Down south for plenty of goals

Saturday 19 October 2019, Charlton Athletic Under 18s 3 Ipswich Town Under 18s 3 - Development League, Sparrows Lane and then onto:
Crowborough Athletic 2 AFC Croydon Athletic 5 - Crowborough Community Stadium, Southern Counties, East Football League, Premier Division.

Double game day, south of the Thames and I was rewarded with 13 goals!

The youth game at Charlton had six goals and a penalty save - a game Ipswich should have won but they were not helped by a ref, who was keen to book as many players as he could then add on an amazing amount of injury time- fortunate for Charlton as they scored in injury time in both halves!

A sort drive then into East Sussex, surprised to find that we were the only people in the clubhouse, but all was explained when entering the ground as in the corner of the ground was the Crow Arms, also selling the excellent Harvey's beer!

The whole ground had character, from the small seated strand, the view over the forest and the covered terrace behind the goal which included the changing rooms and a tea bar.

Football wise neither team are on a great run but I saw enough from both teams to think they should be on the move upwards and in particular, Croydon seemed to have a great attacking threat.

Quality pitch

9 March 2017, Beckenham Town 1 Crowborough Athletic 3- Eden Park Avenue, Southern Counties East League

The ground is beginning to look a bit tacky, the home team are near the bottom - but when you arrive you just can't believe how green the pitch is for this time of the year.

It was not just the pitch that was a nice surprise, Beckenham may be just one off the bottom and the visitors just one place from the top but what we saw was a very competitive game and  Crowborough had to work hard to get the three points.

Beckenham  have a talented young team maybe just need a bit more encouragement from their coaching team who just seemed to want to shout and moan at both the ref and their own players.

All in all, it was a good evening of football and really like the feel of the place, just hope they find enough to stay up.