BTC Reserves 0-2 Burridge

Wednesday 22nd April
BTC Sports Club, Stoneham Lane, Southampton

BTC's groundsman stormed straight toward the goal mouth where a group of Burridge players were kicking a ball around. With a crooked jabbing finger he pointed them in the direction of a sign hanging in front of the dressing rooms that asked players to stay out of the goal mouths. It was an instruction that BTC would later take far too literally. Satisfied that he'd got his message across, the groundsman walked away only to notice something laying on the grass, that to everybody else looked like a banana skin, but to the groundsman represented two fingers up to his profession.

"That wasn't there ten minutes ago." He stared. "Who does it belong to?" Paul Dyke was more interested in getting an energy boost from a quick snack than wanting to start a fist fight with a man with quick access to garden tools. He scooped the yellow skin up in his hands and walked back to the away team dressing rooms. The groundsman followed, walking past a group of BTC players who'd still yet to get changed, confessing to them that he hadn't had a drink for three days. I wouldn't want to be the person responsible for leaving an empty bottle of Lucozade in the six yard box on the weekend should he have managed to stay dry that long.


Click on pics to enlarge. Top: Sam Schwodler has his studs checked by the referee. Below: Ben Hutton enjoys a quick snout.

The first half provided little by means of entertainment. Paul Dyke's voice is usually heard by all, but on this occasion it was having to compete with the nearby fast moving traffic of the M27. Burridge's main creative force during this period was Justin Newman. Unfortunately for Burridge he was only here as a spectator, and his offerings were solely concerned on finding new ways to make fun out of Lee Fielder, who having come dressed in a hat stolen from a pensioner's wardrobe, made Justin's task comparatively straightforward.

Mark Reeves had spent the first half stuck out alone on the other side of the pitch with a linesman's flag in his hand. There was twenty minutes left of play when he was brought on as substitute. Within ten seconds of his arrival Burridge had scored. His exchanging of two quick successive passes was the beginning of a move that ended in Kristian Hewitt hitting the ball under the BTC goalkeeper from the outskirts of the penalty area. BTC barely had time to argue about their lapse in concentration when Rich Allan added a second goal, which effectively ended the game for BTC.


Click on pictures to enlarge: Top: Bryn Schwodler relaxes. Below: the first half action

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Burridge 2-1 Sholing Sports

Monday 12th April, The Shed, Burridge

Sholing's goalkeeper continued shouting at the referee long after the final whistle, as the sun set over the trees. In his opinion, thirty-five minutes each way was an unreasonably short game. He relied heavily on colourful language to make his point. Kristian Hewitt had scored Burridge's winner from the penalty spot. It had been conceded by Sholing's goalkeeper, whose team's arrival to Burridge had eaten fifteen minutes into the scheduled kick off time. The referee had warned both teams he wouldn't accept any abusive language. Seventy minutes of football was enough to expose a goalkeeper's short memory, as well, it seemed, as the strength of the referee's conviction.


Click on pics to enlarge: Kristian Hewitt wallops Burridge's winning goal in from the penalty spot.

The referee stood in the centre circle shaking hands with several Burridge players. Sholing's goalkeeper wasn't ready to call a truce. His words broke the referee's dignified silence. Who momentarily glanced in the direction of the goalkeeper for long enough to tell him that he wouldn't have had this problem if his team had turned up on time. The goalkeeper took his anger back to the away team's dressing room. The referee was in no rush to follow. The price for wandering if he was going to get a knuckle sandwich was his match fee of twenty-two pounds.

Bryn Schwodler weaved through Sholing's defence to make it one-nil, demonstrating great promise in a career of sticky witches. Sholing drew level from a corner kick before half time. Burridge's net yawned wide open for several shorn and unmarked Sholing heads to compete successfully in directing the ball past Ryan Jones. Responsibility to win the game rested with Kristian Hewitt. The club's third choice penalty taker had been fast tracked to the front of the queue by injuries and absentees, in a starting eleven that gave a début to Kev Judd, who wore the number seven shirt and a mop of hair. Hewitt put his faith in raw power and the Nike encasing his right foot. Five minutes later the game was over. Within ten the referee had his foot to the floor on the A3051.


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Burridge 3-1 Hythe & Dibden

Date: Saturday 31st October
Venue: Botley Road, Burridge

Click the pic to enlarge the current league table.

The man with no hair or front teeth told Sam Schwodler to shut his mouth. As far as he was concerned Sam was nothing but a big nosed prick for calling Hythe's linesman a cheat. He continued muttering something about straightening Schwodler out as he jogged into Burridge's half looking for a second equalising goal. Seeing as the judicial system have been mostly unsuccessful in ironing out every lively kink in Schwodler's personality, it may have been in the tax payer's interest for Hythe's number ten to share his strategy. Instead, he pushed one nostril shut with an index finger, propelling twin jets of air down through the other, sufficient to inflate a rubber dinghy, instantly evicting all manner of unwanted debris, along with any rent paying tenants, onto the grass beneath him in a trail of wet mess. The volume of which justified cordoning off.

(Pic by Roz H) Kristian Hewitt's view of his free kick as it gets groped by Hythe goalkeeper.

Burridge's first half lead from Justin Newman's neat finish had been cancelled out by a headed Hythe equaliser. Burridge's second goal came with compliments from Hythe's goalkeeper. Kristian Hewitt's intentions made quite clear when he began berated himself for over hitting a free-kick from forty yards out on the right-wing. Whilst Hythe's goalkeeper's peaked cap was able to improve his view into the low sun, it was inadequate in stopping him from letting the ball squirm through his grasp into the net. Disappointment prevented him from turning around to survey the scene of the crime, but behind him a row of semi-naked oak cast judgement upon him by pointing all number of gnarled wooden tentacles towards him accusingly.

(Pic by Roz H) Ben Hutton congratulates Hewitt is on his long range goal.

Sam Schwodler remained an effective outlet for Burridge, playing like a particularly nasty form of tropical disease, infecting opponents with little prior warning in a pandemic that quickly spread throughout Hythe's back four, leaving them in a delirious sweat. When Ben Rowe charged down the inside right channel to wallop in Burridge's third there was no time for Hythe to stop Burridge going top of the division.

Juddy makes sure that Justin Newman is dead after finding out it was him who broke into his car.

Burridge lined up in a 3-4-3 formation:

GK: Ryan Jones
DF: Kev Willsher
DF: Sam Hewitt
DF: Paul Dyke (Ben Hutton)
RM: Kristian Hewitt
CM: Justin Newman (Mark Reeves)
CM: Rich Allan (Jay Schwodler)
LM: Mark Emerson Sanderson
CF: Bryn Schwodler
CF: Ben Rowe
CF: Sam Schwodler

Burridge scorers:

1-0 Justin Newman
2-1 Kristian Hewitt
3-1 Ben Rowe


Pictured above: Burridge later on in the evening at Marc Judd's thirtieth birthday: Back row: left to right: Jay Schwodler, Pete Lyons, Ben Hutton, Sam Hewitt, Luke Sanderson, Paul Dyke, Ben Rowe, Kev Willsher, Justin Newman, Kristian Hewitt. Front row: left to right: Ryan Jones, Marc Judd, Sam Schwodler, Rich Allan, Mark Sanderson, Bryn Schwodler.

Burridge 4-3 Sway (After extra time

Date: Saturday 5th September
Competition: Hampshire Intermediate Cup first round

Sway had taken the wrong junction off the M27. I know because the man next to me in the ever so close other urinal in the Burridge toilets told me. 'Had the directions all put into me Tom-tom,' he said, before continuing with the second and presumably more telling part of his anecdote that I was unable to give my attention to, being somewhat pre-occupied with the splash back of his rapid slashing that sprayed gently onto my hands. There is not, as far as I'm aware, a law that forbids a man from dying their hair blond after a certain age, but if the House of Lords were to pass one tomorrow, this was a man faced with a vigilante future. If of course he wasn't prepared to get his hair cut.

(All pics by Roz H) Chinese Monkey Allan hovers above the ground. Click on all pics to enlarge.

Today Burridge play in the first round of the Hampshire Intermediate Cup against Sway from the New Forest. There is a school of thought amongst some players that says you cannot tell the quality of the opposition by simply looking them up and down before the game. While that's mostly true, it doesn't stop some from carrying out pre-game analysis of the opposition, in the vain hope of gaining some valuable insight into their footballing ability.

This is never more so when teams from different leagues, who have never played each other before, come head to head. No detail is too slight to be bought back to football, from the sports bag the opposition carry out the car, to the manner in which it's carried, to the gait of walk. As a very basic example: anyone walking with legs splayed like they've a big set of knackers clinging-clanging together like a set of cannon balls is obviously the man for the big occasion. Such analysis is generally, a complete waste of time, but that's not to say it's the premise of the weak minded. Former Burridge centre forward Barry Smith was a long term advocate of such behaviour and he wasn't some nut. I've lost touch with him since he left to join the army because he was bored of working in customer services.

Sam Hewitt enjoys a private moment in public.

Ben Rowe and Justin Newman, January and February 2010 calendar shots respectively.

The referee waited at the main door of the changing rooms to inspect the sole of everybody's boots, not to check if anyone's taped a wrap of speed to the sole of their boot, but in case anybody's studs are unsuitably sharp. Having been through this process countless times I'm still waiting for a referee to say something like, 'Play in those, son? Not on my watch you're not.' They just have a quick look and nod. Both teams were queued up next to each other in the changing room corridor like they do on the telly. I may have spoilt the reflective mood by humming a high pitch blast of the Champions League theme. The first half's a bit like an Hollywood blockbuster starring Nicholas Cage, quite a lot of action but nothing really resembling a cohesive plot. The rest of the game follows on like sequels to it.

Proof that red socks and jeans can work if you want it to.

1-0 Rich 'Chinese Monkey' Allan waits patiently to head in after Greg Baker's shot had launched into the sky off the crossbar. I find myself ignoring the celebrations in favour of pointing my index finger repeatedly to my temple and insisting everybody concentrates. I don't know why.

1-1 Sway tap in a left wing cross. We all stare at the grass and look moody.

2-1 Sway's goalkeeper handles a back pass from his defender, which as we all know is against the rules, then throws a hissy fit when the referee awards Burridge an indirect free kick. Kristian Hewitt touches it to Ben Hutton and whizz bang it's in the back of the net.

2-2 Sway again cut in from left for 2-2. More moody looks at the grass.

2-3 Sway score on the counter attack after quickly clearing a Burridge free kick. Their tails are up. Burridge look spent.

3-3 Justin Newman crosses to Kristian Hewitt to take the game into thirty minutes of extra time.

4-3 What's this? Ben Hutton up for a corner? Check. Paul Dyke incognito on back post in red hair scores the winner? Check. Their goalkeeper throws another hissy fit and lashes out at the nearest thing which just so happens to be a bin. He sends it flying with a good boot. The referee sends him off, so some poor git has to replace him and put on his sweaty gear.

Keep looking above and you'll see Paul Dyke (furthest left in red hair) escape tight marking and score from Ben Hutton's knock down.

(Above) Sway's goalkeeper shows total disregard for tanning solariums whilst on hunger strike.

Pete Lyons in instant pain after picking up jellyfish

Burridge go into the hat for the second round all keeping their fingers crossed for an away day on the Isle of Wight.

Warsash Wasps 2-2 Burridge

Date: Saturday 29th August
Venue: Osborne Road, Warsash

(All pics by Roz H.) Click to enlarge - Kristian Hewitt gets ready to pull trigger

The queen gazed into the distance with cold eyes. I didn't blame her for having the hump, her head was partially buried in the dry dirt on the face of a twenty pence piece, along with a broken amber bicycle wheel reflector, a warped plastic cherry Coca-Cola bottle top and an endless scattering of small stones that fight for space in the dead yellow grass of Osborne Road, home to Warsash Wasps. The pitch is flat though and with the changing rooms located directly behind the goal there's no need to eye up decent sized bushes in case you need to take an emergency leak, or worse. This ground has happy memories for Burridge. Eight years ago Rich Allan and Jay Schwodler scored the goals that beat Bold Forrester in the Southampton Cup semi-final.

There's forty-five minutes 'til kick off when I arrive, but Warsash are changed and ready in their yellow and black kit, an enthusiasm no doubt drawn from last season's junior one title win in which they lost only a single game. I watch them as they stand in a circle passing a ball around. Everyone of them seems immaculately turned out with short coiffured hair, polished black Adidas boots, with even a degree of care going into the neat binding of electrical tape that wraps around their socks to hold their shin pads in place. Rich Allan attempts to restore the balance by arranging cones for Burridge to run around. Ben Hutton takes a few pot shots at goal. When he misses the target the ball hits a garden fence that makes a cracking noise that sounds like it's about to die.

Chinese Monkey Allan holds off his man.

We return to the dressing room for Pete Lyons to name the team. When the referee put his head around our door two things became very clear. His Scottish accent is so broad it's just a noise I can't quite understand, and his pallid complexion looks as though it's made up entirely of Wensleydale cheese. He wanted to have a quick chat with us about what he wouldn't tolerate during the match, Burridge eyes turn to Greg Baker, because although he's been to Lesotho to help children in poverty, and is due to start a job with an initiative that's sole purpose is to help vulnerable people living in the poorest places in the world, he does need reminding before every single game that if at all possible could he reduce the verbal abuse directed at the referee to a minimum. Baker's dad is a referee. He used to referee our games when we were kids. He's also a keen follower of Gillingham FC and is known to fall into catatonic despair should they lose a game. You have to feel for Greg's mum. At this moment the referee is more preoccupied with the state of the goals, muttering something about needing another peg or two for the net if we're to get underway.

Justin Newman takes another breather while Fielder gives him the magic sponge. Sam Schwodler looks concerned.

Burridge start the game well. Kristian Hewitt collects a squared ball thirty yards out, waddling forward like some blind animal, allowing his bristled jowls to become hundreds of tiny blond antenna, all able to calculate the exact velocity in which to strike the ball that thuds against the underside of the crossbar and bounces back up into the roof of the net. He shuffles away to mark this goal with a raised index finger pointed towards the sky before being mobbed by team mates. Ten minutes later Justin Newman concedes a hotly contested penalty which Warsash score. Mark Judd then heads home unmarked from Hewitt's pinpoint ring wing cross to make it 2-1. During half time Kevin Willsher is unsure which is going to give in first, his back or his football boots. The sole is left clinging to the size ten Umbro boots he bought in the cut price sale at West Quay five weeks ago. He wraps reels of gaffer tape around them and hopes for the best.

Burridge gaffer, Pete Lyons, plots his next move.

It's difficult to tell from Pete Lyons' team talk if he's happy or just surprised at how Burridge are playing. There was little evidence of this kind of performance during the winless seven game pre-season. Wasps equalise in second half, their forwards rousing each other in reassured and earnest tones that the winning goal will come, but Burridge resist the temptation to fall to pieces and play out a draw. Players file off the pitch at the final whistle, asking how Saints were doing and were Liverpool still losing to Bolton. Without a transistor radio nobody could be sure.

Kristian's goal was a combination of this and this.