Wakefield AFC 3 Glasshoughton Welfare 1 (30th July 2022)
The season may have started for some in July, but beyond the mildness of the breeze, this did not feel like a summer season opener. It also didn’t feel like at NCEL game entirely either, due Wakefield playing their home games in Featherstone Rovers’ 7000 capacity Post Office Road ground. Officially it’s The Millennium Stadium, for sponsorship purposes, one of four such names its had, including a rather strange season when know as the Chris Moyles Stadium after the Radio 1 DJ.
The fact that Wakefield are in Featherstone at all is due to Wakefield AFC being a club formed as recently as 2019, after a failed experiment to bring football to Wakefield by moving Emley into Wakefield Trinity’s Belle Vue. Poor crowds in the rugby league town, and the locals from Emley not being supportive of their club being snatched away, meant that club folded in 2014.
In contrast, the new incarnation of Wakefield seems to be getting things right, after a bumpy start. The club’s first two seasons were cancelled due to covid, but their first full season saw them win the Sheffield & Hallamshire County Senior League Premier Division, to earn promotion to the NCEL1.
With season tickets priced at just £75, they are certainly doing what they can to get fans on board, and 361 would be at this game. Crowds for Wakefield’s FC‘s last season in 2014, averaged just 87. Wrong town or not, it does have that feel of being a community club, with volunteers doing it for the love of it. Speaking to an official of the Northern Premier League in the bar before the game, he said that if you offered clubs at this level £10,000 or ten volunteers, they’d take the volunteers every time.
Those making the six mile journey to Featherstone will find an oversized (for their crowds) but well appointed ground, with good facilities, as befitting the home RL club, who get around 3000 at their games. Three sides are either wholly or mainly seated, aided by the addition of two stands from Scarborough’s McCain Stadium, after that club met its sad demise.
One end is still open terracing, rather steep and moss covered, with barely a barrier in sight. While mainly covered by advertising boards now, the front of the terrace still has an old fashioned metal fence, with some bits showing their age. Indeed, if there is one criticism of the ground, it would have to be the lack of maintenance. You can’t really blame the rugby club for the huge number of their lazy fans who dump their plastic beer glasses and food wrappers on the floor rather than in the bins, but most of the seats look like the like time they were cleaned, they told fans about it on MySpace. Quite a few of the seats have been ‘claimed’ by the local pigeon community, leaving markers on them like German tourists claiming sunloungers by the pool. That said, if you are careful where you sit, you can get a view much better than in almost any ground for quite a few divisions up.
This was Wakefield’s first game at this level, but for large parts, it didn’t really live up to the billing, being a game of few clear chances until the last 20 minutes or so. The visitors Glasshoughton actually took the lead in the 5th minute from the first real chance, surprising almost everyone by firing a shot from wide across the keeper into the far corner. They looked the better team in the opening stages, but a red card for them after 15 minutes changed the game completely.
Being a goal up, Glasshoughton understandably played more ‘conservatively’ after, and despite the numerical advantage, the home side were struggling to get through a well-drilled back line. Midway through the second half though, that one man advantage became two, with a player sin-binned for 10 minutes. This was enough to turn the game.
With more space now to play with, Wakefield were finding gaps. One saw the ball taken into the left side of the box, then hit hard from a tight angle across the keeper to level the scores. Within three minutes the turnaround was complete, with a shot lashed in from the middle of a crowded penalty box.
And five after that, it was three, with a penalty unstoppably dispatched into the top corner, to set a very happy Wakefield onto an opening day win on their debut in their new league. Glasshoughton will no doubt wonder what would have happened if they’d been able to field 11 men for the whole game (or even 10 at times) and their frustration was clearly visible in the closing stages, occasionally kicking the ball out of play like it had personally insulted them.
Some might say fortune smiled on Wakefield, and even though you can’t really tell too much from one game, they had enough about them when they did get going to suggest they should be ok, and they could be an entertaining team to watch. Just be careful where you sit.
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