The following article appeared in the programme for Racing Club Warwick v Causeway United on 29th January 2005.
Another winter’s week goes by. Christmas comes and goes. And for those of us hooked on Racing Club Warwick, there is eager anticipation as thoughts turn to the post-Christmas visit of Stratford Town. Well tough luck one-and-all because the hard frost puts paid to another home game at Townsend Meadow! I got the call just before one o’clock telling me that Racing Club’s game is definitely off. By my reckoning that’s now six Racing Club games that need to be rescheduled. We’ll be playing Tuesday-Saturday in the final few weeks of the season I suspect. Let’s hope that the worst of the weather is behind us, otherwise we’ll be playing on consecutive days as was the case in our Southern League days when previous fixture pile-ups occurred.
Once again, the committed fan (er…that’s me folks!) must find another match to satisfy his yearning for live football. So where did I decide to go? Well I’m always on the lookout for a game at a ground that I haven’t yet visited and, having visited all the 92 League grounds and almost all of the Nationwide Conference (just Accrington Stanley to go), I’m having to go further and further down the pyramid to find new grounds. Another consideration, of course, is the time and distance involved – as is whether I can get the appropriate permissions from the missus! In the end, and once again using the invaluable fixtures list contained in the Non League Paper, I selected the delights of the local derby between Dunstable Town and Hemel Hempstead Town, a fixture which was still going ahead according to Ceefax.
You can imagine my joy therefore, having made good time through Southam, Daventry and via the M1 South and having arrived in Dunstable at a comfortable two thirty, to discover that the Dunstable Town car park was deserted. A quick check with a very helpful and informative club official told me all that I needed to know. The match had been called off within the last half an hour despite the best efforts of a small group of intrepid staff due to frozen patches in the shaded parts of the pitch. Disaster! I legged it back to the car and consulted the Non League Paper once again with a nervous eye on the clock. My rough knowledge of the proximity of football clubs to the Dunstable area came up trumps when I spotted that Barton Rovers were at home. A quick call to the club confirmed that the game was on and I made the fifteen-mile trip without incident (and respecting the speed limit at all times, honest Officer) to arrive in the club car park about two minutes before kick off.
I suspect that the majority of you will know little or nothing about Barton Rovers. This was my first visit to their Sharpenhoe Road ground and what a little gem it turned out to be. This season Barton Rovers are making their debut in the Southern League’s Division One East, having previously played at the same level in the Isthmian (Ryman) League prior to the reorganisation of the non-league pyramid. For those of you Racing Club diehards who are struggling to relate to this, Division One East is the level at which Racing Club would have been playing at had we not been relegated in 2002-03, albeit that we would probably have been playing in Division One West along with old foes such as Bedworth United, Bromsgrove Rovers, Evesham and Sutton Coldfield Town.
Where is Barton? Well Rovers are based in the Bedfordshire village of Barton-Le-Clay. The match in question, which had kicked off by the time I actually got in (I missed nothing as you could see perfectly well standing on tiptoes waiting for the queue of latecomers to make their way through the turnstiles), was another local derby, with 1977-78 FA Vase Finalists Rovers hosting Arlesey Town, themselves the 1994-95 FA Vase Winners. The pitch appeared to be very hard and the temperature must have been at or close to freezing but, given the conditions, credit to the officials and to both teams that a hard-but-fair encounter ensued with Rovers easing their way to a 3-0 victory. A brief cameo appearance by Arlesey coach and former Spurs player Scott Houghton gave me a short trip down memory lane before climbing back into the car for the journey home. Here’s praying for better weather and some Racing Club exploits to review.
Keep the faith!
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