Hardenhuish Park Saturday, April 27th, 2019 k/o 15:00   National League South Attendance: 533         Chippenham Town 0-1 Chelmsford City
2018 /19

Comments :

Set off from Crewe in absolutely torrential rain as Storm Hanna swept across the UK. Probably as a result my first train was delayed putting my connection at Stafford in jeopardy. A quick check of the timetables and I found a different train that would save me 10 minutes so hopped to a different platform and just caught it. After that everything worked perfectly. another 6-train day will all (bar the first) spot on time. It was blowing a gale but thankfully not raining for the walk to Hardenhuish Park which is proper old school and lovely. A little path around the back of the sports club up to just 2 turnstiles. Inside there's a reasonable main stand with a long narrow bar upstairs that looks out onto the pitch. It was packed but very friendly and a pint of ale was welcome. The game itself wasn't great, not helped by a roaring gale and a hard and very bumpy pitch surface. But the commitment of the players was intense - helped by Chelmsford angling for play-off position which at this level is very important with home advantage always coming to the higher placed team. I met a nice family watching the game. They lived in Swindon but were Bradford City supporters and their son (about 10 years old) was a huge fan of one particular Chelmsford player who used to play for Bradford. Anyway, I chatted to them for almost the entire second half which took my mind of some pretty poor football and the ever dropping temperature. The home journey was thankfully trouble free but seemed very very long. (about 4.5 hours door to door). And by the time I got home (empty house - Sue in Tenerife) I needed to light a fire to get me warm again. But another great day out and so lovely to be back in Wiltshire where be that blackbird be.