County v Doncaster
Fingers crossed we can bounce back after last weekend, as Donny Rovers come to town for the first time since 2004-05
Saturday 4 March 2023
County have six games in March. The first three are against teams in the bottom half; the last three against teams in the top 10. I still think we can challenge for automatic promotion, but to do so, we’ve got to pick up a decent number of points from this trio of games over the next week, starting this afternoon.
Has the Barrow defeat inflicted serious psychological damage, however? Our County correspondents are usually an extremely optimistic bunch, but two of them think Donny might take a point back to Yorkshire with them today. With kick-off just three hours away as I write, Nick Lee, Ian Brown and Jonathan Baker look ahead to Donny’s first game at Edgeley Park since Tony Blair was still at No 10.
Today’s edition is sponsored by The Marple Plumber Ltd, who have a fantastic offer for The Scarf My Father Wore readers, which could come in extremely handy at this time of year. They’re currently offering a full boiler check and service for just £65. Scroll down for further details, and if you have any boiler issues whatsoever, be sure to give Paul a call.
Come on County!
Des Junior
Des Junior loves writing about County. But he can never be arsed doing match previews. They’re a bit dull, aren’t they? Paddy Madden’s out for two games with an ingrown toenail…blah blah blah…tomorrow’s referee has handed out more cards than Moonpig…blah blah blah…County haven’t won at Birmingham since 1672.
Fortunately, he has a number of County content providers to call upon, although they’re a nervous bunch today, with two-thirds of them fancying Donny to nick a point. Squeaky bum time, indeed…
Nick Lee, The Scarf Bergara Wore
County 2 Doncaster 0
How’s it March already? The opening day against Barrow was only five minutes ago. Anyway, the business end of the season is here. What are you thinking - automatic, play-offs or nothing?
I've said all season we'll finish top three, even when we had the sluggish start. And you can go back and check the old episodes and see that's exactly what I said. You might struggle though, what with all the Wrexham fans combing every joke for reference to them.
2-0 County today. First half lead, tense second half before a second goal on the break. Stevenage all over again.
Ian Brown, hedgegrower
County 1 Doncaster 1
With Barrow not playing on the Tuesday night we were at Rochdale, did Challinor get it wrong by not freshening the team up for last week’s game in Cumbria?
Well, if Challinor got it wrong so did I, as I’ve been banging on about not making many changes in the starting line-up forever. But hey, where would we be without hindsight, which now has us all convinced that we needed multiple fresh legs in the team against Barrow and probably before that?
But who do we rest?
Byrne - probably not. Wright or Knoyle - ditto. Croasdale - at our peril. Hinchliffe, Wootton or Collar - no way!
We really don’t need knee-jerk reactions to just one defeat, which hopefully we can learn from. OK, maybe there is room for the odd change - Rydel in on the left, and maybe we can give more game time, if not a start, to Rowe, who looked lively when others didn’t in Cumbria. But I think the return of Madden would be the best tonic the team could wish for, although we rush him back at great risk, so we keep calm and let the manager do his job.
Today we welcome Doncaster to Edgeley Park, and we owe them more than one for their over-the-top display of vaudevillian talents and the dark arts in taking all the points at their place earlier this season. For 20 minutes until we were reduced in numbers we were outclassing Donny and whilst I hope for the same from us this time (and a better ref) I will also hope for a suitably satisfying big win, but I’ll go for a 1-1 scoreline when asked.
Jonathan Baker aka Geordie Hatter, The County Away Day Show
County 1 Doncaster 1
Most of the 625 County fans who headed up to Cumbria last week had a pretty miserable afternoon. You combined County with a pleasant weekend in the Lakes though. Let’s talk about that rather than just focusing on the game at Holker Street.
OK, my weekend in the Lakes, in four brief instalments:
1) Saturday morning. Me and Charlotte (Mrs Geordie Hatter) have primed and pimped up the trusty Toyota Aygo for the weekend, so we're up and out on a post-dawn dash up the M6, and are ridiculously impressed with ourselves to be on the outskirts of Lancaster by 11am. Pulling into our pre-arranged rendezvous point at the train station, Charlotte catches sight of our lovely boy Frankie, who's made his own dawn departure down from Glasgow Queen Street and is there to meet us. Our university student kid is going to be 19 years old in just three days time so strictly speaking is actually a man; but he'll always be our lovely boy, of course he will. Unabashed familial reunion hugs all round. And maybe some tears of joy (Charlotte, obviously. Those motorways do throw up some dust; some might have got in my eyes).
2) Saturday afternoon. Me and Frankie climb into the Aygo and hotfoot it up to Barrow, where the highlights of our afternoon are a chip barm based lunch in the undercover market, a photo opportunity with a bronze statue of Emlyn Hughes (he was very amenable about it, a gentleman), and an impromptu diversion to a deserted rugby league stadium that due to our genetically-yoked poor navigational skills we had believed to be the home of Barrow AFC. Our similarly genetically-yoked speed-hiking skills still get us to Holker Street by 2.55pm but the less said about what we witnessed from 3pm onwards, the better, as we all know. Nice to see and chat with some familiar faces once on the terrace though - Ben Suedehead and Mark Brockbank, to name just two. Mark's verdict on the view from the away end - “Like something from 1989” - is hard to find fault with. On reflection mind you, I think we would all have paid extra for a more restricted view.
3) Saturday evening. Charlotte, who is clearly more sensible than any of us, has spent the afternoon in leisurely progress via train bus and ferry across the Lakelands, pausing at a handy Booths Grocery store to pick up enough tortellini to feed the entire away end, should we have chosen to descend en masse upon the youth hostel at Ambleside to recover from our afternoon travails. Thankful for arriving on the banks of Windermere in one piece following a very slightly darkness-descending death-defying drive along the A591, me and Frankie make short work of the large servings of home-from-home-cooked fare, along with several pints each of foaming ale from the establishment's well-stocked bar - and we're all tucked up in our economically priced bunk beds before Match of the Day.
4) Sunday. We're up and about early, for a healthy full English in the hostel then a slightly treacherous drive (but then we're used to these by now) up to The Mortal Man at nearby Troutbeck, for a hearty Sunday lunch. Clearly believing myself thereby to have been rendered immortal, I then set the battered old Aygo on a make-or-break challenge to get to SK2 by teatime in time for the kick-off of the League Cup final, with a short pause early en route to drop off Scots-returning Frankie at Windermere station. Somehow, I'm in the living room at 4.31pm, with the first can opened, the curtains drawn against the early Spring sunshine, and the opening exchanges from Wembley beaming live; my personal footballing weekend surely set to be redeemed. Or maybe not, as it turned out (and the least said about the many more cans consumed in a vain effort to temporarily drown that particular 72 years of hurt, the better - although I am sure you can all fill in the gaps, God knows serial Wembley pain is something none of us need introducing to).
Scores for the Lakeland weekend, then:
Transport infrastructure of Northern Britain: 7/10
Rural Scenery: 8/10
Food/Drink/Hospitality: 9/10
Company: 10/10
Football: 1/10
Prediction for Saturday: County 1 Doncaster Rovers 1
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Today in SK
🎶 There’s live music at the Dog & Partridge (Buxton Road, Great Moor) with Reserved on from 8pm.
🕺 Once you’ve finished watching Reserved, head up the A6 to Bask to continue your Saturday night merriment. DJ Gareth Brooks is on till 2am.
Never mind Google or Yell.com, we’ve got you covered
STOP! That got your attention, didn’t it? Just a quick one… I’d hazard a guess that at some point in March, all of our readers will use Google or Yell.com at some point looking for a particular product or service. But before you do, please have a quick look at our own directory to see if we have what you’re looking for. A number of great businesses support The Scarf My Father Wore, allowing us to publish fresh content every day, so let’s send a few enquiries their way in return.
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