Today I'm going back 21 years to 2002 and Stratford Town's Midland Football Alliance fixture against Ludlow Town from Shropshire. The game was played in Stratford-upon-Avon at Town's old Masons Road ground. Stratford-upon-Avon isn't terribly far from my home in Warwick but, at the time, I hadn't made a visit to Masons Road so this was a new ground for me. In 2008 Town vacated Masons Road for a new facility at Knights Lane in the nearby village of Tiddington and their previous ground is now no more. Ludlow proceeded to surprise a few people on the day by picking up all three points when running out as 2-1 winners.
The cover of the programme featured carries no details of the date of the game or even the name of the opponents but that isn't terribly unusual in the world of Non-League football where cost considerations often dictate a standard cover that is used for every home game throughout the season. Of course programme collectors prefer their programme covers to carry match details since it helps when it comes to organising their collection. On the whole however, I'm grateful for any paper issue at all these days rather than the dreaded "online only" versions (or no programme at all!) that is increasingly the case post-Covid. Probably worst of all however is to arrive at a match only to discover that there was a programme but that they have all been sold. I do understand that clubs have limited print runs to ensure that they aren't left with piles of unsold issues but, for the collector, it's very annoying especially when you know that some people will have purchased a dozen issues for other people who didn't attend the match or that others will toss their issue into the garbage within a few days of getting home. Rant over!
The Midland Football Alliance of 2001/02 was a curious affair originally involving 23 clubs (meaning that one club would have to sit it out every Saturday during the season) until Stapenhill folded mid-season with their record "expunged" (a lovely word that you only tend to hear in football circles and which means that the club's results that season were declared null and void). Ludlow Town had been promoted into the Alliance as champions of the previous season's West Midlands (Regional) League and would go on to finish in a respectable 10th position. Stratford Town, under manager Lenny Derby, went on to finish 4th, nine points behind champions Stourbridge who were not promoted despite winning the League due to ground grading regulations that were in place at the time (it probably had something to do with Stourbridge's War Memorial Ground being three-sided and shared with the local cricket club). Indeed Stourbridge scored a dramatic last minute goal to earn the point that they needed and pip Bromsgrove Rovers to the title in their final game of the season at Stratford Town. Ironically perhaps, runners-up Bromsgrove were promoted back into the Southern League in Stourbridge's place after only one season in the Alliance.
CRB Match No. 1269
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