Guruk Nanak (0) 1
Sporting Bengal (0) 3
Headcount: 75
New Ground: 343
Admission: Free
Programme: None
Mileage: 50/50
When I walked away from Concord Rangers on 14th March, although fully aware of the seriousness of the Covid-19 outbreak, I and a think many others, were not quite expecting it to be 19 weeks before I stepped inside a football ground again. And for those without an interest in Step 7 football, it could be another eight weeks before they take similar first steps.
The loss of live football has been just a minor irritation in the great scheme of things as, I’m sure, everybody knows someone who has died; someone who has lost their job or someone who has seen their business close. For those of us who didn’t experience the Second World War this has been the strangest, most harrowing times of our lives and we are far, far away from being out of the woods.
German football led the way in staging Bundesliga matches behind closed doors and, armed with that knowledge, the Premier League managed to convince the Government that the same could be done here and so we embarked on a 90-odd day feast of televised football in which even the BBC were allowed to partake. Despite the fact that Liverpool had all but won the Premier League prior to lockdown it was fun, but although the canned crowd noise belied the empty stadiums, it was no substitute for the real thing whether you are used to watching your football with 75,000 inside Old Trafford or 75 at Guru Nanak.
And so it was a week previously that it became apparent that under the present set of the revised guidelines, spectators would be allowed to take their places at Step 7 or as the Government labelled it, Grassroots Football. The Pre-Season fixture lists were immediately scanned and there were a couple of opportunities relatively locally, one of which, Guru Nanak, offering a new ground to visit was an obvious choice.
Saturday morning felt the same as any first Pre-Season Saturday which normally would have been just four weeks but the length of time of this off-season was highlighted as the collection of my football paraphernalia showed the camera to have a flat battery! But there was an excitement as the car pulled off the drive, I was on my way to a match. A traffic hold-up at the top of Bluebell Hill saw me anxiously watching the time of arrival tick dangerously close to kick-off but this just added to moment.
Guru Nanak, of the Kent County League Division One Central and East played host to Sporting Bengal of the Essex Senior League, and to be fair and considering the normal nature of a Pre-Season Friendly, produced a really decent game with one or two individuals from both sides catching the eye with a quality that wasn’t really expected of Step 7 football.
After a goalless first two periods of 30 minutes in which both goalkeeper excelled with Sporting Bengal’s custodian saving a twice-taken penalty after 15 minutes, the visitors took the lead after 61 minutes with a penalty of their own. Bengal doubled their advantage after 75 minutes when their winger cut in from the left and buried a shot into the far corner. Guru Nanak were awarded another opportunity from the spot with a minute to go which they converted but Bengal still had time to restore their two goal win in time added.
Guru Nanak’s Khalsa Avenue ground offers the most stunning of backdrops with the imposing Sikh Temple and has a small seated area with three sides having hard standing and the other roped off. Apart from the backdrop they were humble surroundings but for the football-starved it was a veritable feast.
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