The Match: Leigh Genesis v FC Halifax Town (Unibond Div One, North).
The Date: Saturday December 5th 2009.
The Result: Leigh Genesis 1-1 FC Halifax Town (Marshall, 95).
Our excursion to Leigh cost us £9.50 on the train via Manchester Victoria, which included unlimited bus travel for the day around Greater Manchester. Quite fortunate really as Leigh does not have its own railway station although there are plans afoot to reopen it at some stage. Atherton is the closest rail station, which is about a 10-minute bus ride into Leigh itself.
However the credit crunch has obviously hit Leigh hard as at least 4 of the pubs on our list printed off the Internet thingy had closed down! Still we managed to find some decent ones en route to the ground - which is a steady 10-minute walk (or limp in my case) to the ground - notably The Riverside that as the name suggests overlooks the canal!
Having been forewarned that food and drink were expensive in the stadium itself we left our arrival as late as possible even calling for a pint at Leigh East's BARLA rugby club, which is part of the impressive Leigh Sports Village.
Having paid £8.00 at the ticket office we headed for the turnstiles as the Legends Bar outside the ground was full to overflowing and Town fans were queuing to get in. Once inside the ground our fears re the prices proved to be founded, as it was £3.00 a pint, £2.80 for a Snake and Pigmy pie and 90p for a Yorkie! Shaymen fans take note the company who have the contract for food and drink at Leigh are the same people who now have the franchise at The Shay.
The stadium was; like most new builds; was lifeless and lacking character and the entire crowd of 612 - which included 450+ from Halifax - were housed in on section of the seated stand down one side. The rest of the ground was also covered seating with the exception of covered terracing behind one goal which was used as a flag / banner display zone.
The stewards / bouncers were a tad over enthusiastic to say the least and reminded me of an S.A.S unit as they pounced on some poor innocent guy in the toilet cubicles at half time who they suspected of smoking when all he was doing was going through the motions!
The game ended 1-1 and justice was done for me with Scooby's late, late equalizer making up for a sub standard referee and some dubious time wasting and unsportsmanlike tactics adopted by the Leigh team and management.
So the return journey home and after getting a soaking walking back into Leigh we had to have an hour or so in the pub to dry our before eventually arriving back in Halifax around 9pm and heading straight to Freddy The Foxes' 18th birthday bash.
Journey Distance: 79.2 miles.
Total Distance for the Season: 1,897 miles.
Terry "Chadders" Sunderland, just loving the two away cup games this week.
