If you’re a regular to this site you’ll know the Hamlet are our local side and we’ve written much about them, so this is pretty much the last you’ll hear of them in this piece.  Walton & Hersham on the other hand are unusual in that they are complete unknowns to us. Given our Ryman addiction in the last two years they are one of the few sides who have never turned our heads. So, we did some reading, and, of course, based it round our joy, the Old Jug, the FA Cup.

At step 4 in the football pyramid a lot of clubs have ‘their’ story of FA Cup greatness, their cup final, their defining moment.  The Swans of Walton & Hersham are no different. In fact, in the early 1970s they had more than their fair share of joy in the old jug and were rightly feared. They were a team that all 3^rd and 4^th tier clubs would gladly avoid.

Before that period of success, W&H got their first taste of the propers when they progressed through seven 1957 FA Cup games against the likes of fellow Ryman side Hastings, future winners Wimbledon and fellow giant killers Sutton United.  The 1^st Round brought Division 3 South side Southampton to Stompond but there was to be no shock yet, they lost 6-1 but had made their first mark.

It took a while for them to notch their second effort, mind, 12 years in fact.  The 1st Round saw them eventually lose to a high-flying but not yet fully-fledged football league club in Barnet. It was close though, they only lost 1-0 to that year’s FA Trophy finalists.  The following year, 1970 they dumped out Sutton United again, this time to book their place in the 1^st round. It was an inauspicious exit for Sutton who only eight months previously had been hosting eventual Cup winners ‘Don Revie’s Leeds’ at gander Green Lane in a 4^th round tie.  The draw was unkind, W&H failed to net a league side and ran into renowned FA Cup giant killers Telford.  They lost 5-2.

The following year they fell at the final qualifying hurdle but 1972 was the zenith – and they got their first league scalp.  Only a Division 4 side at the time Exeter City were nevertheless a good one, despite going through a period of struggling to get past non-league sides in the FA Cup. The Grecians crept past Crawley after a replay a year earlier and got knocked out by Alvechurch the year after the Swans beat them. But beat them they did, 2-1, and the Surrey side went on to lift the FA Amateur Cup with Dave ‘Harry’ Bassett in their ranks.

The ‘reward’ for their first proper giant killing was a shocker. Instead of getting the bounty of another, bigger league side, the Swans drew fellow giant killers Margate. Margate were probably equally as miffed at the time, they’d just knocked out the Welsh Swans, at that time in Division 3, and were certainly hoping to avoid the tricky prospect of the English variant. That season, though, was Margate’s, they beat W&H 1-0 and earned a plum 3^rd Round tie against Spurs, which of course they lost 6-0.

Before the lean times of the 80s and 90s set in, Walton & Hersham had one last tilt and this was, with hindsight, probably the most odd and remarkable.  In 1973, their fourth foray into Round 1 in five years, they were drawn against Brighton & Hove Albion.  Having held the Division 3 side at home it was feared that was probably going to be it for the Swans.  Brighton had a new manager who the season before was facing down Juventus in the European Cup, a certain Brian Clough. Clive Foskett scored a hatrick at the old Goldstone Ground but he wasn’t playing for Brighton, he was playing for Walton and they whacked Cloughie’s Seagulls 4-0.

In the next round W&H got another bum draw.  They were drawn to face brand new football league side Hereford United who were smack bang in the middle of their four year rise from Southern League to Division 2!  The Bulls ran out comfortable 3-0 winners and consigned Walton & Hersham to the doldrums for another 20 years.  So, from hammering a club managed by a League Champion, future European Cup winner and self confessed legend, W&H had just lost to a team who only a few months earlier were in reality just one tier above them in the football league pyramid. Funny old game, Saint.

The club regrouped in the mid-2000s with long serving player and current Kingstonian manager Alan Dowson at the helm before getting relegated again in 2007.

Back to the matter in hand, form is dicey among all three of the play off challengers.  Walton & Hersham have won just once in their last five but have drawn a few and have been muddling along. Burgess Hill Town have lost four of their last five and, a point against Dulwich aside, they have been woeful.  Hamlet have, frankly, come from a position that looked beyond them when they lost 2-1 at home to Worthing a few weeks ago and again when they could only draw with Burgess Hill Town last week. So, thanks to a few wins, in truth, Hamlet are in the best form of the three but aren’t exactly firing on all clinders, they have simply profited from the failure of others.

If we were betting men, we’d probably suggest that the game will be a draw and BHT will fail to beat a decent Ramsgate side who are just two points behind them but who mathematically can’t quite reach the play offs themselves. But, hey, this is effectively a cup final so anything can happen.

Ryman Division 1 South
Walton & Hersham .v. Dulwich Hamlet
Saturday 30^th April, 3pm, £8
Walton-on-Thames is the closest rail station, 25-34 mins from Waterloo depending which train you get.  We’ve been recommended the Ashley Park pub near the station and reckon we should be there by about midday, though there does appear to be several decent boozers nearer the town centre and towards the river.

We broke our vow instantly. Simon couldn’t make this for a worthy reason I won’t go in to. I was going to go with my Southend supporting cousin but he didn’t fancy it. Fortunately it was a draw so we could go to the replay. We did, however, complete the vow of going to an extra game.

Southend United 2 AFC Telford 0
Attendance 4,415
Price £10

This game wasn’t bad, though the icy chill coming down from Scandinavia was. Telford proved they were only in second gear against Hendon by bossing Southend for much of the first hour. Like in previous rounds though, the better team failed to capitalise on their chances. In the 5 minutes leading up to Southend’s first goal, Telford had 3 or 4 very good chances that they hacked wide or headed over when they should have done better. Southend broke away from the final of these efforts and got a corner, from which former filthy Blade Simon Francis converted. They swiftly added a second with a great goal. The ball was played down the left hand side to James Walker who turned inside, looked up and curled the ball round the keeper. This was not Southend’s first team though, they weren’t deliberately fielding a weakened side they just had lots of injuries and some important loanees were ineligible. As a result of this dearth of players, a 17 year old former Ipswich Town youth player, Stuart O’Keefe, made his debut in the last minute. What appeared to be his granddad and some other friends and relatives were sitting in front of us and were understandably well chuffed when he came on. Had some great fish and chips too. Haddock. Under a fiver.

AFC Wimbledon 1 Wycombe Wanderers 4
Attendance 4,528
Price £10

It was really hard to get a ticket for this, it was a sellout and this was just the type of game we hoped we would see. This was the romance, a decent, footballing non-league side, who had been raped by prospectors and the fans were rebuilding their club. They were poised, ready to stick one up the league side and the TV boys knew it, that’s why it was LIVE on telly on a Monday night.

Having built this game up to epic proportions in my head, it was the most tedious one so far. Surprising given the scoreline but the pragmatism of the unbeaten league side was such that they more or less sat there all game waiting for errors. AFC managed only about 5 or 6 errors but 4 were punished by clinical finishing. So, we were standing on a packed terrace among ‘real’ Wimbledon fans and feeling the buzz of a reborn side on the verge of big things. Nope. We were hunched double on a cold, drizzly night in an uncovered stand listening to one, occasional, dreary song next to the most annoying of drunken Sarf Lahndan pretend fans. Was the silence because they are a newish side and haven’t got their identity yet or was it the early opposition goal and subsequent bore tactics from Peter Taylor’s side? More likely it was the prepondernance of fans of other teams that semed to have latched on to AFC as their second team. Tonight the FA Cup lost some of its lustre, although I was cheered slightly by the Womble that walked up and down in front of the main stand pulling a wheelie bin and banging the lid shut to get the crowd going.

Crawley 0 Havant & Waterlooville 3
Attendance 1,253
Price £13

We got there just in time and with only just enough money to get in. The announcer said there were 187 H&W fans in the crowd, a far cry from the thousands that went to Anfield last year. It would seem the romance isn’t as strong near Gatwick as it is on Merseyside. A guy standing next to us asked a mate “Where’s Bill”? “At home. He refused to pay £13.” I wonder if Bill said that when they went to Anfield? Let’s not forget that here Havant are actually playing a team still some divisions above them in the pyramid. The romance of drawing Kerry Katona in 4th prelim this year appears to have been somewhat spoilt for H&W fans by flirting with Heidi Klum last year.

The Hawks fans that did make it were in good voice and “Dirty northern bastards” was a hackneyed but witty favourite. Surely they can’t fit Havant & Waterlooville into a song? No, they can’t, instead they sing ‘Havantville’ in one song and another where they repeat “Havant, Havant Havant” and then shout “LOOVILLE”. For their part the Crawley fans bought mainly silence and left their hilariously pathetic attempt at riling the Hawks fans with a Pompey chime until they were 3-0 down. Losers.

H&W’s defence was immense, the midfield terrier like and the lone forward a willing runner. They were under pressure early on but it was a very even first half that ended 0-0 with some neat passing, a few long shots but few chances. At half time we needed grub but had no cash. The steward told us the pub over the roundabout had a cash machine so we took a ticket and went. Like much of Crawley both pub and machine were broken and the clientele as transient as the nearby airport. We trudged back and, just as we walked behind the stand we’d been in, a ball came over, presumably from an errant substitute’s warm-up shot. I wasn’t going to miss this chance, like an excited child I rushed to the ball first and drop kicked it perfectly back into the ground. Yes!

Crawley were awful for a side on the brink of the league and, at the time, joint top of that league. Simpemba, one of H&W’s towering centre backs, headed in the opening goal and then Crawley’s most constructive player, Thomas Pinault, showed some gallic hot headedness and got himself sent off with a Cantona-style lunge at a H&W player who appeared to actually be on the floor getting treatment – might have imagined this bit but it seemed the funniest of the five red cards we’d seen so far. Simpemba headed an almost identical second and someone else scored to make it a very comfortable 3-0 win for H&W. On the way out I heard a fan excitedly proclaim “it’s happening again”. He was feeling the romance still but, sadly for H&W, the players weren’t. The fickle mistress of the FA Cup dumped them in the next round and started seeing some other non-league hopeful.

And now it’s time for Sports Report. “Northwich .v. Telford, match abandoned at half time due to floodlight failure”. Woohoo, we dodged a bullet there, £70 and 12 hours saved. However, we vowed we would make up for not going to it by making sure we went to every game from now on and go to an extra game. And we’re on the highlights of the 3rd goal too, just behind the goal, laughing at the 1000 dismal Crawley fans.

One of the last fields Bontcho graced regularly as a player was Hendon’s famous old ground, which has featured in loads of films, TV programs and ads, it’s an icon. Sadly, in the week before this game, it was repossessed by developers and so Hendon had started playing their games at nearby Harrow Borough. Harrow were at home that day so the green and white army had to switch to WEMBERLEEEE!!!!

Imagine Roman pulling his rouble out of Chelsea and them having to switch their games to Fulham but having to switch to Griffin Park due to a fixture clash, hahahaha, if only. Anyway, Woohoo, we were off to Wembley already and we hadn’t even got to the ‘Propers’. Errr … no … Wembley FC, not Wembley Stadium. However, you can see the arch from the ground and we got the train with England fans on the way to the Kazakhstan game so it felt special. And a bit weird when they all got off and we carried on for another stop.

This was also the first ground we’d been to that vaguely resembled what you might call a stadium. Down the main side there was a bar set back from the pitch, with a kind of patio area in front. You really can’t beat football when the sun is blazing, you’re standing, beer in hand, twenty feet from a World Cup goalscorer watching the FA Cup.

The game was fairly good but Telford barely got out of second gear during a thoroughly professional performance and Hendon only scored in injury time with a dubious penalty. I definitely saw Bontcho this time, he looked old but then don’t we all? The Telford fans, though, were great, they were well up for this Cup malarkey. They only stopped singing at the start of the second half, they even sang all the way through half time and had a man with a twenty foot stick with a flag on the end. And a fucking bell ringer. Grrrr.

They did sing some good songs, including the Shrewsbury dissing ‘There’s only one team in Shropshire’, which sounded funnier in song than it does in print. The ‘No ground, no fans’ song sung to the boycotting Hendon fans, protesting about their ground repossession, was a bit harsh and, without any audible response was a bit hollow. Their most popular tune was their rework of the classic FA Cup song – ‘Wemberlee, Wemberlee’.