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Post by Deleted on Aug 16, 2009 21:41:51 GMT
Some months ago Dave R posted the programme from our FA Cup game at Canterbury City in 1964/65. Here's the cover:  As I was staying in Canterbury either side of the Palace and Dagenham games, I decided to go in search of the old Kingsmead Stadium where we played all those years ago. Fearing it may have been demolished some time in the past, my hopes were high when Kingsmead still appeared on the latest A to Z of the area ("partly revised" in 2007). On that map it's clearly marked a few hundred yards north of the cathedral on the city side of the Stour (opposite King's School playing fields where the young David Gower would have been scoring his first runs a few summers after our visit). And, as I approached along Kingsmead Road, the word "Stadium" was clearly displayed on the direction signs. But alas, all gone! A few new houses - off to one side - already complete, the rest under construction. No sign of the stadium's existence aside from an undistinguished, unmarked set of metal gates. From a web search, I now gather dog racing continued to 1999 with the stadium then laying derelict until its demolition two or three years ago. Better luck at Whitstable Town where I was able to walk through the open gates of the Belmont ground, one of those lovely places which shares a site with the cricket next door. There's a fine 1950s stand and apparently football has been played there since 1888. And, in one of those odd twists of fate, there was a reference to Torquay United and Whitstable in Saturday's Dagenham programme. This related to Jack Conley, a key Torquay player in the late 1940s who was Whitstable born and bred. After leaving Plainmoor in 1951 he apparently joined his home town club and lived in the Kent town until his death forty years later. There's also a Torquay United link along the coast at Hartsdown Park in Margate, another ground which helpfully leaves its gates open for the passing traveller. Hartsdown is neat and tidy enough but I suspect it's a shadow of his former self. Certainly it's now hard to imagine how it held 14,000 for the FA Cup visit of Spurs in 1973 (when Cyril Knowles scored one of the goals). In fact it's something of a surprise the ground met Conference standards when the club reached that level in 2001 (we'd have played there had we lost to Barnet). Indeed, the state of the place - and messing about with a proposed redevelopment - led to Margate groundsharing elsewhere and being demoted from the Conference. I'm guessing Exeter's 2003/04 visit must have been to the Crabble in Dover. As for the present, life's fortunes have seen Terry Yorath pitch up as manager of Margate - there must be a story there, surely? And, as you can see from this week's Thanet Gazette, he's got an old friend for company:  And, lastly, a question; which Kent teams have we faced in competitive fixtures? First team or reserves; historic county boundaries apply (including Kent London). |
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Dave
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Post by Dave on Aug 16, 2009 21:51:50 GMT
Now thats what I have been waiting for, just where and what Barton has been getting up to this last week. Great interesting factual read, that I'm sure will get some good posts added to it by Merse and others.
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Rob
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Post by Rob on Aug 16, 2009 22:02:18 GMT
Ebbsfleet. Gillingham. Maidstone.
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Post by Deleted on Aug 16, 2009 22:13:24 GMT
Ebbsfleet. Gillingham. Maidstone. Good start! There's a few more.... And, of course, we played Ebbsfleet when they were good old Gravesend and Northfleet Athletic. |
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merse
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Post by merse on Aug 17, 2009 3:04:11 GMT
 Capitgull and I witnessed an amazing match at Hartsdown Park once, it was the season Boston United "won" the Conference and we saw things we would never expect to see on a professional football pitch that day.....................well maybe with Steve Evans involved we should have. My memory for detail seems to be draining at an alrming rate these days but I recall the ground still having that strange "barn" of a grandstand which sat so far below the near touchline the players had quite a climb up the stairs to get onto the strangely sloping pitch. Two covered ends one incorporating the social club within it's ancient wooden structure and an open side from which the surreal view of distant hills, a windmill silhouted under a full low moon (all it needed was Don Quixote to tilt at it) and the most ancient flickering and dull floodlights imagineable....................a good job for the moonlight then! For all that, the abiding memory was of the Margate centre forward getting sent off for rushing towards the wall beside the goal post after he had been taunted by the travelling Boston fans for missing a sitter and thumping one of them. He compounded his sin by turning at the top of those steps before he disappeared into the bowells of the stand and giving it one last but prominant finger in the direction of his tormenters.....................laugh? you'd have pissed yourself! 
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Post by Budleigh on Aug 17, 2009 8:48:32 GMT
Interestingly we've played both Kent league teams, Maidstone and Gillingham in both the league and FA Cup. In fact our very first FA Cup game after joining the football league was a match against Gillingham at Priestfield, on the 24th of November 1928, which we drew 0-0 with an attendance of nearly 5,900, the replay at Plainmoor being emphatically won 5-1 watched by a crowd of 7,000. We also clashed with them in the 1959/60 second round where a 2-2 away draw in front of over 10,000 in Kent saw us bring them back to Plainmoor for a 2-1 loss, Ernie Pym getting our one goal in front of nearly 6,000.
I know that Ebbsfleet have been listed but, as mentioned earlier, we also played them under their old name of Gravesend & Northfleet at home in the FA Cup in 1949 with a 3-0 win in front of 8,000. Cameron, W. Whitfield and Lewis scoring our goals in this first round clash. Also in November 1979, in the same competition, with a Stevie Cooper winning goal in front of over 3,000 at their place.
As to other Kent teams played, they've both been in the FA Cup, the first being Margate in the first round in November 1933 when we were held 1-1 at Plainmoor in front of 4,100, Kennedy getting our goal. We then went to Margate and won 2-0 with goals from Walters and Stabb in front of over 4,700.
Then another FA Cup game saw us play at home to Bromley on November 24th 1951, a home match watched by just under 8,000 when we won 3-2 with goals from Shaw 2 and Northcott.
The game against Canterbury in the Cup in 1964, was won 6-0 in Kent in front of 3,001. Cox, Stubbs and Northcott all got two each.
Our FA Cup game against Maidstone occured in the first round in November 1990 when we went down 4-1 in front of 2,303. Tommy Tynan scored our goal but it will also be remembered as Sean Joyce's last game for some time after injury. This game was played at Dartford's ground as Maidstone had left their own place a couple of seasons before, a switch that was to see the demise of both clubs, now reincarnated, and the loss of Watling Street as a stadium. It is now under a housing estate...
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Jon
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Post by Jon on Aug 17, 2009 18:57:09 GMT
Our FA Cup game against Maidstone occured in the first round in November 1990 when we went down 4-1 in front of 2,303. Tommy Tynan scored our goal but it will also be remembered as Sean Joyce's last game for some time after injury. We didn't have much luck at Dartford, did we? A month or so later, Phil Lloyd suffered that terrible injury there and was never the same player again.. |
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Jon
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Post by Jon on Aug 17, 2009 18:57:40 GMT
Doesn’t Charlton Athletic count as Kent? We haven’t played them in a competitive game since 1934 – the longest blank of all the current league clubs we have played against.
Carshalton, Crystal Palace and Dulwich Hamlet are all just over the border in Surrey, aren’t they?
Our reserves played lots of Kent teams in the Southern League just either side of WW2. Gillingham, Gravesend and Margate have already been mentioned, but you can add Dartford, Folkestone, Tunbridge Wells and Tonbridge. We also played Arsenal, and I suppose you could argue that they are really a Kent team squatting in North London.
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merse
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Post by merse on Aug 17, 2009 19:35:51 GMT
Our reserves played lots of Kent teams in the Southern League just either side of WW2. Gillingham, Gravesend and Margate have already been mentioned, but you can add Dartford, Folkestone, Tunbridge Wells and Tonbridge. We also played Arsenal, and I suppose you could argue that they are really a Kent team squatting in North London. Would that have been Arsenal's Third Team in the Southern League? If so, they were a "Kent Team" as they played those fixtures at Stonebridge Road, Gravesend (Ebbsfleet United FC) which remains virtually unchanged, unpainted and uncleaned to this day......................come to think of it that was Gravesend & Northfleet FC when they were the Arse's nursery club! |
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jerry
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Post by jerry on Aug 17, 2009 19:43:01 GMT
We didn't have much luck at Dartford, did we? A month or so later, Phil Lloyd suffered that terrible injury there and was never the same player again.. The victim of one of the most atrocious tackles I think I have ever seen, by Maidstone's Mark Gall!  |
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Post by Deleted on Aug 17, 2009 19:58:24 GMT
Well done to all who have risen to the challenge of naming our opponents from Kent. 10 out of 10 - including Charlton Athletic who I'd count as coming from the historic county of Kent (and, yes, I found myself checking back to when we played them). Indeed, I even thought about Millwall. I think it's a pretty close run thing - given the old Surrey/Kent border passed through New Cross - but I'm sure Cold Blow Lane was just the Surrey side of the street. And Jon is right about the just-Surrey credentials of Dulwich Hamlet and Crystal Palace (although Crystal Palace proper became part of Kent when Penge was incorporated into that county). Here's a map of 200 odd years ago on which you can see the county boundary to the west of Deptford with Charlton and Woolwich clearly on the Kent side:  |
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Post by Budleigh on Aug 18, 2009 8:43:37 GMT
Interestingly, as the subject of nursery clubs has reared its head again this week in the press, Margate were, for some years from 1934, the nursery club for the Arsenal and as such were asked to reduce the size of their pitch to match the dimensions of the one at Highbury. Their first major ground was the lower pitch at Margate's Dreamland, being a fun fair operating near the sea front, which they played on until the move to their present ground Hartson Park, in 1929. The interesting fact about Dreamland is that the pitch area is now a coach park with one side still retaining the banked terracing from the days as Margate's ground. (As seen in the Google picture below). So anyone visiting the area can still see remains of this former ground. Another interesting fact is that the 'Scenic Railway' in Dreamland is the oldest roller coaster in the country and the only fair ground attraction that has a Grade II listing. It 'burnt down' after closure in the mid nineties but the owners have been forced to rebuild it in it's original state! The last remnants of Dreamland's concrete terracing.... (with the Scenic railway just visible)  And as it was.... (Note the Scenic Railway)  The car park in 2009 with those last remains of the actual concrete terrace since grassed over.... Shows the position of the ground with the banking along one touchline and behind the goal in front of the houses which still exist.  And as it looked... from a similar angle....  And as shown in Mike Float's 'The Non-League Football Grounds of Kent'  |
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Post by Budleigh on Aug 18, 2009 8:51:31 GMT
The outline of Canterbury's ground is still obvious in this aerial picture of 2003....  |
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Rob
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Post by Rob on Aug 18, 2009 14:54:07 GMT
Have we never played Welling? Another LB/Kent example.
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Post by Deleted on Aug 18, 2009 17:20:57 GMT
Have we never played Welling? Another LB/Kent example. Not to my knowledge but - remembering Welling's fourteen seasons in the Conference from 1986 to 2000 - we must have come close to playing them on a few occasions! Superb material from Leigh regarding Canterbury, Margate and Dreamland. I'll return to that subject later when I return from watching football up the hill..... |
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