Billingham Town 1-3 Redcar Athletic, Friday 11th March 2022

Billingham Town 1-3 Redcar Athletic, Northern League Division 1, Bedford Terrace, att. 219

Another case of Friday Night Lights in the Northern League, and a second bite at the cherry for me with Billingham Town. Does it count as a groundhop if the game gets called off after an hour, as it did the other week? No such worries this evening as a decent crowd was boosted by a Boro Cabs minibus full of Redcar fans. What better evening entertainment in this neck of the woods? No programmes though, to the disappointment of one of the party (and me).

Learning from my earlier jaunt, I parked up in the club car park, a beautiful bit of tarmac formerly a mudbath, and headed for the social club, a spacious building behind the main stand. Last time, I wondered where everyone had gone at half-time. It was to here, the spacious social club, where I sank into a couch to enjoy the last-but-one bottle of Brewdog IPA. ‘We just don’t sell enough of the stuff’ the barmaid told me.

I was out in time to see the teams take to the field, as ‘Right Here, Right Now’ tickled out of the Main Stand speaker(s). Like last time, I edged slowly around the ground as the first half developed. Billingham, in all sorts of problems at the bottom of the table, were up against a lower midtable Redcar side. A chance, then. It took 6 minutes for Redcar to go ahead. It should have been two, as a Billingham throw-in put REDCAR clean through. I can see why they’re bottom.

Surprisingly, ‘Billy’ equalised on the half hour, though that was to be it as Redcar romped to 1-3 by half-time. That still didn’t stop the Town ‘ultras’, half a dozen blokes with a drum in the main stand. ‘What do you think of Synners?’ ‘S***’ ‘And what do you think of s***?’ ‘Synners.’ ‘We hate Synners and we hate Synners.’ Obviously, local rivalry with Billingham Synthonia counts for something…though perhaps too much, as talks to groundshare broke down and Synthonia currently reside across the border (the River Tees) in Stokesley, their Central Avenue ground long gone. Perhaps it’d be good for both teams if Synners returned?

The Damage:
£7 ent
£3 Punk IPA (bottle of)
= £10

The Tunes:
Whirlpool (Chapterhouse)

Redcar Athletic 4-1 Hemsworth Miners Welfare, Saturday 7th August 2021

Redcar Athletic 4-1 Hemsworth Miners Welfare, FA Cup Extra Preliminary Round, BM Bi-folding Doors Stadium (Green Lane), att. 29

As per Whitley Bay last week, my plan was to take my other half out and leave her to wander while I went to a Northern League game. I was going to go and see a match Newcastle way and drop her off in the city centre. However, I sensed exhaustion from yesterday’s trip to Hadrian’s Wall (Chesters fort, since you ask – a friend was visiting), plus the Olympics had reached its penultimate day, and she loves a bit of sport. So when Molly (based in South Yorkshire) asked where I was going today, I knew he fancied a trip out. I looked again at the fixtures and Redcar stood out, somewhere inbetween our locations. My partner jumped at the chance of staying in.

Redcar (the place) has always been one of the north-east’s main seaside venues, containing as it does miles of sandy beach. Back in the day it used to have a large (indoor) amusement park too, though that’s long since closed, along with the steelworks that once employed half the town. The latter has been of some debate as to its future, between historical conservationists who’d like to see some of its buildings saved for posterity, and local (Tory) politicians, who wanted it levelled and turned into yet another industrial estate / ‘job creation scheme’. The decision-makers won and demolition has started.

Back to the football, and today was a historic day for Redcar Athletic – their first ever fixture in the FA Cup. If that doesn’t sound impressive, they’ve had a steady rise since forming in 1993 and playing in the Teesside League. Having worked their way up through the Wearside League, their championship win of 2018 allowed them entrance to the Northern League. And thanks to their promotion to division 1 (based on a points-per-game basis over the last 2 incomplete seasons) they can finally join the country’s premier cup competition. On the up and up.

The stadium is a new-build on the edge of town. Indeed, it’s nearer Marske United than Northern League 2 Redcar Town. I’ve seen it before, and feared a it was a little characterless, but with a decent crowd inside (nearly 300) it had a certain charm. As you enter through the turnstile, there is standing room to the left behind the goal. Today it was slightly sullied by a couple of Dirty Leeds flags from the travelling fans, so I’m hopeful these don’t appear every week.

To the right as you enter are 2 identical stands holding 50 people each. How long did they take to put up? An afternoon? I’m not joking. I can imagine them arriving on the back of a big lorry, being plonked down and a couple of men with screwdrivers finishing it off. Still, very smart with its bright red seats and when the rain came down second half, it provided welcome temporary relief.

The rest of the stadium is neatly enclosed with a wooden fence and obligatory gates to enable someone to rescue the ball when it was skied over. Collecting the ball is no mean feat at this time of year, as two sides of the ground are bordered by farmer’s wheat fields. Good luck finding the ball in there. Behind the near goal are more pitches, while there is a snazzy social club behind the Main Stand(s), with the clever addition of half a dozen wooden ‘pods’ outside, where 6 or so fans could sit in each one and remain dry while enjoying their pint.

Going back to heritage, I’m pleased Hemsworth Miners Welfare have retained their traditional name despite the closure of the mines. It’s a small town inbetween Barnsley and Pontefract and today they brought a fair few, no doubt bolstered by the Premiership season not starting till next week. They also brought a mouthy, yet inept defence, who conceded a penalty after two minutes and gave Redcar two further goals from cock-ups leaving the poor keeper stranded. Hemsworth scored a comedy equaliser themselves as the Redcar keeper somehow fumbled a low cross into his own net. Thankfully, the one bit of quality was to be Redcar’s, a well taken 4th goal rounded it off as Owen Clarkson bamboozled a back-tracking defender before sidefooting the ball into the far corner. Athletic won’t have to wait quite as long for their second FA Cup game as they did their first.

The Damage:
£6 ent
£2 programme
£1 Coca-Cola
= £9

The Tunes:
Come on Feel the Illinois! (Sufjan Stevens)
BBC6 Music (Gilles Peterson / Craig Charles)

Redcar Town 4-3 Redcar Athletic / Marske United 2-0 Guisborough Town, Sunday 25th July 2021

Redcar Town 4-3 Redcar Athletic / Marske United 2-0 Guisborough Town, The Vibrant Doors Stadium, Mo Mowlam Memorial Park, Mo Mowlam Memorial Cup, att. c.100-200

What a brilliant, yet simple, idea – have a pre-season tournament and invite 4 local sides to compete, winners of each semi to play the final. And so it was that I was in Redcar on a hot sunny Sunday afternoon. I mainly know Redcar as a seaside resort, a place where, once in every 3 years, our town’s workman’s club (‘CIU affiliated’) would go (the other years being South Shields and Whitley Bay). Us kids got a pound pocket money and I remember as many as 9 buses heading from Ferryhill to these exotic places. Sadly, time has changed. The ‘rides’ at Redcar have long gone, though they were a far cry from Whitley Bay’s ‘Spanish City’….I think Redcar’s rides were in some warehouse / aircraft hanger. Anyway, happy days.

Today though, I’m seeing none of the sea. I’m at The Vibrant Doors Stadium, part of the Mo Mowlam Memorial Park, for the Mo Mowlam Memorial Cup. For those of a younger vintage, Mo was the MP for Redcar and Secretary of State for Northern Ireland who was pivotal to the peace talks which culminated in the Good Friday Peace Agreement in 1998, but who sadly died in 2005. How time flies. As a mark of her enduring legacy, Belfast too has a park named in her honour.

The Vibrant Doors Stadium is on the Trunk Road leading into Redcar and today was very easy to spot with the parked cars in the fields adjacent. I turned into the main car park, to be asked whether I was playing or spectating. I wish! At 47, I should have called her bluff, but instead was pointed in the direction of a field which had been taken over for the weekend’s footie.

Redcar Town, the hosts, are a relatively new team, having only been formed in 2014. Their ascent has been speedy, as they have progressed from local leagues to becoming members of the Northern League second division this season. This weekend their guests were Northern League 1st division sides Redcar Athletic and Guisborough Town, as well as upwardly mobile neighbours Marske United, currently playing in the Northern Premier League Division One North West.

Today’s entertainment kicked off at 12:30 with the losers from yesterday facing each other – the Redcar derby. With other responsibilities this morn, I arrived with about 10 minutes left, in time to see Town nick an 84th minute winner, 4-3. Sounded like a cracker. I looked around, there were maybe 100 people watching. A bit disappointing, but I overheard an official later say ‘between 650-700’ had come in the 2 days play. I’d say there were 200+ for the final, Marske v Guisborough, as Marske fans came in numbers. Smaller than Redcar, but near enough that Athletic’s ground is closer to Marske’s than it is Town’s, Marske appear to be a club on the up. Flags put up, shirts and scarves in attendance, and even their own ultras, the ‘yellow warriors’, complete with drum and what looked like a vuvuzela. Luckily, the instruments weren’t played too often.

Mind, the ultras did have one unintended effect. They’d homed in on the only cover in the ground (save for a gazebo bizarrely covering the trophy and plinth). As someone who struggles with the sun, I edged in, but even though we were inbetween games, the teenagers were keen to holler their support. I took my Coke and had a wander to the opposite end. I wondered how Redcar Town were allowed in the Northern League with their lack of seating. ‘Standards have dropped’ I was told.

The match was surprisingly zesty, considering both sides had played the previous day. Marske edged it throughout and won 2-0 with a near post finish and a 20 yard stunner as the protagonist cut in from the left past 2 or 3 defenders. An early contender for goal of the season. Certainly goal of the month (July). And I saw a trophy lifted for the first time since yesterday. Well played, Marske!

*possibly because of a conversation I was having with an old timer, on the way home I popped in to see where South Bank used to play, a detour of about 200 metres from the main road. What a pity a legendary Northern League club closed down because of constant vandalism to their ground. Now it’s a park and community centre, Golden Boy Green, named after local Boro all-time great Wilf Mannion.

The Damage:
£7 ent £1 Coca-Cola = £8

The Tunes:
Classics (Aphex Twin)