Sunk by Wells

The 38th FA Vase competition began at the weekend with 146 ties in the ‘First Round Qualifying’ and I watched two of them – Erith & Belvedere v Tunbridge Wells on Saturday and Warlingham v Farnham Town on Sunday. In both matches, the away side won 3-2 after extra time. Both had two penalties, the first scored and the second saved.

Erith & Belvedere, who were formed in 1922 and two years later played in The FA Amateur Cup Final before a 32,000 crowd at Millwall, share Welling United’s ground at Park View Road. I travelled on the 13.32 ‘Vase Special’ from Charing Cross, leaving in sunshine and arriving in Welling with dark clouds promising a heavy shower or two.

The first gates to the ground were padlocked but this was Welling United’s ‘half’. I sat in the Erith stand on the far side and 49 spectators settled down to see the home side miss a sitter in the first minute. The Wells, on the same points in the Kent League, were 2-1 up with five minutes to go when things went a bit crazy. Technically the referee sent off five people!

Wells appeared to have increased their lead to 3-1 but the lino flagged for offside. An Erith defender took the indirect free-kick and play proceeded up the field, with both teams happy, until the ref decided that he hadn’t been ready. The home left-back made some kind of inappropriate comment and was shown his second yellow card. Then a very annoyed coach was banished from the dugout to the back of the stand.

Two other Erith players subsequently saw red in separate incidents, leaving them with eight on the pitch. A Wells player was also ‘sent off’ but the ref then changed it to a caution to leave most people in the ground thoroughly bemused. The Deres equalised in the last minute of normal time, had a penalty saved early in the extra period and finally went out of the competition when a defender’s clearance hit a team-mate to leave Wells’ No.10 in the clear in the 101st minute.

It rained on the long walk back to Welling station but I only had to wait two minutes for a London train. You win some, you lose some.

Sunday’s tie was played at Whyteleafe’s Church Road ground in leafy Surrey, now something of a regular haunt for the superfan. Warlingham’s No.10 scored my goal of the season after a couple of minutes, blasting the ball high into the net from an ‘impossible’ angle out on the left. Another entertaining match was poised at 2-2 when the Wars were awarded a spot-kick in the last moments of the first half.          

The Farnham ‘keeper saved brilliantly, throwing himself to his right to push out a hand, and there were no further goals in normal time. As is often the case, a goal was scored very early in extra time and it proved to be enough to take the visitors through to a Second Round Qualifying tie at Hassocks in two weeks’ time. Tunbridge Wells are at home to Mile Oak.