The Weaver Stadium – Nantwich Town

Nantwich Town – 2

Colwyn Bay – 1

Evostik Premier League – 22nd March 2011

The dreaded C word had bitten me on the arse.

“Commitments”

You see, I was a bit late leaving work on a beautiful early spring day meaning that my train – the one an hour service to Nantwich – would get me into Nantwich a can’t-enjoy-a-pint time of 20 minutes before kickoff. Furthermore, a desperate plea to a taxi number found on iPhone resulted in a fairly obstructive text implying that I could walk to the ground.

Fine. Suit yourself.

Walk?!? Walk?!?! Do you know that I’m not from these parts? Furthermore, an arse like mine is used as currency in less than affluent areas. Luckily, Nantwich isn’t such a bad place to alight from the train, and the 140 character directions she rather helpfully gave did lead me to The Weaver Stadium, the home of Nantwich’s Town. So yeah, I don’t like to give cheap plugs to commercial entities on this here blog, but the Taxis of Nantwich come highly recommended. Though you may have to walk.

The game itself was a promotion chasers vs relegation battlers affairs. Colwyn Bay, as far as the 10/11 season goes, have exceeded all expectation. The goal was survival in the league, and the seagulls came into this game in second place, strong for the playoffs. Couple that with Nantwich who – despite having backing, fans and a fairly impressive ground – have struggled on the pitch. The game was the first game in charge for Jimmy Quinn, the former Northern Ireland international, who took over from the duo of Kevin Street and Darren Tinson.

Nice to see Nantwich named a stand after me.

The fact that it was their new manager, and the fact that the last few games we’ve ridden our luck at times, set us up for an almighty fall, a fact I confided to to a mate, whilst Nantwich’s walk on music played – the Star Wars Theme. Astronomical.

A rare Bay attack

These fears were confounded in the 9th minute, where the ball broke far to easily for Rodney Jack. He passed the ball through the Colwyn Bay defense like the Red Sea parting, and Michael Lennon slotted it into the bottom left hand corner, giving Nantwich the lead. This seem to lit a fire underneath the Seagulls, who pressed for an equaliser, and they achieved one on the 36^th minute, with a blinding shot from outside the area by Anthony Sheehan that beat the keeper with a rifle of a shot from 35 yards out to draw the scores level. At a tightly poised game, the ref blew for half time.

The what?

At half time, I enjoyed a rarity at football grounds at this level – a chicken balti pie. Marvellous, I also enjoyed the facilities of the clubhouse, which featured two projectors, but no projector screens. With that said it wasn’t a problem – sod all was on the telly that night.

Nantwich fans are happy with how the game's panning out.

The second half kicked off in earnest with both sets of players desperately trying to break the deadlock, which was broken with assistance from the referee when Mike Lea was adjudged to bring down Dabbers’ Michael Carr in the penalty box – which from my vantage point seemed a little bit of a harsh decision, as Carr seemed theatrical in his descent, but with that said I was looking from my seagull tinted spectacles on from the other side of the ground. Jake Sedgemore coolly slotted away the spot kick.

Despite going two goals ahead, Nantwich seem more likely to score a third, however Colwyn Bay did change their shape following substitutions and pressed back the home side, despite having a succession of corners towards the end, Ben Chapman – who in my opinion was Nantwich’s man of the match with some crucial saves in the last quarter – coolly claimed the last corner and the whistle was blown for full time afterwards.

Yeah Colwyn Bay lost, but I did enjoy my day at Nantwich. Passionate fans, nice ground close to the town centre, and plenty of pubs en route to and from the ground. There are worse places to lose.