Behind the Scenes Live Football Feed, Chesterfield FC

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=v8_gCZcWIoQ&t=1s 

So whats is it like behind the scenes of a National League team having to provide a feed for the fans to watch?

We ask the people who provide the pictures and commentary at Chesterfield and see what's required to bring the pictures in a 2-1 home defeat to AFC Halifax.

Steve Yorke with the commentary, Jamie Hewitt co-commentator Oliver Mooney with the Production. Video by Roland Gent

@chesterfieldfc www.chesterfield-fc

Roland Gent, Journalist, Comedian, Presenter and Music nut: Is the Zombie Apocalypse going to be this boring?

Roland Gent, Journalist, Comedian, Presenter and Music nut: Is the Zombie Apocalypse going to be this boring?: No football.... Football fans by nature re creatures of habit, doesn’t matter who you support you usually have a matchday routine. Fo...

Is the Zombie Apocalypse going to be this boring?

No football....

Football fans by nature are creatures of habit, doesn’t matter who you support you usually have a matchday routine. For most home games, I usually drive through the Peak District whilst swearing profusely at whichever driver is causing the log jam of traffic in front of me. Get to the ground, have a pie; and a well known locally brewed beer, then sit there biting my nails for 90 minutes. Go home, write my column, pop out to the local for a couple of drinks and then watch Match of the Day.

Seeing as the World just turned upside down, I could actually enjoy a drive through the Peak District with absolutely no traffic in front of me, then just not go to the match, not go to the pub and watch nothing on TV. People often ask me why do I go to football on a Saturday, I usually say, “What are you going to do? Spend Saturday doing DIY?” sadly this grim reality is now staring many of us in the face.

We have been discusing the forthcoming zombie apocalypse but it just seems that in a typically British way, we are all tut tutting at bog paper hoarders, is it really this dull? Maybe we could raise a lynch mob for anyone known to hoard loo roll, go round with flaming torches and chant obscenities every time the bathroom light goes on.

I was hoping me and my family could pass the hours with a nice conversation, but once that's been exhusted by 8am we could be in trouble

How will bookmakers cope? They make millions each week from silly punters like me, who nearly win an accumulator every week, if only it wasn’t for minor details like the results. Bookies need to find a new sport to get people to gamble on, how about betting on all the things you were supposed to do round the house without actually getting round to them?

We could have live online link ups to International “Blokes working out how to bleed a radiator” Pro/Am “Finally getting round to creosoting the fence” or The British Open “Taking all that stuff down to the tip that your other half has been telling you to do for months” I’m pretty good at tip runs so I think that’s the one for me, I even know which skip to chuck the general household items into. But why is it every time I get back there’s always one bag of rubbish that I should have taken to the tip that I forgot to take, do these things multiply of their own accord? I might lose points in that aspect of the competition.

On a serious not however Barnet have put all their non-playing staff on notice of redundancy in order to save the club, worrying times for every team in this non league division

Chorley away, is there a joiner in the ground?

Chorley away, is there a joiner in the ground?

From a fan’s perspective our day out on the train to Chorley, was one of those unique experiences, which will live long in the memory but hopefully we’ll never repeat. Going past Bolton Wanderers’ ground was fairly sobering as it wasn’t too long since we were playing there. Whilst I may commend Chorley for giving the world the Chorley Cake and the quality of the pies in the ground was tremendous, some of the other facilities inside Victory Park could best be described as inadequate. 

Amazing grass bank action incorporating broken fence

The toilets looked like a breeding ground for a tropical virus.The general consensus was that a decent joiner could have a field day doing up the ground and most agreed that if they’d had better knowledge of the layout of the place, they might have been tempted to clamber over the grass banking on one side of the pitch and get in for free. 

Top allotments action.

On the bright side there’s not many grounds in the Premier League where you can have a look at someone’s allotments as you walk to the match, however those are the peculiarities of non-league football.

Out of the relegation zone for the first time since November is a good place to be after everything the club has ben through, if there’s one thing John Pemberton knows how to do it’s bringing home the bacon in a relegation six pointer.

The Blues have faced a series of mini cup finals against relegation rivals, since the former Leeds United centre back took over; Chorley, Ebbsfleet, Wrexham, Eastleigh were all beaten and a draw against Fylde, have turned the club’s fortunes around. The next home game against Maidenhead is another one of these do or die fixtures and Chesterfield must be getting used to them, whereas our opponents clearly aren’t.

Ooh nearly

Dover away next week and I’d be more than happy with a point from that one. Dagenham and Redbridge play AFC Fylde in midweek, Maidenhead play Stockport on Saturday and Wrexham are away at Barrow, so there’s certainly a big hope that points will be dropped by our rivals and it is a cliché but Chesterfield’s season is now in our own hands whereas at Christmas it looked like it wasn’t.

Tyson Hat Trick gives hope to the Blues

John Pemberton Post Ebbsfleet match (click on the text)

Nathan Tyson talks about his hat trick  (click on the text)

There's more than light at the end of the tunnel after Saturday's amazing turnaround, a scrppy game being ruined by the wind and one substituiton makes all the difference and we all know what came next from Nathan Tyson. We've had 3 six pointers at home Fylde, Wrexham and Ebbsfleet, if you'd have offered the average fan 2 wins and a draw from those 3, most people would have snapped your hand off.

Saturday's result effectively condmens Ebbsfleet to the National League South, I can't see how they can get out of it now. Our opponents were one of the least effective sides we've seen at the Proact all season, their first shot on target in the 88th minute tells anyone how effective they were. Ebbsfleet could play a bit when they wanted to, tactically they came to keep things tight but once Nathan Tyson's first one went in, they had to gamble going forward and were left with gaps at the back.

Post match comments from Nathan Tyson about how hard the team trains and even pre match how competitive the warm up is tells a story, so do the comments from John Pemberton that even though the surafce at the training ground has suffered, the team are raring to get into practice early. John Pemberton also said about Tom Denton that when he arrived at the club 7 weeks ago, the giant striker "Could have walked in under the door with a top hat and tails on, he was that low"  It's comments like those that make you wonder how bad things had got under the previous regime.
Pemberton had praise for all the three centre backs post match and said it was Josef Yarney's best game for us he looked calm and assured and was doing the right things, it was certainly good to see the centre back making runs to overlap Cropper in the second half, it adds another dimension to our attacking play that we've not seen for a while.

Realistically Chesterfield need 4 wins to stay up, but after Saturday most of us hope we can do better than that
On to the Harrogate game John Pemberton says he's watched them and they are very good, certainly they deserved to beat us in the previous fixture and they hve now won nine out of their last eleven games and are pushing Barrow hard for the title. I'm also looking forward to our next away game at Chorley just to see the idiosyncratic nature of the ground, which boasts a very small stand perched a top a grassy bank on one side of the pitch

The table lookes brighter now with Chesterfield within 3 points of every team up to 15th in the table; post match Nathan Tyson was quite up beat as you'd expect, saying that teams can often find it hard when they think they've done enough only for sides in the relgation zone to go on a winning run and drag them back into the mire. It's all about momentum now and Chesterfield have the wind in their sails so here's hoping we can end up nearer half way than the bottom 4.

Everything Falls Apart for Chesterfield

Just when you thought there was light at the end of the tunnel, Chesterfield manage to shoot themselves in the foot by gifting Eastleigh probably 2 of the easiest goals they will ever score, the highlights of that one will be an absolute horror show for anyone who dares to watch.

Message boards are full of people either directing dire abuse at players and management or fans simply saying they’ve had enough. One statistic highlighted is that 5 years ago Chesterfield beat Sheffield United 3-2 in a league game, and frankly gave them a good hiding on the day, right now there are 100 league places between us. 

That’s how far the club has fallen and if the team keeps playing like this, we will be losing a local derby to Alfreton Town in 12 months’ time.

Ron Atkinson once said “It’s the midfield, it’s always the midfield” when referring to what goes wrong with a football team. For 25 minutes on Saturday it looked as though it would be an easy home win, but once again the opposition simply out works The Blues in the middle of the pitch and leaves us stretched in defence and unable to create anything except a long ball to go forward with. 

On that note, Tom Denton came out of the game against Eastleigh with credit although it would be more appropriate if he wore a mask and a cape as the opposition centre backs spend as much time as they can wrestling with him rather then trying to play football.

It might not be around much longer

Last year John Sheridan turned things round with this formation, but with no real right wing back it’s not working. Last season we had 3 in midfield usually Smith, Weston and Rowley who worked well together as a unit. This time Joe Rowley is asked to play right wing back and seems to have lost all confidence especially in his ability to cross a ball and Liam Mandeville is playing just behind the front 2. 

What happens time and again when Chesterfield lose the ball is that Mandeville doesn’t track back leaving 2 defensive midfielders up against superior numbers and we then put no pressure on the ball. This leaves the defence exposed and they are slow really slow.

Ooh we got a corner

The most galling thing is that we come up against sides who are simply fitter and better organised than Chesterfield. Eastleigh were no great shakes, but only had to work harder than the Spireites and after half an hour the game started to unravel for us. Apart from buying 2 midfielders who actually have pace, or simply swamping the midfield I can’t see a way out of this.

Last minute free kick

What summed it up for me on Saturday was with virtually the last kick of the game Chesterfield played a very clever free kick routine to Gevaro who fluffed his shot when given a chance to redeem himself for the howlingly bad pass, which led to Eastleigh’s winner. The Notts County match live on TV now has potential for national embarrassment.

we lost to these

Chester no-mid Field

One all against Dagenham and Redbridge and the stats have an all too familiar look about them, it’s now 12 games without a win since a pre-season victory against Matlock Town.  After the Dagenham game Chesterfield sit in in the relegation places with 5 points and will need to hit promotion form in the next month just to drag themselves out of the mire.

Everyone can see the glaring problem and it’s midfield. Any side starting at home with 5 centre backs on the pitch, as we did at home to Dagenham, has got a problem. John Sheridan says he’s been enquiring about players, but until we get a loan player in the same scenario is going to keep repeating itself. Recruitment under Martin Allen was awful, we are still stuck with some of his side and it’s obvious that things could also have gone a lot better this close season.

In Mike Fondop’s interview he commented that the club has some amazing talent on its books, we do, its just that we have far too many players in some positions and none in others, meaning it’s a lop-sided team. It’s OK for the club and various fans to say we should all stick together, everyone wants a win, but until the shape of the side is sorted out I can’t see improvement.

Marvellous Aluminium Ladder Action at Stockport, £18 for this view? shocking

Stockport away was an example, of the fact that Chesterfield are going to have to put players out of position because we have no obvious left sided midfielder. The side looked neat in the first half, played some good stuff and restricted Stockport to one half chance, despite only creating 2 good scoring opportunities ourselves. It was a 451, but unfortunately that meant Scott Boden had to play on the left when we need him in the middle. Second half Stockport put 5 across the centre and pressed Chesterfield who were reduced to missing out the midfield and booting it in the air to Mike Fondop who was isolated, the result was, we created no chances second half from open play.

Our message boards are full of fans cogitating on what our best centre midfield pairing is, everyone’s come to the conclusion it’s Jonathan Smith plus somebody else. No one can decide who the other player should be, as none of Weston, Weir and Wedgebury fit the bill as none of them are the type of player to accurately pass the ball to the strikers and boss the game.

A view from the Barrow Game we should have been 5-0 down at half time. Worst performance in 45 minutes of football I have ever seen at home.

Woking FC sit proudly on top of the table, having come up from the southern section, one of the main reasons for their improvement is a loanee from Nottingham Forest, Toby Edser, he will soon return to the City Ground once his spell for the Cardinals is over and it’s maybe that type of signing John Sheridan is looking for. Let’s hope it’s sooner rather than later.

We can nearly see the pitch, sadly

Like most fans I await the start of a new football season with a mild amount of optimism knowing that we finally have a manger who has a proven track record and has shifted players in and out during the close season and has presumably a decent plan of how to play a style of football that’s going to see us win more often than not.

We can nearly see the pitch...

In the summer break every team in the division has had a huge clear out and influx of players, with no fees being exchanged at all, every transfer is a free, so it would seem that all the teams will need time to bed in and get some form together. However it’s not so much about transfer fees as wages AFC Fylde managed to capture Matty Kosylo from Halifax, he’s one player who impressed me last season for the Shaymen, they’ve also got our ex loanee centre back Alex Whitmore, so I’d expect the side from the motorway junction to be there or thereabouts at the end of the season. 

Stockport County have had the fewest incoming, having only signed one player on loan since getting promoted from National League North although Conor Dimaio seems to be impressing for them in pre-season matches.

Our maiden voyage of the season started sluggishly, improved after half time and then went down like the Titanic as soon as the opposition made changes. I have to say I was slightly disconcerted by John Sheridan saying words to the effect of the fact that he has too many midfielders who are too similar, well it’s obvious for all to see, that the side had no width and players looked a little out of sorts. Our manager has commented that if Anthony Gerrard had been playing, we would not have lost, presumably he’s inferring that the ex-Oldham player will be able to organise the team better once he’s out on the pitch and head away from corners.. Many fans have commented despite being pleased that Gerrard has joined us, he might want to focus on shedding a few pounds in order to be fully effective.

 Best seats in the house?

You have to feel sorry though for some fans who have bought season tickets for the centre stand only for the club to build an extended dugout right in front of them, meaning that their welcome to a new season is a restricted view. Hopefully the club will manage to sort out this problem soon enough and put something on the pitch that is worth watching, although this may only happen after key players some back from injury and illness. I’m looking forward to seeing what Anthony Spyrou can do when he gets a good run in the side

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Chesterfield throw it away

GOALS HIGHLIGHTS

Another up and down week for Chesterfield then, win away and then mess it all up by losing at home, not only losing, but falling to pieces against a team in Eastleigh that should have been sent home on the end of a sound beating. Thankfully our next 2 matches are away from home, where the team seems to play better, let’s hope that we get points against Bromley and Havant and get closer to safety.

Against Eastleigh Chesterfield were OK in the first half and having scored our only real chance should have made it to half time one goal up, but if you let the opposition have a free cross and don’t challenge for the subsequent header they are going to score. Second half, we scored and it looked plain sailing, then mighty Eastleigh, put an extra man up front, worked harder than Chesterfield in midfield and we crumbled. 

Watch Tom Denton commit a "foul" 

The opposition’s second goal was amateur stuff from our defence and goal keeper and as for their third if you do let someone run 40 yards with the ball and have a free shot, they’ll get a goal. Why none of our team put in a tackle or even committed a foul for the good of the team is a mystery. Certainly John Sheridan put on subs to try and win the game going three up front but taking Robbie Weir off meant there was no-one to protect our back line and that was certainly crucial in the last goal of the game.

After John Sheridan announced post-match that players aren’t listening to him and aren’t doing what he says, it can only mean that he’s busy drawing up a list of who he’s going to get rid of come May. So fans at the Proact are now drawing up their own lists of players that won’t be good enough to be in a team that should challenge for promotion next time around. We still have players on the books, who aren't good enough, signed by the previous three managers, and the biggest culprit of all Guy Branston

Out of contract in 2019 are Reid, Ofuegbu, Weston, Dodds, Barry, George Smith, Anyon, Ugwu, Wakefield, Binnon-Williams, Talbot, Muggleton, Nelson, Fortune and Weir. I couldn’t blame the manager one bit if he got rid of all of them. We have 5 loanees at the club who will probably go back to the clubs who “own” them. 

That would leave 12 players on the books, which looks daunting but it gives John Sheridan an opportunity to bring in maybe 8 players with some quality, or at least with some pace.

Martin Allen indicated at the start of the season that you needed a powerful hard-working team to get out of this division, since he failed to do that, we looked like we were going to get out of the National League at the wrong end, the only decent player he signed was Charlie Carter. It’s now over to John Sheridan to see if he can recruit a decent side for next season.

Club Website
National league goals highlights

Spireites on the up

Chesterfield are now finally heading in the right direction, with a very welcome 3 points away at Fylde. Since Boxing Day when the wheels came off the team under Martin Allen against Solihull Moors, Chesterfield haven’t lost and the sequence of results reads DDDWDWW. John Pemberton put together a side where Robbie Weir sits in front of the defensive line and breaks up the opposition play, John Sheridan continued this and in his first 4 league games we haven’t conceded a goal. OK we lost at home in the Cup against Brackley, but the less said about that the better.

AFC Fylde away

Fylde had their chances on Saturday and we had the woodwork come to our rescue on 2 occasions, but with 3 more points on the board Chesterfield sit in 17^th place. Four or 5 more wins this season and we will be safe and right now the team sit only a mere 19 points off the playoffs, although only the most optimistic fan would place a bet on that happening.

One of the few things there is to like about watching your team in the Vanarama League is the away day experience of going somewhere completely new and experiencing the quirks and eccentricities of the home team. I was rather fond of the stadium announcer at AFC Fylde, yesterday who was a breath of fresh air in these politically correct times. He cheerfully broadcast to the entire ground that someone attending the match had parked their car across a woman’s drive way and if they didn’t remove it within 15 minutes it would be set on fire. I'm not sure who was gong to set it on fire, the club or the woman, but we didn't see the Fire Brigade anywhere round the ground, so maybe the car was shifted. Also a nice tribute to Gordon Banks before the game, who was credited as having started his distinguished career at our club

Also, leading team Solihull Moors, are going to have to build an extra stand or two if they get into the league, to bring their capacity up to 4,000.

Solihull Moors

Their club has said that plans are in place at the formerly named Damson Park rugby ground to do just that; if so, it’s hoped that the seating arrangements will be rather more permanent than the oddly appointed temporary stands currently in place.

Good away following from the Blues

Round the league it looks like the bottom 2 of Braintree and Maidstone might be set adrift and be odds on to go down, but at the top only Wrexham won at the weekend and Solihull could only draw at home to Barnet. It’s still up for grabs as to who will emerge champions in May, but right now Chesterfield have nothing to fear from any of these sides, we play Harrogate next at home then it’s Barnet and Wrexham away. A few weeks ago, Spireites were wondering if we’d get any results in this current run of fixtures, now it looks like a case of hoping we don’t drop any points against beatable teams.

www.chesterfield-fc.co.uk
Fylde website

Scott comes back to save Chesterfield

Chesterfield are out of the drop zone for the first time since Boxing Day, 1-0 at home to Halifax may not seem much but it was a huge result, but the most important thing is that with Scott Boden returning to Chesterfield we do actually look like scoring.


 His movement off the ball is something we’ve not seen from any of our strikers all season, in this division he looks like a complete player with a scoring record of 12 goals in 30 matches for Gateshead and now Chesterfield.

Of the other players making their debuts Josef Yarney looked comfortable in a back 3 and Ellis Chapman certainly had a good first half and proved that can take on the full back and put in a cross, which is something we have been badly missing all season. John Sheridan mentioned in his post-match interview that he’d shouted at Lee Shaw just to take one touch on the ball and get the ball into the box. Having taken this on board, Chesterfield immediately got their penalty from the next cross that came into the area.

 John Sheridan has proven himself in management, getting players to do the simple things well and cut out the mistakes. He also commented in his interview that he doesn’t need players to run 10 or 20 miles per match if they can’t keep hold of the ball, as we didn’t look like losing to Halifax but at times in the game, we were watching two sides kicking the ball at each other rather than playing to any recognised plan.

Also of note is the fact the Marc Antoine Fortune seems to be instructed to turn with the ball and try to get a shot off, which nearly paid dividends at the end of the first half with the ball going agonisingly wide. For many, a formerly high-profile player like Fortune ought to offer more to the side than simply playing with his back to goal and trying to feed the ball to others, he should score more goals. I know he's never been prolific in his career, but he should get more shots at goal per game.

Round the division, Ebbsfleet got involved in more trouble, with 4 players being sent off against Solihull Moors, 2 from each side seeing red. One would hope that the National League might now ask questions about the conduct of the side from Kent

Next week we go to a motorway junction between Preston And Blackpool to play AFC Fylde, a side who we beat quite convincingly in the FA Cup 3-1 earlier in the season. The key to that victory was that Tom Denton played in the middle with Kiwomya and Shaw running either side of our him giving the home defence a torrid time. Here’s hoping for a similar result next Saturday.

Meanwhile at the final whistle some children supporting Halifax thought it would be a great idea to behave like football hooligans and decided to throw a flare onto the pitch and also launch a firework. The flare landed near a disabled fan, but luckily there were no reported injuries. The Police did make arrests.

 A statement from FC Halifax says;
"We’re appalled at today’s incident involving one of our disabled fans and a flare from our OWN supporters. We’ll be investigating this matter and requesting all ground CCTV from Chesterfield. Behaviour such as this will not be tolerated."


https://www.derbyshiretimes.co.uk/sport/football/chesterfield-fc/match-report-ice-cool-boden-earns-chesterfield-vital-win-over-fc-halifax-town-1-9585682

Top Tuneage and transfers at The Proact.

We don't have a transfer window in this division but John Sheridan's been wheeling and dealing and at least 3 new names on the team sheet should brighten things up and get us away from the drop to oblivion. 

Gateshead finally parted with Scott Boden to bring him back the Chesterfield, our former understudy to Jack Lester has a goal tally of one in every three games in this league and that's what we really need to get wins on the board. 

Louis Dodds has come back from his loan spell at Port Vale although he’s not really made much impact at Vale Park in his second spell there starting only 6 games and usually being a substitute, whether he can make the difference up front for Chesterfield remains to be seen, as he has a career record of one goal every 5.7 matches.

Striker Jack McKay is set to move on loan from Cardiff to the Proact, it wont be a long term move but anyone who has played 10 times in the Premier should be looking to bag a few goals for the Blues, Josef Yarney comes in from Newcastle and rumours were abound that we may have a new left back soon. Phew!

As for last week it's a big shout out to whoever plays the tunes before and during the games at the Proact, National League fans were impressed with our tannoy selection of the Alarm, the Jam, The Skids, Killing Joke, AC/DC, Orbital, Blur and many more favourites. Just stay away from the boy bands and most fans will be fine with that although a little Northern Soul wouldn't go amiss.

Saturday’s home game was one of those “nearly” matches we nearly scored early on with two great chances, which should have been put away. We nearly lost it second half when Barrow put on a bit of pressure and nearly scored one second half after what was a crazy game of head tennis in front of the Barrow goal. Although we really should have had a penalty when the Barrow keeper Joel Dixon blatantly pulled down Curtis Weston in the box.

In truth though there were too many mis placed passed by both teams and Chesterfield are obviously in real need of a striker who can partner Denton or Fortune. John Sheridan’s 4-1-4-1 line up has had the desired effect of not conceding a goal in 3 matches and we can hopefully banish memories of recent defensive disasters against the likes of Solihull Moors and Ebbsfleet and look forward to watching a team who are hard to beat and can pressure the opposition. The majority of our drawn games this season have come from conceding the first goal and then having to play to catch up with a squad that has previously found it difficult to score more than one goal a game.

With 7 wins roughly, required from 16 games to save us from the dreaded drop there’s an awful lot still to play for at the business end of the campaign, we do still have to play most of the teams around us. 

Anyone can put together a decent run to get out of it, a few weeks ago Dover looked dead and buried and most fans had them down as relegation certainties, however they now sit 2 places and three points above Chesterfield, they look to have turned things around in December and recently secured a morale boosting away win at Wrexham.

In other news Ebbsfleet players have some concerns revealing that their wages are hardly ever paid on time and are worried about pension payments, interesting times in Kent...

Defeat at Orient

I’m always wary when your manager says that we are going to win the next game, it’s usually a case of coming down to Earth with a bump and so it proved at Leyton Orient. The thing was, in the press box most of the Orient commentary team thought that Chesterfield were the best opponents they had seen at Brisbane Road, however since we were defeated it’s probably worth sticking your money on the O’s to go up.

Getting vertigo on the camera gantry at Brisbane Road

In effect Chesterfield ‘s demise mirrors that of Leyton Orient only we appear to be a season or so behind them, when they dropped out of the league due to having an eccentric Italian owner who kept on sacking the manager, they found it a real struggle in their first season in the National League. Slowly under Justin Edinburgh they have turned things around and now sit pretty on top of the table by playing some half decent football, unlike the majority of the sides in this division, although agreement in the press box was unanimously that there isn’t a single team that you’d call a consistently good side in the National League.

At Orient the new stand certainly is impressive

On the pitch, I personally though Chesterfield made things too easy for Orient at the start of the game not putting in enough tackles and making it alarmingly simple for the home side to go through our midfield and score before ten minutes were on the clock. Once Martin Allen made a tactical switch and put Alex Kiwomya on the right, Chesterfield suddenly looked the better side and scored an excellent goal.  The key moment for me was once Kiwomya went off with a hamstring problem Chesterfield stopped moving the ball as well as they had done and Orient took the initiative. The home side’s second goal came from a corner that was never cleared properly, even though the opportunity to put the ball out of play was missed by the Blues a good Orient cross still could have been defended, but slackness cost us and the game was effectively sealed at 2-1 to the home side. Despite some controversy, for my money the third goal was a correct penalty decision, although needlessly conceded by Joe Rowley.

So, onto the Christmas fixtures where Chesterfield must gain wins to take us away from the dreaded drop, in a throwback to times past, we play the same side Solihull Moors twice in 6 days home and away sandwiching in a fixture against Hartlepool. Solihull are 6^th in the National League and put up a very good televised display against Blackpool in the FA Cup, it pains me to say it, but they won’t be easy fixtures especially with our ever-growing injury list.

Chesterfield faithful queue up to get in the old stand

From bad to worse, to oblivion for Chesterfield F.C.?

Chesterfield’s inexorable slide continued with yet another one all draw this time away at Eastleigh, a good result on the day, but one where our lack of firepower now sees us in the bottom 4 of the National League. Another one-all draw at home to London suburb Bromley didn't improve things much either. Now we hear that Tomlinsons, the club's sponsors, are pulling out, things are dire, on and off the pitch.

Compare and contrast our fortunes with those of Wigan Athletic if you will, a team from a similar sized town to Chesterfield, yet one which has to compete for support with Rugby League. Wigan did not even get into the league until the 1980s and after that, rattled around in the lower tier until local businessman Dave Whelan came along in 1995 and bought the club, built a new stadium, and won 3 promotions in 10 years to take them into the Premier League and an FA Cup final victory. 

Whelan has just sold the Latics to a Hong Kong based firm International Entertainment Corporation for £22 million. Wigan currently sit 17^th in the Championship, just above Rotherham and Sheffield Wednesday. 

The Press gantry  at Eastleigh

Their manager is a bloke called Paul Cook and their main midfielder, is one Sam Morsy.

In an almost mirror image of Wigan is Chesterfield, also owned by a local businessman called Dave who sends packing potential suitors, from China, Sweden and closer to home, by declaring that they are tyre-kickers and time wasters.

Roberto Martinez who managed Wigan to their greatest ever triumph at Wembley was recently quoted as saying “Dave Whelan is, the reason that Wigan achieved what they achieved. He had an incredible vision, he was a winner and everything he did was done properly and that was contagious.” Our Great Leader avowed that his vision was to “Get the club into the championship and flog it.” Perhaps he could take a tip from Dave Whelan on how this can now be achieved; although to be fair we do have a contagious culture at the club, but one which involves a rather more downward trajectory than we’d hoped for.

At the time of writing, time must be running out for Martin Allen, upbeat in press conferences and very proud of our unbeaten run, which is also a non-winning league run of 18 games. Allen was actually previously sacked at Saturday’s opponents Eastleigh after not winning for 7 matches and guiding them to 15^th place in the National League a spot which would now be regarded as success by most Spireites. 

Eastleigh was an awful wet afternoon, somewhere in Hampshire the supporters bus arrived 5 minutes before kick off. I was filming for the club website and had to climb up a scaffold in the rain set up the camera and get the best pictures I could manage. With rain on the lens and on my glasses I am surprised I got anything on camera at all.

I recently had the misfortune to drive past The Darlington Arena which used to be home to the local football team, who now don’t play there anymore but first ground shared with Bishop Aukland and are now at a much smaller ground in the vicinity, their fans recently clubbed together to make new improvements to the ground. 

Darlo now sit 16^th in the National League north, 2 places below Alfreton, frankly we have more chance of ending up like them than Wigan. Here we go, we could end up a fan owned club desperately looking for someone to buy Chesterfield FC, same thing as happened when Darren Brown took over and ruined the club. Or maybe the club will just be run into the ground and never sold? Ashley Carson wants to know who threw a bottle onto the pitch at the last home game, probably someone who wasn't very pleased with the rubbish they paid to watch.

Getting better or not as awful?

Well apparently, the team are getting better, but are they? The midweek draw against Sutton was slated by Martin Allen as being awful, but at least we got a point through virtually our only clear-cut chance of the match thanks to Jonathan Smith scoring. On Saturday we got a one all draw thanks to Jonathan Smith scoring with virtually our only clear-cut chance of the match. Mind you we had lots of chances against Wrexham in the one apiece result; good job Jonathan Smith grabbed our late equaliser in that one.

Having said that the team is improving is OK but more than one point a game is needed otherwise relegation and the end of the club as we know it looms large. I think in the last 3 league matches we have seen players give it all they have got it’s not as if they aren’t trying, I think we have to be honest and say that one or two of the side haven’t really got it. We’ve played “top” teams in this division and they are hard-working and well organised and that’s about it, there’s no outstanding teams, but on Saturday we should have won.  

Plastic Pitch at Harrogate

We who wait

For me the turning point of the game against mighty Harrogate, was Martin Allen making substitutions straight after we’d scored and Chesterfield went from an attempt to play a passing game to a long ball hit and hope. Doing that handed the initiative to the opposition, I hate to say it but putting Binnon-Williams in front of Muggleton made our left side an easy option for Harrogate, 

meaning our opponents were firing in crosses every time they got the ball into that area of the pitch.

Sorry but Sam Muggleton getting a game must be the most glaring example of "Jobs for the Boys" that we have ever seen on the pitch at the club, sorry but he's got a long throw and that's it, if his dad wasn't on the sidelines he would never have been signed.

he could not stop Harrogate from getting  crosses in, and that's what he is there to do, Binnon-Williams wasn't good enough defensively either and neither of them could get to the ball to stop the ball coming over.. 

Lee Shaw who we signed from Grantham Town has not scored yet and doesn't look like doing so either, he's got some pace but that's about it.

Stadium Approach

The referee found 7 minutes of injury time which wasn’t unfair as 30 seconds are added on for every sub, there were injuries and our keeper decided to have a sit down and a rest to slow things up, however since Harrogate scored in the 98^th minute and then the ref immediately blew for time, one would have to question his timekeeping.

For many fans of the Blues the long throw from Muggleton routine has passed it’s sell by date, every team in the league knows what is coming and the ball virtually never goes to a Chesterfield shirt. So it’s really a dilemma that the manager has placed himself into, with player selections and purchases, which type of game does he go for?  It’s also not great to hear an opposition manager such as Paul Doswell on Tuesday at Sutton saying that frankly our tactics are poor and they were by far the better side.  Oh well onto the magic of the FA Cup, who knows if we can fashion a couple of chances against Billericay?

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Amazing tackle at Halifax

It was one of the greatest runs I’ve ever seen on a football pitch from one end to the other with no opponent able to get near him, with an amazing body swerve, he was certainly my Man of the Match; no not Zavon Hines, the streaker at Halifax!

For those foolish souls who pay to watch their football on the TV, rather than actually go to the match they missed the highlight of the season so far, as I believe the powers that be decided to avoid showing the amazing tackle on display at Halifax and cut to other scenes, such as football. Now we’ve all seen exhibitionists encroach on the field of play at sporting events, which schoolboy of my generation could ever forget the magnificent Erica Roe, who flaunted her assets at a Rugby Union game?

But this guy, the Halifax Streaker, has taken the art to a new level with the game at 0-0, he sprinted out of the home end wearing nothing but a broad grin and put up a fair pace, slowed down a little near the half way line, did an aeroplane gesture, and with no stewards looking like they wanted to intervene, clambered on to the top of the turnstiles, saluted the crowd and made his exit over the wall, completely starkers onto the streets of Halifax accompanied by a round of applause from the Grandstand.

I only hope he had an accomplice armed with a spare set of clothes and a getaway car, woe betide the impromptu streaker who forgets to leave any spare togs near the scene of his indecency. But who was that unmasked man? Surely someone in West Yorkshire must know him? Perhaps he could liven up subsequent fixtures in this division

It’s been a long time since I went to Halifax Town as they used to be, these days ground sharing with rugby league the place has been spruced up, street signs advertise the fact that you are going to Shay Stadium, I thought that was in New York? Didn’t the Beatles play Shay Stadium once? Anyway, bad puns aside, I paid twenty quid to nearly see a football match, yes the delights of the tv crews turning up meant that we were on one half of the old main stand, with a camera gantry right in front of us and the main one on the halfway line blocking out one corner of the pitch. 

You could nearly see both goals if you strained your neck a bit, surely a bit of stadium management could have solved this, why didn’t we just get the big terrace behind the goal? 

Anyone got any hedge clippers?

It was a good header by Tom Denton though, 1-1 fair result, I thought.

Zavon Hines was clearly our best player, he's obviously coming back from injury, Joe Rowley is playing well back in his midfield role, and the rest well they worked hard. We nearly scored with a header against the bar in the first half and an early kick off the line by Halifax, both from our long throw routine, but apart from that, the first period was forgettable. With fresh legs in midfield Chesterfield could turn draws into wins, but its going to be a long, long season.

Did you see yourself on TV?

https://www.derbyshiretimes.co.uk/sport/football/local/streaker-livened-up-my-barely-adequate-view-of-chesterfield-draw-1-9397007 

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