TT No.137: Andrew Gallon - Tues December 4th 2007; Stourbridge v Sutton Coldfield Town;             Southern League Div 1 Mids; Res: 1-0; Att: 166; Admn: £6; Programme: £1.30 (36pp); FGIF Match Rating: 4* 

 
A 280-mile midweek round trip in December is, I'll concede, pushing the boundaries of sanity - especially when the motorway system in the Birmingham area is involved. But with the previous Saturday spent shackled to my office desk, and the one ahead promising similar imprisonment, a Tuesday away from work and a forecast of unseasonally clement weather presented the ideal opportunity to scratch the itch. Midweek fixtures are getting fewer and further between as the winter progresses but this top-of-the-table Southern League derby looked a good bet for entertainment. Having seen recently an intriguing photograph on this website of Stourbridge's ground, I'd pencilled it in for a future visit but didn't realise the opportunity to get there was going to come along quite so quickly. I certainly wasn't disappointed with the War Memorial Athletic Ground, which is a simply fascinating enclosure encompassing several interesting features.
 
The ground is on Amblecote High Street, just off Stourbridge's three-lane racetrack ring road, perched on a rise high above the bustling town centre and close to the unique glass quarter which made this generally inoffensive community famous. The fun and games begin immediately. Turning sharp left from the road, you pass through ornate metal gates painted red and white, and under a towering memorial arch complete with carved wreaths
and a tile-capped pitched roof. I don't recall seeing anything like it before. This wing mirror-scraping entrance leads to a small, unmade car park, hemmed in by walls, and a splendid red-brick turnstile block whose roof echoes that of the arch. On the night of my visit, the turnstiles were not in use, with spectators paying at the adjacent gate. From here, the three-sided nature of the venue is immediately apparent. Ahead is the ground of Stourbridge Cricket Club, who have played here since the 1860s. The footballers, arriving about 20 years later, are accommodated over to the left. To the right, a wonderful mock Tudor red-brick pavilion, with three gables and clock tower, serves the exponents of the summer game.
 
The Glassboys' social club, boardroom and dressing rooms are housed in a flat-roofed, single-storey block fashioned from brick to the right of the near goal. It has the functional appearance of most buildings dating from
the 1960s. The club shop is in the foyer and the line-ups are taped to the window of the announcer's cabin, further down between the boardroom and the red metal cage tunnel. Be sure to make use of this facility because the quality of the PA system is terrible - unless the chap really does have his head in a bowl of water. Beyond here is an area of grass where, until 1990, a smart, 100-year-old wooden stand was located. Nowadays,
there's a couple of steps of terracing, the battered remains of a turnstile block and more gates no longer seeing active service. Shame.
 
To compensate, the three stands running between the penalty areas on the far touchline are absolute gems. The oldest, positioned centrally and erected in the 1930s, is a real curiosity. It has a high, airy roof which
is tilted through four angles. Wooden benches, painted bright red, are straight from the 1950s and flank a box of rather more comfortable red plastic tip-up seats for directors, press and the executive element. The stands on either side are identical and were added just after the Second World War. They have back-sloping roofs and cover shallow terracing. There aren't any crush barriers, adding to the sensation of being caught in a time warp. The amount of ironmongery is remarkable and reminiscent of Victorian railway station canopies. There are 22 pillars supporting the three roofs and these make viewing tricky. There are so few unobstructed seats, spectators almost find themselves sitting on each other's knees to occupy those avoiding the uprights. Dugouts are positioned either side of the main stand but are set back into the terracing so they are flush with the perimeter railings. From here, over to the right, the tower of Holy Trinity church - its clock stopped at 7.25 - watches over the scene across the High Street. Beyond are the modern buildings of a health centre. Behind these stands, either side of which are small strips of terracing, the land falls away quickly to factories, engineering works and the terminus of the 18th Century Stourbridge Navigation - all reminders of when the Black Country was a palace of industry.  
 
The stand at the bottom end of the ground, an old-fashioned 'cowshed', is also a cracker. Its high, pitched roof is relatively new but the nine steps of terracing it shelters and its corrugated iron sides definitely are not. This is where Stourbridge's noisy teenage choir - all five of them - gathered, chanting throughout the match. To the left from here is the cricket pitch which, in its winter garb, appears somewhat forlorn. There is no provision for spectators on this side and the three forms of barrier used to mark off the two territories looks particularly messy. There are two corner floodlight pylons on this side, and two others on either flank of the wing stands opposite. The pitch, shared with Midland Alliance club Causeway United, is a little frayed - and not just round the edges. This may be a rather tatty, timeworn ground with a layout frowned upon by grading jobsworths but its constituent elements are offbeat, historic and unusual. A sight for eyes made sore by modern stadia rolled
off the same unimaginative production line.
 
The game, in which Stourbridge recorded a 10th successive win to leapfrog Sutton Coldfield into second place, lived up to expectations. Coincidentally, the Glassboys' last defeat had been a 4-2 setback away to the Royals in the reverse fixture on October 27. Sweet revenge. The hosts made all the running in the first half and got the winning goal as early as the third minute. Damian Whitcombe floated over a free-kick from the right and Nathan Bennett, the biggest guy on the pitch, got up higher than anyone to direct a header over stranded keeper Chris Gemmell and into the top corner. Wing-back Kyle Hadley, whose wholehearted rampaging down the right flank was a feature of the opening 45 minutes, struck the near post with an angled 16-yarder and Whitcombe sliced horribly wide when unmarked near to goal. Sutton relied on long balls and struggled to make chances. The visitors switched to an along-the-floor style after the break, and had much the better of the play without managing to force the equaliser their neat build-ups deserved. Jimmy Quiggin, ex-Glassboy Leon Blake and Liam
McDonald were all close in the last 20 minutes after the best chance had fallen to Stourbridge, Gemmell making a good block in a one-on-one with Hadley eight minutes into the second period.   
 
The long trek home (takes the edge off the closing stages knowing that's ahead, doesn't it?) proved even more tedious than expected. No less than three diversions for overnight roadworks left me wishing I once again
lived on the west side of the country. Still, I got the chance to drive south down the M5 when I wanted to go north, took a much closer look at Lichfield than anticipated and went quite a few miles further up the M1
than I needed to. Was it all worth it? You bet it was!
 

contributed on 05/12/07