The relationship between materials science and sport has a long and distinguished history. We can consider just a few examples. In tennis we see the old wooden racquets replaced by carbon fibre types of structures. These new style racquets bring tremendous advantages in terms of lightweight and stiffness. This allows the racquet head to be of almost any shape and the “sweet spot” to be much bigger thus bringing significant advantages in terms of power and accuracy. Any champion player from the old days, playing with a wooden racquet, would be beaten by any average tournament player today, playing with the most up-to-date racquet, simply because of the improvements in technology.
In golf, we see innovations relating to both the clubs and the balls. This often causes controversy as new equipment needs to be assessed by the technical people at the Royal and Ancient to establish if it is “fair to use” – not an easy task. There have been examples of drivers which are claimed to send the ball straight no matter how badly it is hit. Other innovations in clubs suggest that their construction, mainly involving shafts of very high stiffness made from modern day composite materials, send the ball further. The balls themselves have changed dramatically since the days of the old “feather balls”. The introduction of dimples on the surface of the ball helps to maintain accuracy in flight. The consequence of all of this is that many golf courses have had to be reconstructed in order to reposition bunkers and, generally, extend the length so that a “fair” contest between the golfer and the course is maintained.
There are many other examples, not least the construction of snooker balls, but your ageing scribe is reminded that the subject of these short narratives should relate, if only tenuously perhaps, to football. That being the case, it may be useful to dwell for a little while on the construction of a modern day football.
We will all know the stories of laced leather footballs getting heavy in the rain and sorting out the men from the boys in terms of who was prepared to head such a football. And yes, I was that wimp who refused to head an old leather football on the grounds of not wishing to either suffer from concussion or be scarred for life with an imprint of the lacing a permanent feature of a receding forehead. It was only quite recently, whilst fielding a football from the KFC end at fortress Surrey Street, that your ageing scribe was reminded of the science behind a modern day football. And now for the science bit – oh goody!!
The modern day football is made from 32 panels of synthetic material. These panels consist of 20 hexagons and 12 pentagons. When assembled together, the shape is known as a truncated icosahedron and is sometimes referred to as a Buckminster Ball – of which more later. On the face of it, this is very strange as how can 32 plane shapes be made into something which is spherical? Well, the answer is that they can’t and so we are obliged to conclude that a football is not spherical – ready made excuse for the striker who plants his shots in Row Z rather than the goal. The Buckminster referred to above was an American architect called Richard Buckminster Fuller who, in the 1950s, stumbled across this design based on hexagons and pentagons whilst trying to find a way of constructing buildings using the minimum of materials – a style later known as geodesic domes. And that’s not all. The design of the modern day football was later found to be reproduced, if rarely, in nature. The modern day science of nanotechnology is based on structures known as fullerenes the first described of which is known as Buckminsterfullerene (carbon 60) in homage to the aforementioned American architect. It is often said that many modern day examples of technological advancement have roots in the mathematical simplicity of nature and this is true in this case.
So, dear reader, what has this got to do with the mighty GNE playing a football match at Padiham? Well nothing at all really. (Note to self: could be considered as somewhat self- indulgent this one. Answer: true, but having spared them from the rigours of sub atomic particle physics I just had to get something into these short narratives of a scientific nature and, lest we forget, the season is coming to an end.)
And so, back to the “towns perched on the sides of hills” which are all over East Lancashire. As normal in this area, the approach to the Arbories Memorial Sports Ground is up a steep narrow hill. Approaching the bottom of this hill, the attention of your ageing scribe is attracted by a GNE scarf hanging outside the local hostelry. Seems like a good place to start and a handpull with Wells Bombardier suggests something interesting. Alas, the beer is too cold – an increasing trend with real ale these days, very sad and a complete waste of fine ingredients and the brewers skill.
Not quite suitably refreshed, a short walk up the hill brings us to the turnstile. £5 entrance and £1 for a very good programme which is full of information and, not unlike Abbey Hey, several pages of jokes. The jokes are not football related but, even so, entertaining although, again like Abbey Hey, it is suspected that the same jokes are used for the whole season. Fine for the away supporters but a bit tedious for the home fans.
This is a well set up ground in picturesque surroundings. A very good seated stand and two covered standing areas look to be quite new. The pitch, unlike some in recent weeks, is in excellent condition and almost flat – well, compared with Colne and Atherton LR anyway. The sound of leather on willow from an adjacent field reminds us that we are back to the season of our national summer sport and brings back memories of our first away match of the season at Ramsbottom United back in August.
The well appointed clubhouse – available for private hire for birthdays, office parties etc. - features a large screen TV which tonight will show Man. City vs. Spurs as both of these teams vie for fourth place in the Premiership and the qualification for the first stages of the Champions League which goes with it. No chance of us talking over this clubhouse – remember Congleton last Saturday (and others) - as the GNE travelling army is struggling to reach 20 in number from a crowd given later as 109. A no flag day.
As the match kicks off, our indomitable manager cuts a lonely figure up on the top of a grassy slope behind the dug outs – seems that he is still banned from the touchline due to some earlier misdemeanour that everyone else has forgotten about. Early in the first half, four of the home supporters attempt the “you fat b*****d” chant as Stuart takes a goal kick. Bit cheeky this but a poor effort and a training course in The Trenches at fortress Surrey Street is recommended.
After 45 minutes, its half time and the scorer has yet to be troubled – mixed metaphors here perhaps as for some of the first half your ageing scribe has been watching the cricket match in the adjacent field.
The floodlights come on and are described as “very good” by our official photographer and, let’s face it, he should know. Four of our supporters occupy a very small part of one of the covered standing areas and try to recreate the atmosphere in The Trenches back home. To be honest it doesn’t work. As the scoring starts, frantic text messages are sent to absent friends updating them on progress. This proves to be not any easy task as so many friends are absent and rather detracts from the attempt to generate some atmosphere.
The match ends with GNE victorious by 2-0. The players of both sides are applauded off with Rick Bailey (Richard in Congleton we understand) holding back to milk the applause. Well, why not.
The journey home is disturbed somewhat by the closure of the south bound A56 near the Little Chef but, despite a diversion through Haslingden, we arrive home comfortably before last orders in our local pubs.
All-in-all a good evening and we look forward to our next trip to East Lancashire in three days time for the final match of the season.
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