Top league stadium, top league crowds but lower league team

Friday 16 February 2018, Rot-Weiss Essen 0 Bonner SC 1 - Essen Stadium, Regionalliga West

Meant to be watching the best ream in the league, Viktoria Koln but some unexpected snow meant a regional train to Essen for the first football of the weekend.

Koln may be top of the league but Essen are the most popular team, with average crowds of over 7,000.

Soon as I arrived at the ground, I was impressed, new stadium in an out of town car park but it had a football feel to it, all fans chatting, free programme and plenty of beer on sale - and being drunk. Great singing from the fans and plenty of encouragement for the home team but that did not help.

the team are poor, Dortmund and Shalke 04 are their natural rivals, but it will be a long time till Essen are ever playing them again if they do not improve on the pitch.

The other great thing about Essen is the history of their club is important, and around the ground are pictures and statues to remind you of the past and their links to heavy industry.

Football is an important part of life for many in the Ruhr region

FC Shalke 04, Dortmund, great football teams from the Ruhr area, some compare it to Lancashire, Yorkshire on even cities in Northern Italy. industrial area, coal mines, steel works - where people worked hard and played hard.

Shalke and Dortmund may be the top teams in the area now but once it was Rot-Weiss Essen who were the 'top dogs'.

I saw Essen in a game last week, and they may now be playing in a Regional league, but they still get crowds of over 6,000. This shows how important football is in this area, but another great thing about watching football in Essen is that they are proud of their history - not just the football club but the links with heavy industry.

 

Essen team in 1950 - buildings still damaged from the war.

The next day I was in an art gallery in Cologne, the Ludwig- Modern art, and then in the museum shop I found this set of 4 postcards from the Ruhr Museum - the subject is football and two of the pictures show football being played with heavy industry in the background.

Duisburg 1939

 

1950's football in Essen

 



 

 

 



Helmut Rahn - Essen 1954

Not a great day for football

Saturday 10 February 2018, Ipswich Town 0 Burton Albion 0, Championship, Portman Road

Lowest crowd for a league game for 20 years and one of our worst home displays for 20 years, just what you want a week before the derby.

Played with pride

Tuesday 6 February 2018, Leiston 2 Ipswich Town Under 18s 1 - Victory Road, Suffolk Premier Cup Quarter Final

We played well! After two bad defeats in the last 10 days, a young Ipswich side turned up tonight and played with pride. Stood up to their older opponents (who included 5 ex Town players) and were unlucky to lose to a 92nd minute goal.

Makes you feel old

Monday 5 February 2018, Colchester United Under 23s 5 Ipswich Town Under 23s 2 - Florence Park, Professional Development League

Makes you feel old when two of the players, Harry Wright for Ipswich and Diaz Wright for Colchester are the sons of Ipswich players who played in the 2000 Play off final victory. Diaz would be the one who went home the happiest.

Home of the East(s)

Saturday 3 February 2018, East Bergholt United 4 Grundisburgh 1 - Suffolk and Ipswich League, Senior Division, Gandish Road


Cold but dry day, and the need to be back early in Ipswich  this evening meant it was going to be a local game for my footie fix.

So I ended up in Constable country, close to the Essex border. A basic set up and a small pavilion but it was in here that you get the real feel for village football. The pavilion like many has old team pictures on the wall, both cricket and football. You notice straight away that the same surnames keep popping up on the team pictures and I guess the same families.

One name I spotted made me look at the pictures more closely, it was the name 'East' - there were  a number of players, both cricket and footballers with this surname and though I did not spot the person I was looking for, some of those called East, looked very like Ray East, Bergholts most famous sporting son. Ray had played football cricket for the village before becoming one of the greatest bolwers to ever play for Essex. One player in one of the pictures, I guess a close relative to Ray, could have been a twin if it was not for the case that the picture was from the early 50s.

From this display I am not sure any of the current players will ever be remembered as those from the 'East' family in the village. they did win, but only after Grundisburgh had a player sent off, if it had been 11 v 11 it would have been a much closer game.

What was noticeable was the gap in quality between these two sides and the likes of Achilles at the top of the table, both village teams could certainly do with another 'East' or his like in their team.

Constable Hall - not sure the artist would have found much to paint here today.

As usual, if it is Playford Road, it is raining!

Friday 2 February 2018, Ipswich Town Under 18s 1 Colchester United Under 18s 5 - Playford Road, U18 Professional Development League

What is it about Playford Road? Rain, wind and another defeat for our Youth team.