Carlisle 2 County 1

Pre-season comes to an end with defeat in Cumbria

Aug 06, 2024

Tuesday 6 August 2024

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STOCKPORT COUNTY PREDICTION GAME 2024-25: Predict County’s top scorer, final league position, cup performances etc. £10 to enter. 40% of the pot to the winner, 30% to second, 20% to third, and 10% to Mentell. If you’d like to enter, drop us a message or an email.

Dear County fans, Stopfordians, Carlisle supporters, and anyone else from The Football Family joining us today, a very warm welcome to your Tuesday edition of The Scarf My Father Wore.

I’m at the LNER Community Stadium this morning, the new home of York City. I’m doing some filming on the new series of CBBC children’s drama Jamie Johnson, playing a top football coach. (Stop sniggering…) County haven’t played at York’s new place yet (which is nearly an hour’s walk from the train station) but here’s a few photos to give you a flavour.

I’ve always quite liked York ever since they won 3-0 at Old Trafford in the 90s (former County defender Tony Barras scored one of the goals) and I loved the ragged terraces of Bootham Crescent, but I’ve got to say this new place is shit. Shiny, but shit. It’s a crappy little Lego stadium in the shadow of a massive Cineworld on a retail park. I wouldn’t mind York away in the cup, but it’d be an in and out job in a taxi for the game.

Give me a proper old-fashioned football ground any day of the week, like Brunton Park, where County played on Saturday afternoon. I couldn’t make the trip to Carlisle, but John K Bilsbury did, and he’s shared his thoughts from our final pre-season test.

Today’s edition is sponsored by Colourtone. As always, a big thank you to Paul.

Finally, I’m currently walking every street in Stockport to raise money for mental health charity Mentell. If you’d like to make a donation to help me reach my target, please click here.

Total distance so far: 176.31 miles

Total steps so far: 284,130

Total raised so far: £1,976

Total completed streets so far: 399 (Click here for the full list, which includes reports and photos from every day of the walk.)

Further information on the walk can be found by clicking here.

Des Junior

✍️ Saturday’s match in one word

Disappointing.

🤔 Pre-match thoughts

I was looking forward to seeing those who didn’t play against Blackburn and hoping we wouldn’t incur any more injuries.

🧐 Post-match thoughts

Hurrah! No additional injuries. Hurroo. We didn’t offer much of a threat.

🔵 Verdict on Carlisle

The better team by a long chalk but by all accounts it was pretty much their first XI.

🟣 Verdict on County

I came away very disappointed but time lends perspective. With two new trialists and two players making their season debuts, perhaps I was expecting too much. This was our last game before the season starts though, so I would expect a first choice team to start to appear but I don’t think we’ve seen that yet.

🔵 Top Cumbrian

I don’t generally pay the opposition much heed but Luke “Son of Alun” Armstrong looked impressive when he came on and got their second goal.

🎩 Top Hatter

Nobody particularly shone but Kyle Wootton played the target man role well and scored the goal so I’ll give it to him.

👂 Atmosphere

There were only 121 Blue Army footsoldiers rattling round in a decent-sized ground, so we didn’t generate much in the way of atmos. I like Brunton Park, it has both sorts of stands, ram and shackle and the few people we came across were friendly and helpful.

🙏 Hopes for the new season

We’ve signed some exciting players and with more of them fit I’d be looking forward to the season much more than I am at the moment. My glass is always half full, so I’m going for a mid-table finish.

😀 Best part of the day

It’s a mark of the quality of the match that I got very excited by the bottle of pop with the cap on and the Scotch Pie that I bought on arrival.

😡 Worst part of the day

Carlisle getting the winner just as I thought we were getting somewhere.

The British Library receives a copy of every single book published in the UK. In the same fashion, Des Junior believes a detailed record of every County game should be preserved for the history books. So here’s the full story of our 2-1 defeat at Carlisle United on Saturday 3 August, as told from his County-related WhatsApp groups…

4.51pm: Colchester 6 Cambridge 0 today!

4.52pm: Oh fuck. County 0 Cambridge 1. Nailed on.

4.57pm: Some people are actually worried for the season!

5.04pm: We're not going to get relegated, so I'm not worried in that aspect, but I don’t think we’ll be play-offs and that's what the club wants. There will likely be another slow start due to injuries. Today’s the final game of pre-season and I don’t think anyone really knows how we want to play or the starting 11 next weekend.

12.51am: I'm not sure I should have cycled home tonight after 10 pints.

Give your car a lick of paint

Granted, Stockport used to be a little rough around the edges. But the town’s getting a good old lick of paint these days, with fancy new offices, apartments, bars and restaurants springing up. You can’t be driving up and down the A6 in a tatty car with chipped paintwork, so give your car a nice lick of paint too. Colourtone is your go-to company for that. They’ve been servicing the automotive and industrial markets in Cheshire and Greater Manchester for decades, and carry an extensive range of car paint and industrial paints.

Visit colourtone.com for further details.

Photo of the day

A pub, somewhere…

First of all, Sky Sports, MK Dons and Bradford are not in League One. Bradford cocked up their whole season again and MK Dons got twatted 8-1 on aggregate in the play-offs.

Secondly, I have compiled a strongly worded letter to the Advertising Standards Authority. There are currently around 8 billion people in the world. Not a single one of them would ever describe Harrogate v Bromley as “unmissable”.

Today in SK

🎬 Cinema

Two films at The Savoy Cinema (SK4) today. Despicable Me 4 (U) at 2.15pm, followed by Deadpool & Wolverine (15) at 4.30pm and 7.30pm. Click here for tickets.

🍺 Food and drink

Treat yourself to lunch at The Dog & Partridge (SK2). One course for £7, two courses for £11. 12pm - 2pm.

Bitter £2.30 a pint all day at The Cross Keys (SK8). Plus, discounts on certain lagers between 12pm and 6pm.

If you’re simply in the mood for a couple of pints today, pop along to one of our featured venues such as The Nelson Tavern (SK1), The Crown (SK2), The Armoury (SK3), Reddish Working Men’s Club (SK5), The Steelworks (SK6), The Shady Oak (SK7) or The Three Tunnes (SK7).

🤣 Live comedy

Bask in Laughter at Bask (SK1). Comedy night with Sean Moran, Mary Cross, Melina Fiol and Steve Harris, hosted by Trevor Lynch. 7.30pm. Tickets £8.

100 random grounds that County have played at

#79 – Recreation Ground, Aldershot

Last visit: A Sunday afternoon in December 2023. Round two of the FA Cup. The National League side took the lead after just 10 minutes through Josh Stokes, but Neill Byrne’s screamer three minutes later drew Dave Challinor’s men level. Paddy Madden gave us the lead just after the break, but Stokes’ second of the game earned Aldershot a replay (which we won’t talk about).