From Paul Burgman@PressPhotos-uk.com
28/09/13 Guildford City FC v Taunton Town FC @ Guildford Spectrum.
City’s Laurie WALTERS & Taunton’s Rob NORRISH
Pic: Paul Burgman
It makes a change that after the last few matches where the standard of refereeing has been diabolical, that this game was overseen by a competent ref & lino’s who knew what the off-side rule was.
Anyway, well done The City let’s do the same to Chertsey Town FC in the Cup match next week. COYC
After a good result in the week, we were hoping that Guildford City Fc could lift themselves out of the relegation zone by picking up all three points at struggling Clevedon Town. After having the goal keeper red carded after 15 minutes, for handball outside of the area, you just knew it wasn’t going to be City’s day.
However down to 10 men, City played very well, and were unfortunate to go 1-0 down just before half time. After the break City then conceded a second. However they did rally and pull a goal back, after some sustained pressure, and indeed you wouldn’t have thought that they only had 10 men on the pitch.
Unlucky GCFC, Taunton at home next week, Come On City!!!
7 Games into the season & Guildford City record their first three points of the season, with a 3-2 win over their local rivals in the Calor Gas League – South & West Division. Now off of the bottom of the table and the next match against the bottom of the league team Clevedon Town it hopefully a chance to put a few more points on the board.
On Sunday the Guildford City committee received the very sad news that Tracey Wallis, our Youth team secretary, had passed away suddenly after a very short illness. RIP Tracey.
More match pictures Here
This post was from a little while ago, but I think that some of the mental scars that I bare are from some the jobs that I have done as a photographer….
Firstly an apology for not updating the blog recently events have kind of overtaken me. But rest assured that normal service will be resumed shortly. I won’t bother writing the rants that was going to do, as they were time sensitive, and I can’t be ‘kin’ arsed.
Slightly gob smacked at the jobs in the diary this week, yours truly ended up in a Swingers Club in the South West of England from about 2130 till stupid o’clock. By the time I got home, wired the images, written up a narrative of the evening it was 0430, and I still had to get up at 0630 to get to Patsy Kensit’s Wedding. D’oh, I am knackered now, anyway I have included the narrative for your edification. Any images placed in your mind from reading this text is down to you, I will not accept charges of mental assault.
The Office!
Having been a singleton for a little while, tonight’s mission was one that appealed and repulsed on so many levels, the opportunity to immerse myself, or at least bits of myself into the Swinger culture! The venue for tonight’s little adventure was The Office. A swingers paradise in what can only be described as a derelict and condemned nine-story office block in one of the “nicer” parts of Bristol.
Hmmm, The Office even David Brent would cringe at this, I was confronted by some garish red lights “duct taped” to the hand-rail as I approached the main entrance, in the gap between the entrance steps and the building are the remains of old arm-chairs and sofas obviously past their “use-buy” dates in Swinging terms.
A glance up to the fourth floor reveals a light show of dazzling proportions, 100 metres of Red Rope Lights woven into shapes to spell the legend “The Office”
The Entrance lobby is an impressive mixture of dereliction and abandonment, drinks vending machines and settees randomly scattered, with bits of old carpet, “duct-taped” to the floor.
Having negotiated the main stair case to the fourth floor again “shabby chic” without the chic, peeling paint and flickering lights abound, if this place ever decorated it was probably sometime in the late 1970s.
Having made the long journey up to the club, you are greeted by a cheerful, but definitely home made sign (PIC) , through a heavy office door and you are into the ante-room (probably the Anti-Room) and the first thing that you spot is a curious mannequin, with a curly wig and what appears to be a bowler hat (although the lighting is so bad it could equally be a pork pie hat). The initial reaction was slight shock, it is about as realistic as Michael Jackson, on a bad day.
Negotiating one’s entry beyond the Anti-Room, is conducted through a serving hatch, where the teller behind the hatch tells you the charges, £50 membership for the year and £25 for the evening, so 75 quid up front, before you even get to see what the quality of the goods is like. Had I dragged a partner with me, then membership would have been free, and I could have just paid the £25.
In a curious example of Low-Rent and High Tech, you scribble some details on a form, including Name, Address, Mobile Phone Number and Age (yeah like that’ll happen) and then they scan your finger print. Once the harridan at the door has got all of your personal details you are ushered into the “inner sanctum” or Bar as I prefer to call it.
Having got there early enough, (can tell how keen I was ehh?) I was given the tup-penny tour. And introduced to the “old hands” and some of the staff, including Ray behind the bar, Simon, the owner and his partner.
Other than the bar area, which incidentally doesn’t have a licence to sell booze, so you have to bring your own, whatever gets you through the night, probably a case of Jack Daniels in my case, the club has a few other “facilities” which paid up members can avail themselves of.
And so started the guided tour. The first room that I was invited to inspect was the Dungeon, a curious black hole of a place equipped with some very strange dungeon equipment, including pommel horses, a few skeletons and countless chains hanging from the ceiling, I recognise this place now, from some of my worst “cheese induced” nightmares. On one wall there is a full length mirror and in the far corner appears to be a one man tent, no, my mistake a blow up doll.
At the opposite end of the room is a rudimentary Prison cell, where is Max Mosley when you need him? And the essential for any Friday night Swinger a stirrup pump to inflate your chosen partner, if required.
The next room I visited was what could only be described at a “Snug” a cosy little room tastefully decorated with purple and black stripes with a circular bed knocked up from some old floor boards, and a luxurious wipe clean plastic finish, nice.
One of the highlights of the tour was the Glass Bed Room. A narrow little room with a stair case to a glass bed that is over your head, nicely garnished with a set of illuminated flowers, just in case you need to look elsewhere.
Next came the Exhibitionist room, as if bonking with your arse cheeks and tackle visible through Toughened Glass wasn’t overt enough, an 8ft Vinyl covered mattress, with two CCTV cameras, which with the flick of a switch will turn all of the TVs inside the club to the channel showing you in all your glory.
There were also several other communal rooms, but by this time I was kind of losing the will to live. Much more and I would have been bored rigid.
So what did I get for my 75 squideroos, well probably the most uncomfortable bar stool, in the world, Evar. and a chat with Chris, (I assume is was short for Christine) who regaled me with stories about following Bristol City, or it may have been Bristol Rovers, I kind of lost track a little, being so completely underwhelmed.
I had the dubious pleasure of seeing women of a certain age (you will get my drift, if I explain that my Mum is of a certain age), arrive wearing seemingly normal clothes and then disappear into the WCs and emerge, Superman-like in a completely different, almost alter ego! One game old bird, and she must have been sixty, had a trio of young bucks (well younger than her) follow her, twenty minutes or so apart into one of the Anti-Rooms. Business for her was obviously looking up, unless she prefers to be on top.
But there is something vaguely nauseating (at least for me) about middle-aged and beyond, women, in skirts down to their kebab and tights up to their knees.
Adios for now drivel lovers.
From PressPhotos-Uk.com 21/08/2013 Guildford City FC Team Photographs
Only in America, would someone think that it is acceptable to issue firearm permits to blind people. In Des Moines, Iowa the rozzers have issued a number of firearms permits to people that cannot see, either are registered as visually impaired, or could not see well enough to complete the forms themselves.
To quote one retard: Michael Barber, who is blind, said: “When you shoot a gun, you take it out and point and shoot, and I don’t necessarily think eyesight is necessary.”
GCFC just seem to be desperately unlucky, they played well today, took the game to Tiverton Town at the Spectrum & really didn’t look to deserve the 1-4 scoreline.
The good thing is that the lens that I have had serviced appears to be working as it should. Which is nice. Next game is a local derby game against Fleet Town, at the Spectrum, on Wednesday 18th September at 1945hrs. Come On The City!!
Having been away for a second “recalibration” the Sigma 120-300 F2.8 EX APO DG HSM (how many letters are needed in a name for a lens, this one has slightly more than the average Korean Car) is back from Sigma, first checks seem to show that it is now actually focusing where it should. The last time that it was used it was about 10% out, which on a 300mm lens at F2.8 is fairly significant.
However the true test is tomorrow, with the coverage of the Guildford City FC v Tiverton FC match at the Guildford Spectrum. Anyone in Guildford come and get behind “The City” If you have a season ticket for any other club, in any other league you will get a heavily discounted ticket, because tomorrow is NON LEAGUE DAY. A quick google will reveal all.
UP THE CITY!!!
ADEMENO scores for Crawley
Having covered a few matches over the last 20 years, and not seen very many Red cards, and GCFC suffering a near last minute red card a week or so ago, I wondered what the records were for Red Cards.
The fastest & probably the funniest was Cross Farm Park Celtic striker Lee Todd, who was sent off just two seconds into a game back in October 2000. Todd had his back to referee at the start of Cross Farm’s Sunday league game against Taunton East Reach Wanderers, and was startled by the force with which the whistle was blown for kick-off. “Fuck me, that was loud,” muttered Todd, and the referee promptly showed him the red card.
Dave Pratt hit the headlines in December 2008 when he received a straight red card in a Southern Premier League game between Chippenham Town & Bashley after a mere 3 seconds.
Enjoy
Saturday the 7th September GCFC face opposition that are travelling nearly 3 hours from the West Country for the game at the Spectrum in Guildford for a 1500hrs kick off.
Tiverton Town are mid-table currently whereas GCFC are languishing down at the bottom of the league. Knowing how hard travelling can be in this league, we can only hope that they travel as badly as GCFC have.
After the last performance away at North Leigh, City really need to lift their game. With a couple of players carrying knocks from the last match, I hope that they can return fit and that we are able to put out our strongest & fittest squad.
On the upside, my 120-300mm F2.8 should be returned from being serviced tomorrow (Thank You Daniel at Sigma) so with luck it will fully functional. As long as UPS don’t loose or drop it!
Go On City!!!
Bloody Hell, now that really was hard work. Over the years that I covered football on a regular basis, I can’t really recall how bad none league football lighting was, maybe it is the haze created by the rose tinted glasses and the fog of time, but North Leigh v GCFC was the worst that I could remember. By the time the game kicked off I was shooting at 1000ISO and by the end of the match 3200ISO, which on my now ageing EOS1DmkIIN bodies is not a nice place to have to shoot.
I was also made harder by the fact that I opted to shoot the GCFC attack, and as they were slaughtered by North Leigh FC 8-0 there was not a huge amount of that to shoot. Not helped be the fact that my 120-300 F2.8 was requiring servicing, I was down to one body and the 70-200 F2.8L.
David Methold with some of GCFC
From PressPhotos-Uk.com 31/08/2013 Pat COX shoots in the Guildford City FC v South Park FC in the FA Cup at the Guildford Spectrum Pictures Paul Burgman 075 88 66 9580
Mad rush yesterday, had a wedding to photograph in the morning, followed by giving a lift to a couple of friends to a wedding followed by the GCFC v South Park FA Cup match in the afternoon. The day was going well until the football match. Guildford City went 0-1 down in the first half, and then went down to 10 men, which is worrying, because the old GCFC team had a “bit of a problem” with discipline, and ended up with a suspended fine last year, let’s hope that we don’t end up with too many more bookings & sending offs.
From bad it became worse, as GCFC eventually ran out 0-4 losers, and so out of the FA Cup at the first opportunity. The thing is that they seemed composed on the ball, create goal scoring opportunities, but just don’t seem to get the “rub of the green”.
Anyway the good news is that the Mighty Arsenal sent the Yiddos packing from the Emirates this afternoon, all that money spent and still can’t beat us at the Emirates. Hopefully Wenger will spend some cash tomorrow, as with the injuries we have the squad looks very weak.
The ramblings of a press photographer 