Been there, done that, worn the slippers
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Frosinone 0 Torino 0
Saturday 10th December 2023 – Serie A – Stadio Benito Stirp – Frosinone, Italy Frosinone, like many provincial towns in Italy, enjoys a stunning location. Surrounded on three sides by the Ernici and Lepini mountains, in what is known as the Valle Latina (“The Latin Valley”), there’s few better vistas on a sunny day that the…
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Ternana 2 FeralPisalo 1
Saturday 9th December 2023 – Serie B – Stadio Libero Liberati, Terni, Italy I’m all for clubs being different, but Ternana Calcio, currently in Serie B, perhaps take the individuality to extremes. One of the club’s nicknames is I Rossoverdi – the Red and Greens. I can’t think of one other side that can lay claim…
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Houston Dynamo 1 Real Salt Lake 1
Saturday 11th November 2023 – MLS Western Conference Play-off – The Shell Energy Stadium, Houston Despite the efforts of British Airways to ruin my first ever trip to Houston, I was in the Shell Energy Stadium to see the Dynamo’s win a second successive penalty shoot out to progress into the next round of the MLS…
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Cliftonville 3 Crusaders 0
Saturday 25th November 2023 – Northern Ireland Premier League – Solitude, Belfast On 21 August 1979 over 1,900 police officers were on duty for a football match, the most there had ever been in attendance at a football match in the UK. This was no Manchester, North London, Merseyside or even Old Firm derby, but…
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Lewes 1 FC Oslo 0
Tuesday 7th November 2023 – The Fenix Trophy – The Dripping Pan, Lewes Aside from a couple of Isthmian South league games against Guernsey and an FA Trophy tie against Merthyr a few years ago, there’s not been many opportunities to play against teams outside of England. But this summer an opportunity arose for us…
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Stranraer 3 Elgin City 1
Saturday 4th November 2023 – Scottish League Two – Stair Park, Stranraer It’s always good to discover a piece of football trivia that you can bring out on the terraces. These aren’t the facts that are regurgitated by commentators and the media, but those which are so strange or irrelevant that you can only question…
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Larne 2 Cliftonville 1
Friday 3rd November 2023 – The Irish Premier League – Inver Park, Larne Sitting in 340th place in UEFA’s Rankings, one place about Floriana from Malta, one below Iceland’s Vikingur, you can find Northern Ireland’s current champions, Larne FC. When they lined up in Helsinki for the Champions League First Qualifying Round against HJK in…
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Dulwich Hamlet 0 Lewes 2
Saturday 28th October 2023 – The FA Trophy – Champion Hill, Dulwich Champion Hill is one of a few grounds, used at the semi/professional level where I can claim to have played at, and scored. However, like old Wembley Stadium (MPs XI vs The Football Trust at half-time as a photographer, circa 1997), it wasn’t…
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FC Teutonia 5 BWLohne 0
Sunday 22nd October 2023 – Regionalliga Nord – Stadion Hoheluft It’s been a while since I’ve been able to sneak a game in whilst travelling for work – blame global event organisers who schedule conferences I need to attend outside the relevant domestic seasons. But finally, I had a chance to combine the two,…
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Olympique Lyonnais 0 Le Havre 0
The ground was about 2/3rd full, with most of the top tier closed off on the opposite side of the stadium closed off, except the smattering of away fans who had made the 800 mile round journey from Normandy.
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Como 1907 3 Ternana 1
Sunday 13th May 2023 2pm – Serie B – Stadio Guiseppe Sinigaglia, Como It takes just as long to get to Como from London as it does Manchester and based on the state of our railway infrastructure, invariably costs less. So whilst you could enjoy the delights of Old Trafford and its leaky roof, or…
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Bonnyrigg Rose Athletic 3 Elgin City 0
Saturday 6th May 2023 3pm – Scottish League Two – New Dundas Park, Bonnyrigg Whilst the calls for the National League in England to become League Three, and an additional promotion and relegation spot awarded, it is still easier for a team at Step 5 to be promoted to Step 4. The National League has…
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East Fife 2 Albion Rovers 1
Saturday 29th April 2023 3pm – Scottish League Two – Bayview Stadium, Leven
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Elgin City 1 Stenhousemuir 1
Tuesday 11th April 2023 7:45pm – Scottish League Two – Borough Briggs, Elgin
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FC Edinburgh 1 Queen of the South 3
The move to Friday night was to avoid a clash with Scotland’s game with Cyprus on Saturday, a hope that they could also increase on their average of 591, currently the lowest in the league. Edinburgh offers a lot for the nocturnal visitors – unfortunately a trip out to Meadowbank probably doesn’t figure in the…
The Ball is Round 