Friday, January 28, 2011
Bloxwich hopes Torn apart
Bloxwich United 2 Torpoint Athletic 3
Just occasionally, thinks come together. My wife and are are fans of the rock band Genesis & there is an extremely good tribute band called G2 who play about a dozen gigs a year. It's not far off listening to the real thing! Anyway, they were playing this Saturday in Bilston. Shall we go & stay over?" my wife asked. I wasn't sure what to do as it was FA Vase last 32 day. Too much to hope that there would be a game nearby. So I examined the draw & couldn't believe my luck as I spotted this game at Bloxwich, only a few miles from our evening venue. So off we all happily went. This was my first trip up the M1 for quite some time. It really does seem to have fallen behind many other motorways. It seemed narrow, busy and in a very poor state of repair. Thankfully, the traffic moved fairly freely all be it at about 50 mph. We had chosen a pub on route from the Good pub guide and ended up at The Pheasant in Withybrook. This place is clearly there for the food market & I've never been presented with so many choices in my life. I full menu on the tables, a specials board with about 20 options and a lunchtime menu with another dozen or so choices. I had no idea what to pick but eventually went for a pork chop with apple sauce & roast potatoes. The food was okay but a bit 'Beefeater' when it arrived & I never did get any apple sauce. Still a quiet little spot that I wouldn't have otherwise bumped into. We found the ground easily despite the seemingly never ending number of traffic lights around Walsall. I arrived at 2:20, paid my entrance and requested a programme only to be fed the line that they had sold out. I've no idea how many they printed but never saw anyone in the ground with a copy. There is cover behind the near goal, the clubhouse was bustling and well staffed with several TV screens. The rest of the ground was in a state of slight dis-repair, every now and then you came across piles of rubbish lying around. It is a proper enclosed football ground with a busy road on one side and a quiet side street on the other. This was a real pudding of a pitch with quite long grass, I'm sure the recent weather has made the groundsman's job almost impossible.
Bloxwich started the better and scored after 12 mins. They looked the more dangerous side although Torpoint were always easy on the eye with their style of play. It looked all over when Bloxwich scored again on 64 mins. But always felt Torpoint would score and that happened on 77 mins when Bloxwich cheaply gave he ball away. Suddenly it was all Torpoint and they won an uncontested penalty for handball on 85 mins and then sent the healthy Cornish contingent home happy by completing a remarkable comeback on 89 mins.
Not my favourite ground by any means but memorable for the fabulous finish this game produced.
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