Spoiled?

When me and Kev go to a game, we usually know what to expect, and what facilites will be on hand. We seem to be a little spoiled at the venues we visit compared to regular Tony Kempster forum poster Dan Bishop..... "Leicestershire Senior League Division One Lutterworth Town 0-2 Newhall United Admission: No, Programme: No, Food: No, Drink: No, Cover: No, Hard-Standing: No Stretcher: No, Good Football: Good God No, Attendance: Yes! – 11 (h/c)

Banality, thy name is Lutterworth Soccer Centre. In addition to it’s gratuitous use of the ‘s’ word, the sign states without a hint of irony that it’s ‘where all the fun kicks off’, despite offering all the fun of a mild bladder infection. Large car parking in support of both the main pitch, and the adjoining 3G small sided pitches, with a shared new-build dressing room complex. The ground itself is spectacularly non-descript, separately fenced off on three sides with trees separating the far side from the main road, and fully-railed. No hard-standing or cover, they do have floodlights though. The welcome from the hosts committee was, as ever for this league, lukewarm, getting information on where the away dressing room, drinking water etc was like extracting teeth. There is an upstairs bar facility, but was out of bounds due to a private function. There was a couple of fully-stocked vending machines in the complex foyer, but these were switched off, therefore there were no refreshments in sight whatsoever. The game itself was execrable in the first-half, rising to merely tepid in the second. Pretty standard LSL fare. Newhall created, and missed, a couple of half-chances as the interval approached. The only occurrence of real note was the injury to a Lutterworth player who looked and sounded in some distress after falling awkwardly in the centre of the park, and obviously unable to continue. However, with no stretcher forthcoming it was left to four team-mates to grab a limb each and remove him from the field of play as though they were about to leg-and-a-wing him over the barriers. Second-half was a marginal improvement, and Whetton pounced on a loose ball on the edge of the box twenty minutes from time, and Dent put the game beyond doubt with a composed finish on 89 minutes. Whichever official from the home side thought it would be funny to lock myself and three players in the dressing room for 15 minutes afterwards - and respond to our hammering and shouting with a witty f**k off – it wasn’t, and it just made you look pathetic. It’s hard to be enthusiastic about the football at this level, which has undeniably plummeted in standard since my last sojourn 8 years ago".

Thanks Dan - great post, and it will certainly make me think twice before complaining about our local games/venues/facilities ever again ......