GNE Away – Rossendale United 2 GNE 0

We start this short narrative with a verse from a well known tune:-

We're on a road to nowhere
Come on inside
Takin' that ride to nowhere
We'll take that ride

Now, for sure, many will recognise this little ditty from the mid ‘80s as a verse from the song “Road to Nowhere” from the album Little Creatures by the American band Talking Heads – and weren’t they good too? Well, OK, matter of opinion maybe! Anyway, what relevance has this to a GNE awayday? We will soon see, dear reader, be patient.

The hooli-van returns after the summer recess, re-charged and raring to go. The disciples, also re-charged and raring to go, assemble at The Friendship at the appointed hour and away we go in the direction of Rossendale which, as we all know, does not exist. And herein we find the link to “a road to nowhere” as how can we be off to a place which doesn’t exist or, put another way, is nowhere? It seems that Rossendale is an area – the Rossendale Valley – consisting of a number of small towns “clinging to the sides of hills” in East Lancashire and the particular town we are to visit is Waterfoot. Good job we knew that otherwise the magical sat. nav., as operated by our inestimable driver Shifty, may have had some sort of hissy fit and started screaming at us in a high pitched female voice – “turn around when possible”, “turn around when possible” – oh, do be quiet!

The route to East Lancashire is now getting very familiar and, as is now tradition, refreshments are taken as we cross Woolley Bridge and enter Tameside. This time some fluorescent green stuff – as used in dentist’s surgeries – appears followed closely by what was described as one wag as creosote. (Note the use of the lower case wag here. We know that WAG is something completely different and it is not the objective of your ageing scribe to insult anybody – glad we cleared that one up.). It transpires that the “green stuff” is absinthe which sends the proud to be Chairman of the Supporters Club off in search of some device with which to cut off his left ear, and the “creosote” is matured Sambuca – well, you live and learn.

After a perfect drive we turn into Dark Lane and arrive at the ground to find the clubhouse outside the boundary wall: (following the correct usage of the term “pitch perimeter” in a previous short essay in this series we find yet again the value of education by finding the correct usage of the term “boundary wall”. Never let it be said that “knowledge is a dangerous thing!”). We knew in advance from the excellent Vodkat League website that the bar at Rossendale has recently been re-instated (whatever that means) and we are delighted to find real ale in the form of Flat Cap Bitter from the Bank Top Brewery in Bolton. We are beginning to like this place already as Rossendale is mentally added to the very short list of real ale outlets in the Vodkat League – Congleton and fortress Surrey Street are the other two. We are greeted by Rossy supporter Graham – quite a character this lad, we will come across him again later. Suitably refreshed after a sojourn in the beer garden we enter the ground.

The entrance price of £7 is met with incredulity by the travelling supporters. When challenged, the response from the gateman was “well we used to be in the Unibond”. Yes, well, note the use of the past tense here – sorry Rossendale, you are not in the Unibond anymore and this will not do. £1.50 buys a very professional looking programme – full colour on glossy paper, professionally printed. Looks good and with decent content but should not win the programme of the season award. The ground reflects the fact that Rossendale United were once at a higher level. Stands around most of the ground but “essence of fading glory” fills the air – much like Winsford really. As with many of these grounds in East Lancashire the setting is marvellous with a back drop of rolling hills populated by sheep. The pitch is reminiscent of a rolling hill with a bit of a side to side slope, significant bumps and more weeds than grass – not good so early in the season.

The GNE travelling army of about 40 from a crowd given later as 102 (what were they saying about Unibond!!) assemble behind the goal at the turnstile end. A 5 flag day. Pies described as "not good" but some words of praise for the chips.

The teams enter the field with GNE wearing red shirts much to our surprise. Comments such as “where did they come from” and “I’ve never shouted “come on you reds” in 50 years and I’m not starting now” rent the air. By way of explanation, Rossendale United play in blue and white stripes and either of our standard blue or white kits could have been considered to be a clash.

After 45 minutes, its half time and Rossendale lead 1-0. Shazza is obliged to accept defeat in the challenge of getting the home manager to have a go on the football card and we move down to behind the bottom goal for the second half. Harking back to the £7 entrance, we discover one local resident whose house backs onto the ground would have been prepared to let us into his back garden for £3.50 and thrown in a free beer. Too late for us sadly but this valuable information may help the supporters of teams yet to visit Dark Lane.

The game re-starts and after what was later described as a Laurel and Hardy piece of defending and a missed penalty, GNE fail to register an away win. A 2-0 final score in favour of the home side represents their first victory this season in the Vodkat League.

We depart to the clubhouse where the aforementioned Graham joins us and befriends the Supporters Club Chairman of Vice – in the words of another song “You’ve got a Friend” there Tim. The Flat Cap flows and we do our best to liven the spirits. This fails as the collection of smokers in our party collectively run out of cigarettes – time to leave. Just before we leave, the room next to the bar starts to fill up with people dressed in a strange manner, men looking uncomfortable in collar and tie, women wearing dresses which might have fitted them several years ago. Does this sound familiar? Well, to regular readers of these short but meandering essays, think back to Rossington Main last year and we can confirm that “A Bit of a Do” type functions are not unique to Yorkshire although we are perilously close to the Yorkshire border here.

Supplies of the “evil weed” and some monastic sounding cider are obtained from the nearby Tesco and we set off on the journey home. The challenge on the way home, as set by the Supporters Club multi-talented Events Co-ordinator, is to come up with a single word to describe the collective mood. We fail in this challenge in that the nearest we can get is the two word epithet “in denial”.

We arrive home and disperse into the persistent drizzle. A quality day despite the football and, as my loyal dear readers are well aware, I am never one to shirk the task of borrowing or stealing quotes from someone else when my feeble imagination lets me down. So, I leave the last word with moonbasealpha who describes us as “a drinking club with a football problem”.

No more to be said…