead are a young team who try to play a passing game so maybe never had the killer touch to put a shed full of goals past Cornard.

Chris Symes the long serving manager at Cornard is looking to hand over, I say manager, he is actually owner, gateman, programme editor, seller, groundsman and numerous other jobs. There is no one else! One of the substitutes made the tea at halftime and Chris alternated from selling programmes, collecting gate money, serving beer and giving the team talk.

So Cornard may not even exist next season – but visit if you can, great pitch and a ground that would be good enough for a few levels higher. Chris has a number of contacts in the pro game and the Cornard ground has been used for training by a number of top teams from England under 21s to Everton to Walsall.

Chris also has success as a non-league manager at Braintree and Chelmsford but also in the early 70s he was a coach at Scottish side, Arbroath who managed to beat Rangers. How do I know this? The club house is a mini museum to Chris and every space in the bar has a signed replica shirt. If he just sold the shirts he could keep the club going for one more season.