ARCHIVE NEWS: SEPTEMBER 04 to DECEMBER 05   JANUARY 06 to APRIL 06   MAY 06 to AUG 06 

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NOV 07     DEC 07       JAN 08

29 Feb I will be in the Club Shop 4.30 to 6.30, sorry for anyone who called in to find I wasn't there, delayed at work.

28 Feb Trust In Yellow meeting at the Grandstand Club 7.30pm.

26 Feb After this evening's games the Predictions Competition has been updated and there is a new leader and it's not a fix honestly!!  Burscough beat Leigh 5-2 and the two good results see Harrogate lose at home to Blyth and our opponents on Saturday, Redditch beat Hyde 3-1 to move second in the 6 match form table with 15 out of their last possible 18 points, Burscough being top with 16 out of 18.

25 Feb Neil Sorvel has returned to Morecambe after 6 games. We really are a bit short on numbers, hopefully replacements are on the way. I make it 17 players with 2 goalkeepers included and that includes David Prout and Josh Hine who are "on the fringes" Neil failed to make much of an impression with me although he did get very close to the penalty box on Saturday. He soon retreated to his safe haven of the centre circle though!

Robbo's booking on Saturday was his fifth whilst with us. I'm never sure how suspensions work at this point in the season but I think he was suspended whilst at Burscough as well so I guess he will be in line for a ban.

23 Feb Away Hinckley-New ground, number 166.

16 Feb Home Nuneaton. SOUTHPORT 2 NUNEATON 2. A late Neil Prince goal salvages a point after Nuneaton had come from behind with a penalty (awarded 3 mins 8 seconds into 3 mins of added time) and an own goal. Robbo gave us the lead with his 33rd career league goal and moves up to joint 7th place in the all time scorers list. We should have won this one. I can't remember too many chances that Nuneaton created whereas we spurned chance after chance to win the game. It's all about putting the ball in the net though and we didn't do that enough times! Two points out of 15 isn't good enough. We now have two must win games coming up before a visit to the improving Tamworth. I said last Sunday we would know more about our fate by 5pm today. I don't think we do!

The one thing to brighten up the day was the defeat of Liverpool by Championship side Barnsley in the FA Cup, now that does make the day a whole lot better. Considering the verbals I received from the mouthy Liverpool fan who continually criticises every single thing anybody does towards helping the club, I did particularly enjoy that score line, stick to Anfield, you deserve each other!

If anybody wants a copy of the poster from the centre pages of today's programme signed by the scorer, Mark Duffy, they are available for just £1. Thank you to everyone who commented on the centre page spread today it was hugely popular and I am very grateful to Kappa Sports Pictures who gave me the photos to be able to put the sequence together.

PREDICT COMP is updated and a serious challenge is being mounted in second place and as Tamworth continue to climb up the table I am confident that the leader will be put under more pressure!

15 Feb I will be manning the Club Shop from 4.30 to 6.30 today and will have copies of the Kettering DVD available to purchase without ordering. All those who have ordered and paid for a copy have been sent out. Still available to order for just £6. DVD's can be ordered for all home games this season at the normal price of £8.

Northwich seal their relegation spot by bringing in Mike Marsh. How long shall we give him? 37 days or is that too generous.

Just watched the You Tube of the Blyth game from last weekend and I'd forgotten that we did have a few chances in the second half after all. It also reminded me just how good Mark Duffy was. Also, the free kick award for the Blyth goal is a dreadful decision. I suppose like I always say when Andy Gray harps on about referees the ref only sees it once and doesn't get the chance to watch it a few times like I have. Having watched all the DVD's this season Duff's percentage of goals created is incredible.

14 Feb Taken from the excellent Tony Kempster site and based on league positions at 9 February. If it was today you would need to take out Telford and add back Harrogate assuming the second palced team goes thorugh via play offs. Tony has made the assumption that Worcester will be the team realigned to Conf South from the North. That would mean only one new ground for me, Farsley. If we were to be promoted at say the expense of Harrogate that would be three new grounds, Histon, Eastbourne and Lewes. Is Harrogate's ground ready for the Conference? I wouldn't have thought so but I can't find any confirmation anywhere. All supposition at the moment, there is a long long way to go yet so it's all academic.

I would think Northwich v Witton would possibly be the most local of local derbies of all time!

STEP TWO
Northern		Southern
Team	From	Team	From
AFC Telford United Alfreton Town Barrow Blyth Spartans Boston United Burscough Droylsden Farsley Celtic Fleetwood Town Gainsborough Trinity Hucknall Town Hyde United Northwich Victoria Nuneaton Borough Redditch United Solihull Moors Southport Stafford Rangers Stalybridge Celtic Tamworth Witton Albion Workington	CONFN CONFN CONFN CONFN CONFN CONFN CONF CONF NPP CONFN CONFN CONFN CONF CONFN CONFN CONFN CONFN CONF CONFN CONFN NPP CONFN	Basingstoke Town Bath City Bishop's Stortford Bognor Regis Town Braintree Town Bromley Cambridge City Chelmsford City Eastleigh Fisher Athletic Hampton & Richmond Havant & Waterlooville Hayes & Yeading United King's Lynn Maidenhead United Newport County Staines Town Team Bath Thurrock Welling United Weston Super Mare Worcester City	CONFS CONFS CONFS CONFS CONFS CONFS CONFS ILP CONFS CONFS CONFS CONFS CONFS SLP CONFS CONFS ILP SLP CONFS CONFS CONFS CONFN

13 Feb Nuneaton drew with Worcester last night to stay in 5th place and set up a 4th/5th place showdown for Saturday!!

It's Urwin Milly, not Unwin!

PREDICT COMP UPDATED

12 Feb Away Stalybridge 7.45pm. Coach Departs Haig Ave at 5.30pm £8 TIY Members £13 Non Members or if you travel to Blyth and Stalybridge it will be just £25 for the two games. Coach is nearly full, book early to avoid disappointment.

STALYBRIDGE 2 SOUTHPORT 2-A highly entertaining game which saw us come from behind twice and we could and perhaps should have gone on to win with both Michael Powell and Robbo missing very good late chances. An early pen gave Celtic the upper hand before a penalty to us levelled it up. No arguments about either of the penalty awards from me, both clear cut. Roca put Celtic ahead with a super strike, probably one of the best goals scored against us this season. The second half was 2 minutes 40 seconds old when a floodlight failure delayed proceedings for 30 minutes. We looked lively after the restart and Mark Houghton on as sub cost me another fiver with a bundled in equaliser. It was an end to end game which could have gone either way but the points ended up being shared. Injuries to Matt Hocking and Mark Duffy saw them subbed early. Duff's looked serious at the time but I understand it was a back spasm and he was up and walking around in the second half. Great to see the supporters getting behind the team tonight, we may have been fairly small in number but that is the kind of support the players respond to and I know it was much appreciated by the players and manager.

GOALSCORERS
12-Feb-08	Lge Goals	Cup Goals	Total
Tony Gray	4	6	10
Mark Duffy	4	3	7
Liam Blakeman	4	2	6
Kevin Lee	5	1	6
Neil Prince	5	1	6
Mike Powell	5	1	6
Karl Noon	2	2	4
Neil Robinson	3	1	4
OWN GOALS	4	0	4
Mark Houghton	4	0	4
Chris Lever	3	0	3
Joel Byrom*	2	0	2
Adam Dugdale*	1	1	2
Chris Holland	2	0	2
Paul Barratt	1	0	1
Sean Newton*	1	0	1

11 Feb From Millster on the Burscough forum "Another pleasing thing was seeing the man and wife wearing their Southport colours applauding with vigour when the linnets left the pitch at the end - good job they came to Victoria park - they would not have seen a victory in 4 games following Southport where it appears to be going all wrong.
The natives are already restless on their message board!"

Maybe they were applauding with such vigour because Burscough had just beaten one of our play off rivals? The natives are permanently restless on Port Chat Millster, you should know that by now!

Hinckley beat Alfreton 1-0.

9 Feb Away Blyth Spartans 3pm.

BLYTH SPARTANS 1 SOUTHPORT 0-This was our 3800th First Class match and a goal 6 minutes from time settled it. After a promising first half when we should have been 3 up we didn't appear for the second half which was an absolute shocker from our point of view. Even so we still had a chance to win it via an own goal. It was not to be and there was an air of inevitability when the Blyth goal went in. Too many off days with Neil Sorvel having almost a Rigoglioso-esque performance, apart from his missed open goal I didn't notice him on the pitch for the remaining 95 minutes of the game. It clearly doesn't work having him, Chris Holland and Michael Powell in midfield. We were lacklustre in the second period with too many going through the motions. A decent following considering the distance of around 60, The Blyth fans say they were impressed with the numbers of about 80 but that seems a bit high to me. Onwards to Stalybridge on Tuesday and with Nuneaton to come next Saturday we have two tough games on the bounce. I'm sure we will know a lot more about our fate this time next weekend.

7 Feb The DVD from the Kettering game is now available at a discounted price of £6. You can e-mail me or ring me to order a copy. Thanks to everyone who has placed an order so far, copies will be despatched over the weekend.

2 Feb Away Kettering-KETTERING 5 SOUTHPORT 2. What a day this turned out to be. A game that had everything except a Southport win. Twice in the lead, the linesman getting injured and being replaced (with our agreement) by the Kettering Managing Director, the first penalty scored against us this season, a Kevin Lee own goal, the save of the season from Steve Drench and it was our 1250th Non League league game. The scoreline certainly flatters Kettering who despite being the better side looked to have run out of ideas until a debatable penalty decision and the own goal put their tails up and in the end you could only see one side going on to win the game. Goals in the 92nd and 94th minute make it look worse than it was. 118 Standing Southport fans-Official.

The MD linesman was a major talking point. I understand if we hadn't agreed to the switch the game would have been called off. Thankfully for his sake he didn't have that much to deal with but surely it shouldn't have been allowed in such an important game as this. Imagine the outcry if he had been involved in anything controversial.

We have also seen an outstanding talent today in the shape of Jean-Paul Marna. I can see why he is touted as one of the best players in NL football. Absolute class.

I think we have to accept that after that display the title will be heading to Kettering and probably by some margin. We really have to bounce back at Blyth next Saturday to keep us up in the play offs. I expect the moaners and I told you so's will be having a field day today but I am not that despondent, we were 2-2 with 4 minutes to go away from home against the best team in the league having twice taken the lead. All is not lost!

1 Feb We will have played just two home league games in 2008 by the end of February.

Webmaster Rob Urwin Contact rob@southportfcstats.co.uk