Bostik Matchday: Football for the soul

It’s been a rather depressing week for followers of our national game. We’ve had secret talks about a European Super League, confirming, if there’d ever been doubt, that our top clubs are far more interested in cash than in their supporters (“I’m popping out to watch our Tuesday night match. Yes, I know it’s Monday- I’ll be home on Wednesday.”). We’ve had allegations that Manchester City are dodging Financial Fair Play regulations in a way that’s anything but fair, Everton being banned from signing Academy players from other clubs and fined after offering ‘inducements,’ and -apparently- death threats to players who won’t wear poppies. Sport is meant to be a distraction from the rest of the world, but more often than not recently it seems just to be a reflection of it; a demonstration, perhaps, that we’ve forgotten the true meaning of the game.

There has been one shimmering light at the end of the tunnel, however. We’ve been approaching perhaps the one weekend in the mainstream football calendar when we put the romance back into the football world; when we remember what football is meant to be about. The FA Cup First Round is upon us, which means that our Non-League clubs take their moment in the limelight.

Sometimes that can be rather patronising. “Binmen, bouncers and students,” said the Metro, and you could indeed play a game of cliché bingo if you tried hard enough- but, for once, much of it has been very positive and rather well written- even that Metro article if you discount the almost obligatory line. What’s changed? Well perhaps it’s because Haringey Borough- our very own Haringey Borough- have achieved so much in such a short space of time that clichés don’t seem appropriate. What seems appropriate, instead, is to take the chance to marvel at the work that Chairman Aki Achillea and manager Tom Loizou have achieved over the past few years.

We’ve covered them many times in the recent past. We watched them almost trip up Leyton Orient in the FA Trophy last year, we watched them win promotion to the Bostik Premier Division by upsetting the odds last season, we watched them dispose of Poole Town in the Fourth Qualifying Round less than a three weeks ago to reach this stage for the first time in their history. We also watched them nearly make this stage this time last year, eventually losing to Heybridge Swifts in a match which the BBC wanted to show but couldn’t, as the club turned them down so as not to disrupt the car boot sale so important to the local community. Haringey Borough have never had any money- and in making that decision they proved clearly that other things are far more important, anyway.

Tonight, the BBC were back. The ground was packed to the rafters. Dan Walker was approximately seven foot three. And Aki and Tom, despite the pressures, wore the grins of men who couldn’t quite believe what was happening around them.

They should believe it. This part of North London obsesses over whether Tottenham Hotspur will ever be able to move into their nearby stadium, whilst right under its nose a far more impressive football story has come to life. It’s all well and good to build something fortified by the riches of the Premier League; it’s far different to build it, as Aki and Tom have, on the back of little more than hard graft and a firm belief that it was possible. The Chairman has already stated that the money made from the cup will go into funding coaching programmes for local youngsters; Borough aren’t likely to become nouveau riche whatever happens. But how much money they eventually make would depend on the result tonight. AFC Wimbledon were in town, and the pressure was all on the professional club, whose only victories recently came against Dorking Wanderers in the Surrey Senior Cup and Stevenage in the EFL Trophy, whatever that might be. In the League, the Dons had picked up one win from ten with nine defeats, and manager Neil Ardley admitted to the press this week that he expected to be sacked if his side lost this tie.

Ninety minutes before kick off, the FA Cup glimmered under the floodlights, and some locals with a malfunctioning calendar set off some fireworks. The Wimbledon side, taking their first look at the Borough 3G pitch, looked up, startled. We all hoped they stayed that way- whilst at the same time feeling rather sorry for Ardley, a good man in a difficult situation who deserved some luck.

Just not tonight.

Borough’s singing section- The Bell End- were setting up their flags and digging out their cowbells, before breaking into song- a “sound check,” apparently. Loud and clear. The crowd was already streaming through the turnstiles, and the smell of burgers filled the air. The press box was heaving under the weight of national journalists, BBC London and Talksport correspondents. Your Bostik League correspondent and the chap from the Ham and High refrained from singing “who are ya” at them.

But we thought it. A lot.

As we approached kick off, the wind got up and the rain came with it. Dion Dublin’s nice sheepskin jacket was getting soaked, as was around eighty percent of the crowd. The stewards struggled to keep the match ball on its special plinth, and the advertising boards the teams were meant to stand behind kept moving of their own accord. It was, to grab a cliché of our own, typical FA Cup upset weather.

The Dons got us underway. “We’re just a bus stop in Tottenham,” sang the home fans, as the opposition went on the attack. Wimbledon got a corner, Valery Pajetat claimed it, and the crowd erupted as if he’d scored the winning goal at Wembley. “Oh, Haringey Borough,” they sang, rattled, clanked and banged. Joe Pigott fired in the first shot of the evening, well wide, and gave a disgusted look. Kwesi Appiah, proving he could also miss the target, tried an even longer shot a moment later, just as wide. Pajetat claimed a header from Pigott, and Wagstaff continued the pattern, shooting past the post, as Wimbledon dominated the opening exchanges. Borough looked a little out of sorts, hurrying passes and struggling with the conditions.

In the thirteenth minute Borough applied pressure for the first time, Michael Ademiluyi winning a corner. Joel Nouble was scurrying around distracting the away defence, as he had against Poole Town in the last round, and finally the home side seemed to be settling. More skill from Ademiluyi created a chance for Nouble, whose shot was blocked. “We’re gonna score in a minute!” They didn’t, but they forced Wimbledon to do some desperate defending of their own.

The breakthrough so nearly came in the 27th minute. Great work from Ademiluyi then Nouble down the left, the ball was worked into the Dons box, and a shot from Michael O’Donaghue seemed to glance off the top of the bar. The on-pitch storm seemed well and truly weathered, even if the storm of the other kind was worsening, rain now blowing into the stand. At the other end, Mitchell Pinnock steered a free kick just over the bar, and a shot on the turn from Pigott went the same way.

As we approached half time, Charley Barker- who apparently has lovely hair- went down in the box under a challenge from Tom Soares. The Haringey hordes howled, and the referee, Michael Salisbury…looked the other way, much to Barker’s disgust. At the other end, Ben Purrington got perhaps the first shot on target, forcing a fine save from Pajetat, and the whistle blew with the game still awaiting a goal.

The second half began rather like the first, with the Dons on the attack. A good cross, and the header from Pigott wasn’t far wide. He should, perhaps, have done better- he had time to at least hit the target. Borough responded with a change- Georgios Aresti making way for Jorge Djassi-Sambu, but Wimbledon kept up the pressure, and earned a free kick in a dangerous spot when David Olufemi took out Scott Wagstaff. It came to naught, and suddenly Nouble was charging down the wing and earning a corner for Borough, cleared after a desperate goalmouth scramble. A shot from O’Donaghue then forced Joe McDonnell into a save at his near post, and the game swung from end to end, then back again as we reached the hour mark. Djassi-Sambu wiped the rain from his glasses. He could have done with borrowing a pair with windscreen wipers from Elton John on a night like this.

In the 67th minute a cross/shot from Pinnock seemed to completely change direction in mid air, blowing back towards the left of the goal and landing on the bar before bouncing behind. A moment later Pajetat was being forced to make a smart save from Toby Sibbick, diving to his left to hold, as the Dons looked to take the initiative once more. But back came Borough to apply pressure of their own, Ademeliyu again taunting the Dons defence. And then the ball was in the net, a give and go leaving Joseph Staunton to finish, only for the linesman to ruin the moment, the party pooper. The noise in the stand became so loud that you had to hope they’d finished the foundations at that other place along White Hart Lane.

As we entered the last fifteen minutes the professionals got another head of steam. Pinnock sized up a shot from the edge of the box, and hit a beauty with the outside of his foot. Pajetat, faultless so far, was faultless again, diving to his left and not only saving but holding the ball safely. The next time Pinnock got the ball on the edge of the box and shot, three defenders converged to block- but the Dons were in control, and Borough were leaving only Nouble up front as they looked to hold on to what they had. “Sing if you’re Haringey, sing if you’re happy that way.” We were all happy, although we were more than a little concerned when Pajetat was again called to make a magnificent save, this time from Tom Soares.

And then, disaster. Fifteen seconds from time, Pinnock got the ball inside the box. He’d looked the most likely to score all evening, and he lined up a shot. The keeper was ready, a defender charged in to block, and then the ball changed direction, the deflection taking it past the despairing Pajetat. The Borough keeper, undoubtedly man of the match, didn’t deserve that.

Indeed, none of them did. It was heartbreaking.

“We love you Borough, we do,” sang the faithful as the match drew to a close- and there was much to love. Five minutes of added time came and went, and it was over. Borough had been magnificent, but they were out.

It can be easy to forget what football is meant to be about. Perhaps, just perhaps, Haringey Borough- on and off the pitch- delivered a reminder tonight of what a force for good our game can be. Football for the people, football for the community, football bringing people together.

Football for the soul.