Braintree v Lewes

Saturday 15th January 2011

Our first week of a brand new idea.  It's always exciting.  Most ideas don't get to this stage.  We were actually going to carry it out.  I'd been busy extensively researching all the local teams in the area (i went on Wikipedia), and had singled out two potential games for us to see.  It was between Canvey Island and Braintree.  As a child i would on occasion go and watch Canvey play with my Grandad, i also even played on their pitch once (we lost 9-2 and my sole meaningful touch was to hoof the ball over the bar and into the car park beyond).  So i was very keen on starting our journey there. 

But it's a Saturday.  And a Saturday means we had more time on our hands than usual.  So it made sense that Braintree be our first trip.

The trip to Braintree itself was straightforward enough, but finding the ground proved a little more difficult.  Braintree evidently don't seem to be overly proud of their team, as signs for the stadium proved elusive.  But after 30 minutes or so of driving around, soaking up the view of the town we eventually stumbled across it, tucked away within a residential area.

We had arrived at Cressing Road Stadium. 

We paid our £12 each for a ticket and excitedly bundled through the turnstiles.  Braintree Town typically get attendances of around 500 for their home games.  Well today, they would be getting 502.

We still had a few fleeting moment to have a quick browse around the ground.  Immediately to our left was the Board Room.  It was more of a shed, than a room, but still, that's what the sign on the door said. 

As i'm sure is the same with all football grounds up and down the country, Cressing Road came equipped with a Burger Van.  But what has already set Braintree apart from the rest in my eyes was the accompanying 'sweet shop van' parked alongside it.  Still, we opted for lunch and were delighted to discover that here you can order a Cheese Burger and Chips, all for £4.50.

After getting briefly blocked in as the two teams lined up to come out, we decided to head round to the one stand with seating to watch the first half in comfort.

We took our seats and were ready to enjoy our first 45 minutes of Non-League actions, only to discover a steward approaching us.  Perhaps he'd heard about our exciting quest and wanted to come over and wish us luck on our new venture.  Unfortunately not.  It turns out that if we wished to sit here we were required to part with another £1 for the priviledge. 

15.00 - As the game kicked off i should comment that going into this fixture, Braintree found themselves to be top of the Conference South, and were hosting a Lewes side that were struggling near the foot of the table.  And it showed.  All the early pressure in the opening 15 minutes came from the home side.  They forced a number of free-kicks around the edge of the Lewes 18 yard box, and indeed had two early goals chalked off, for offside and a foul on the keeper respectively.  It goes without saying really, that as non fans of the club we didn't really have a clue who any of the players were, and what with the lack of squad numbers at this level, using the programme didn't really help much either.  Still, we soon started to make out a few key figures, Paine at the back standing out for one, with a strong, confident display, despite the ability to lose the ball through his legs on more than one occasion.  Lewes' main man in the early exchanges appeared to be 'the human flick on machine' Paul Olima.  He did indeed get various parts of his body to many a high ball played in his direction, but unfortunately failed to get into the game in any other way, most low passes to feet seemed to bounce off him in various directions. 

Lewes best and only clear cut chance of the half fell to Olima, a free header for him after he manged to ghost in at the back post, but the big man seemed to lose confidence as the ball arrived and could only fluff it wide.  Minutes before half-time and it seemed as though we'd get the much awaited breakthough.  A penalty awarded to Braintree 5 minutes from the break for hand-ball in the box.  But Lewes 'keeper Chris Winterton produced a fine save.

The away support huddled behind the goal

So the teams went in level 0-0 at the break.  A cup of tea was in order as the temperature started to drop.  As we made our way back to the burger van we noticed a few Lewes fans.  8 of them in total huddled behind the goal they had just been attacking.  Due to the wind direction and the fact we'd forked out £1 for the seats, we decided to stay where we were for the second half.  It was interesting to see the Braintree fans though move from behind one goal, and to the other in order to support their team as they attacked the Lewes defence in the second half.  This also forced the 8 Lewes fans to relocate down to the other end as well. 

The second half produced more of the same, Braintree playing the majority of the football, and indeed took an early lead through top scorer Sean Marks (the guy who had missed the penalty and had two goals disallowed in the first half) on 47 minutes, who turned in from close range after a fine save from Winterton. To Lewes' credit they continued to look fairly solid and despite a clear lack of options up-front, were beginning to grow into the game.  However, the scoreline could've been greater were it not for a great perfomance from Winterton in goal.  He was beaten once more when a header from Jai Reason smacked against the post and across the goal mouth before being cleared.

Excitement did come in the form of Anthony Barness, former Charlton and Bolton right-back playing for Lewes.  He was captain and was surprisingly quiet, but his experience on the ball was telling as he showed constant composure when in possession.

The game more than satisfied the home support, who did eventually take to cheering their team on with a few chants mid-way through the second half.  It finished 1-0 to the home side, but not before the ball was lost over the fence on 6 seperate occasions throughout the match.

I think one huge positive from viewing this match in comparison with the Premier League was the flow of the game.  Firstly, the referee handled the game exceptionally well, and whenever there were a few feisty challenges, nobody made a meal of it but were back on their feet immediately, ready to get on with things.  A second plus point was the luxury of leaving the ground and not getting caught in any congestion leaving the stadium.

Over the course of the next few days we eagerly awaited the match report from both teams website.  Perhaps understandably Braintree Town got a bit carried away with their report.  Striker Marks apparently crashed the ball hom from close range, which was not exactly the case.  It seemed the losing team were more honest about the performance and pretty much summed the game up well, despite feeling the penalty was harshly given. 

Two days after the date of this blog the Lewes website announced the release of striker Paul Olima.

Parking: Free (plenty of off-road parking as well as a small unmade car-park)

Ticket: £12 (plus £1 for seating)

Programme: £2

Score: 1-0

Attendance: 535