Northampton Town - FA Cup

Only 52 hours left until kick off, and with a full house it is going to be a cracking atmosphere (and no I won't mention Russ Abbott for a second time!).

If we put in the same amount of effort as we did in our last 3 matches, then it will be an interesting game.  And I certainly don't think it will be as one sided as some people seem to think.  As they say anything can happen in the cup, even if they do play in a league 4 divisions higher.

I was going to start the score predictions going, but as I usually get it wrong I've decided not to bother.

And finally I know that the club & management will be appearing on Midlands Today tonight, but did anyone notice a certain famous Stour fan beat them to it by appearing on last night's programme?  It might have been an article about homeless people instead of football, but you can still recognise that person sitting in the background  

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If he's in that position then that's very sad.

dave w wrote:If he's in that position then that's very sad.

I don't think he's actually homeless himself, I think he just helps out there. He also sings in a choir, or so he's told me last season.

sirsmileriiii wrote:

dave w wrote:If he's in that position then that's very sad.

I don't think he's actually homeless himself, I think he just helps out there.  He also sings in a choir, or so he's told me last season.

If that's the case then fair play to him.

In case you don't know today's game has been P-P, even though there's still been NO official announcement on the website?

Cannot understand why they left it so late to do the pitch inspection, after all the first I heard about it being called off was at 12:30pm.  Which is only 90 minutes before kick-off and after all the Northampton players & supporters would have arrived.

As far as I'm concerned the only part of the pitch that could still be frozen is the stand side which doesn't get any sun on it at this time of year, and they should have known first thing this morning that it would be a problem with little chance of thawing out.

The only possible positive thing that could come from this postponement would be the possibility of either the BBC or BT deciding to show the game live as it's now scheduled for Tues 12th Dec, but I doubt if they will

I am gutted that the game's been called off, but at least that gets us into the 3rd round draw on Mon night

What a disappointment, putting it mildly !

Seeing the heavy frost on my north-facing lawn, I had some doubts and kept checking on Twitter throughout the morning. But it was only when I was about to leave for the match that I found out of the postponement.

With the match now taking place on a Tuesday, a working day for our lads, we are put at an even more of a disadvantage. Not being cynical, of course ( ! ), I would think Northampton were quietly relieved and did not query the ref's decision !

From a finance angle, we will not make as much money as expected once what have turned out to be today's unnecessary costs such as policing, stewarding, refreshment and toilet facilities etc. are taken into consideration. Not sure but hope that Nton.'s 45% of the gate receipts will be reduced by a share of these expenses. Not sure also what happens to the broadcasting income.

Not wishing to be critical of our directors and stressing I don't know the ins and outs, but I thought plans had been made a year or so ago that, in a frosty spell, that area of the pitch which gets no sunlight in winter would be covered. With our finances being in a very healthy position, I cannot think for one moment that we could not afford contingency plans.

redpike wrote:Not wishing to be critical of our directors and stressing I don't know the ins and outs, but I thought plans had been made a year or so ago that, in a frosty spell, that area of the pitch which gets no sunlight in winter would be covered. With our finances being in a very healthy position, I cannot think for one moment that we could not afford contingency plans.

Especially as this was supposed to be the biggest game ever!

The stand side of the pitch has given us problems before in cold weather, so you would have thought that they'd listen to the forecast and make the necessary provisions for covering that part of the pitch. If I was a Northampton supporter that had travelled today I would certainly be upset, especially as they left the pitch inspection so late.

The other thing that annoyed me is that there was no official announcement about the Postponement on the website or twitter. I only found out after setting out for the game after 12:30 and I saw someone on the way to the ground who informed me that it was off. Upon returning home I looked on the internet and the only information found about the game being postponed was 1 tweet and that information was unconfirmed?, but nothing official which was very confusing. Luckily I found out officially via the BCR website before setting out again.

I just hope that they do something to make sure it doesn't happen again on the 13th, after all it supposed to start going colder again by the end of next week

They say a picture tells a thousand words and the ones of Gary Hackett sum up how I've felt today.  I was already outside the Church End turnstiles when news filtered through but as said an official announcement seemed a while in coming after that. I did hope we would be in the 3rd round draw but the circumstances are disapointing.

Don't know what happened to the covers we had a few years back? games against Skelmersdale and Kings Lynn this time two years ago went ahead in worse frosty   conditions, am amazed we didn't try and cover it although it was only forecast to go down to 1 degree, clearly it got colder that that as the canal was frozen in Netherton this morning and once that happened, without cover, I would say there was no chance of the game going ahead, especially with a higher level referee.  An early inspection would have been in order and very surprised that did not happen.

I'm not into finger pointing and everyone who works hard for the club (and very hard they work) will be devastated by this.  What should have been a fantastic day - whatever the result (I thought - and still do - we had an outside chance) has been embarrassing.  It will still be a sell out whenever it's played but the fact the players will have been at work all day makes it even harder for us.

I read talk of possible live coverage of the second attempt, I dislike schedules being dictated by television - whatever the financial rewards - and if the match (and the other 19 if I had my way) had been at 3.00pm on Saturday we wouldn't be in the situation we are now.  There was too much made in the build up about being snubbed for live tv and missing out on the dough - what about the glory? of turning over a third division club? that seemed to come second, I don't for a moment dismiss the financial side and what it's done for Stourbridge but that isn't the be all and end all for me.

My weekend was set out with a charter train trip yesterday - which got cancelled as the locomotive was declared out of gauge at one platform at Nottingham - and FA Cup today with Amblecote declared "out of gauge" by the referee.  The habitual "had a good weekend?" is going to require a count to 10 tomorrow!

oldhillglassboy wrote:I read talk of possible live coverage of the second attempt

I certainly hope they don't consider showing our game live, as people will start saying that we deliberately got the game called off because we weren't chosen for TV first time round. Which is a comment that has already been posted on the Northampton forum.

One of the other obvious comments on there is why was there no official notification about either a pitch inspection or when the game was postponed, for fans travelling to Stourbridge it was very confusing because they didn't know whether to carry on or turn round and go home.

I'm almost certain that no matter how many Northampton fans are able to attend the game on Tues 13, they will give us plenty of stick about it. With the national press & media attending for what was supposed to be our biggest game ever, it's embarrassing that after all the hard work which has been made by everyone to get this game organised they couldn't do something simple like cover the pitch. Especially when every other game that's been postponed due to a frozen pitch, it has always been the stand side that's frozen.

The money that we've won from our other cup runs has been spent on upgrading the ground to the required level to get promotion, but what's the point of doing that if we're unable to get promotion because our games keep being Postponed due to a frozen pitch. The club have got to spend some money on getting a cover to make sure that this doesn't happen again, after all no TV company will want to show us live at this time of year if there's a chance of our game being postponed due to a frozen pitch.

Just hope that we don't get any injuries during the next 2 games.

Like most of us, I am aware and appreciative of all of the hard work and time given by our leaders and volunteers. But it does seem that our eye was taken off the ball when it came to ensuring that the most basic requirement of making sure the pitch was playable would be met.

Perhaps we were distracted by all of the media attention which, up to yesterday, had been very welcome and complimentary. But now we have been left with egg all over our faces.

To repeat earlier contributions, our social media outlets seemed to suffer a black out at a very critical time. Usually they are up-to-date with information but yesterday's lack of clear news caused much frustration to us all. I, for example, had to get confirmation from WM.

A statement from the club concerning the events of yesterday on the website will be very welcome.

It's annoying that so much progress has been made yet the thing we'll be most remembered for is this embarassment. All the new seats and bigger capacity in the world is no good if we call games off at the first hint of frost. And as others have said, to not have the announcement made 'officially' ASAP was a major blunder. I appreciate that we're still a comparatively small club run on the whole by volunteers who almost always do a great job and don't get the credit they deserve, but if you play with the big boys you get judged by their standards.

redpike wrote:Like most of us, I am aware and appreciative of all of the hard work and time given by our leaders and volunteers. But it does seem that our eye was taken off the ball when it came to ensuring that the most basic requirement of making sure the pitch was playable would be met.

Perhaps we were distracted by all of the media attention which, up to yesterday, had been very welcome and complimentary. But now we have been left with egg all over our faces.

To repeat earlier contributions, our social media outlets seemed to suffer a black out at a very critical time. Usually they are up-to-date with information but yesterday's lack of clear news caused much frustration to us all. I, for example, had to get confirmation from WM.

A statement from the club concerning the events of yesterday on the website will be very welcome.

Just wanted to make an important clarification that the social media blackout was due to a lack of information getting through to the team who runs them, rather than them holding onto information received and not giving it out!

The view from the pinnacle is a very good one! 1-0 nil down in the pouring rain at Peterborough Sports does seem a lifetime ago! unbelievable stuff and thoroughly deserved too, we where the better side forced all the saves, although I did feel we needed to put one away sooner rather than later, and we where struggling to get out of our own half in the last 15 minutes as the fitness kicked in, you could see a late defeat and then....... I'm surprised the roofs weren't lifted off! despite my frustration with the fiasco of the original postponement I did feel that a wet Tuesday under lights would be more difficult for Northampton, with the atmosphere hugely enhanced and that was correct, they struggled to bring their higher level status to bear at any point and didn't want it enough when the going got tough.

To use the words of Barry Davies "where was the television, but frankly who cares" I was certainly in agreement with the prominent banner at the shed end! This has to be one of the biggest shocks for some time, Bet Fred was offering 5000 to 1 before the match, shame I don't bet!

I won't sleep tonight, this is amazing, the players where immense, thanks to the management and all the people behind the scenes, a penny for Hugh Clarke's thoughts at the moment.

It feels like it was meant to be with all the away draws, an even numbered "not our year" and a fair role of the dice, the header that was ruled out to bring it back to 3-2 at Peterborough, which nobody could see anything wrong with, the soft penalty at Nantwich to bring it back to 3-1 followed straight away by an even softer second yellow card which killed them. Ghost goal at Whitehawk, not to mention the one spooned over the open goal just before that. Have been to all the games in this seasons competition for the first time usually missing an early qualifier, and what a journey it is and who knows what the final chapter will be.

oldhillglassboy wrote:
The view from the pinnacle is a very good one! 1-0 nil down in the pouring rain at Peterborough Sports does seem a lifetime ago! unbelievable stuff and thoroughly deserved too, we where the better side forced all the saves, although I did feel we needed to put one away sooner rather than later, and we where struggling to get out of our own half in the last 15 minutes as the fitness kicked in, you could see a late defeat and then....... I'm surprised the roofs weren't lifted off! despite my frustration with the fiasco of the original postponement I did feel that a wet Tuesday under lights would be more difficult for Northampton, with the atmosphere hugely enhanced and that was correct, they struggled to bring their higher level status to bear at any point and didn't want it enough when the going got tough.

To use the  words of Barry Davies "where was the television, but frankly who cares" I was certainly in agreement with the prominent banner at the shed end! This has to be one of the biggest shocks for some time, Bet Fred was offering 5000 to 1 before the match, shame I don't bet!

I won't sleep tonight, this is amazing, the players where immense, thanks to the management and all the people behind the scenes, a penny for Hugh Clarke's thoughts at the moment.

It feels like it was meant to be with all the away draws, an even numbered "not our year" and a fair role of the dice, the header that was ruled out to bring it back to 3-2 at Peterborough, which nobody could see anything wrong with, the soft penalty at Nantwich to bring it back to 3-1 followed straight away by an even softer second yellow card which killed them.  Ghost goal at Whitehawk, not to mention the one spooned over the open goal just before that.  Have been to all the games in this seasons competition for the first time usually missing an early qualifier,  and what a journey it is and who knows what the final chapter will be.  

You only forgot to say one thing, and that is "Stour ay' we"

As I never heard it mentioned (which isn't really a surprise!), can anyone tell me what the winning 50/50 draw number was

What a truly memorable, unique night for our club.......... one of those ''I was there'' moments ! Massive congratulations to Gary and his management team, to all of the players, to our leaders and to all of the volunteers.

It was a victory that was fully deserved, a point acknowledged magnanimously by their manager. Even though he said they had an off night, that was because we outplayed and out fought them....we were more hungry than them. Before the game, I did think their superior fitness levels would show but even that was not the case.

In a game of few clear-cut chances, most of the incidents came from dead-ball situations but our defence, backed up by our hard-working midfield, held out impressively, so much so that I can't remember Matt being all that troubled. Last night, we witnessed absolutely awesome displays by both Dan and Jack ! With them in mind and several other players, I just hope that, with all of the national attention, bigger clubs don't come sniffing around.

A special word of Tom. He played the proper captain's role by taking his time to shake the hands of all of their players and having selfies with young fans. A class act, Tom !!!

From the 11 heroes on the pitch 61 fans tried to find a motm.The voting was as follows:

DAN SCARR 28

Jack Duggan 19

Matt Dodd 10

Matt Gould
Kristian Green }1
Darryl Westlake
Team

NEIL STEVENS-WOOD won the wine.

Thanks to all who took part, if this was your first time and you enjoyed taking part, please come and see me in the programme hut and have a go again for just £1.

How to sum this up - a magical night!

It didn't get off to a great start, with being frisked upon entry, which I thought was a total disgrace, and surprise surprise the one person with a smoke bomb didn't get discovered with it anyway!!

Even more bizarrely, we then got tickets checked AGAIN upon entering the main seated stand. This was too much for two guys I didn't recognise in front of me, who branded the two stewards a f*****g disgrace and stormed off. So either they got in without a ticket or couldn't face getting a piece of paper back out of their pocket. I wouldn't have put it quite like they did, but I thought it was pointless to recheck tickets.

Anyway, on to the game. What a performance! It is extremely rare for nobody outside the defence & goalkeeper except for Matt Dodd to get a single vote, but that's a fair assessment I think. All of the back four were absolutely brilliant, particularly Dan, and that was what won it I think. Matt Dodd probably had his best ever game for Stour, being a constant menace and earning the visitors some deserved yellow cards, especially for Matt Taylor's blatant shirt pull on the edge of the box.

Scarr and Duggan were a particular threat at set plays and had a lot of our chances up front as well. Were it not for a few good saves from their goalkeeper, we could have been ahead before.

Tonks, Leon, Brown and Benbow all worked their socks off but I think the impenetrable defence was the bedrock of the win.

There was a stage around the 75th-85th minute where I thought we were tiring a bit but Northampton never pushed on from there. Gater came on and was SO composed, and he helped us get over the line. It looked like heading to a replay until Benbow made a brilliant choice to float a superb free kick into the box when he could easily have decided to shoot, and it paid dividends as the goalkeeper came and missed and Duggan was there to hit home! Bedlam ensued and quite easily the maddest Stourboy celebration for a Stour goal ever.

Was getting a bit teary eyed with the scenes at the final whistle; I shan't forget them in a hurry.

If we were Salford City we would have had about six or seven televised games in the past six or seven seasons but I'm not going to let that affect my enjoyment of the performance, the result and the history in making the third round.

Well done to everyone on and off the pitch who made it happen.