On a cold afternoon I made the short journey to see SJR Worksop F.C. play Harworth Colliery F.C. in the Central Midlands Black Dragon Premier Division North League.
The ground is adjacent to Sandy Lane in Worksop just a quarter of a mile down the lane from Worksop Town’s ground.
It was a cold windy afternoon interrupted by a few sleet and rain flurries decending from the dark grey sky. The car temperature gauge had shown 3.5 degrees as I entered the ample car park. I had no idea that the game would up the temperature and boil over later.
The pitch is set apart from the clubhouse and changing rooms, another pitch being in between. I had a coffee to warm up but there were no chips here for my chip league.
The pitch is surrounded by a white fence and the playing surface sloped slightly end to end with a good thick grass cover.
I would normally write a few paragraphs abut the clubs but this was all about the game.
St Josephs Rockware Worksop 1 Harworth Colliery F.C. O
Central Midlands Black Dragon Premier Division North: Kick off 3.00 pm
Glassworks Pitches, Sandy Lane Worksop.
This local derby, 10 miles apart by car and less as the crow flies started with SJR playing down hill and the grey skies had cleared and now bright blue skies meant you could see planes making their decent into Doncaster Sheffield airport. Harworth took complete control and had most success attacking down the right, they even clipped the post after 7 minutes with the ball rebounding into the keepers arms. For all of Harworth’s pressure it was SJR who took the lead on 15 minutes when from a corner the ball was worked back to no.22 who from just over 20 yards out took down the ball with his right and curled it with his left into the top right hand corner of the net.
Worksop now took control but were pegged back to 10 men when one of their players was sin binned five minutes later for continual arguing with the referee’s decisions. Harworth did not take advantage of this but had a further chance to take the upper hand when the referee sent off Worksop’s number 4 for a second yellow card received for two strong fouls just 5 minutes from half time.
At this point I was thinking of another coffee or even a hot OXO came to mind as I could see an OXO factory in the distance.
A few minutes after the dismissal the referee approached the SJR bench to get them all to vacate the touchline and some ensuing verbal’s resulted with a yellow card for one of their management team which turned red when further words were exchanged. The referee then blew his whistle and shouted that the game was abandoned as he had been threatened by the home team.
The referee gathered the other officials and walked back to the changing room leaving the players bemused on the pitch. The crowd of circa 70 were stunned too and one of them said that someone had threatened the referee to sort him out in the carpark later! The players eventually trooped off and as it was just on half time the crowd stayed hoping that the game would resume for the second half. However the players started to come out of the club house having changed and the crowd drifted back to their cars. I overheard one of the Worksop players say, that was an easy win and an early finish too. Unfortunately I think it will be the Central Midland League’s committee that decide the result of this one in the future.
Payonthegate 