More postponements in big freeze

Burton Albion and Stafford Rangers have been forced to postpone today’s Boxing Day fixtures due to frozen pitches.

In the Evo Stik First Division South all fixtures have been called off for Leek Town, Newcastle Town and Kidsgrove Athletic, scheduled to be played tomorrow (December 27).

Harrison Park Pic: Hampton Productions

Only Stoke City‘s trip to Ewood Park to take on Blackburn Rovers will go ahead.

Weather permitting, Vale travel to Gillingham and Burton take on Stevenage at the Pirelli on December 28, Stafford Rangers have a home tie against Worcester and Stoke entertain Fulham at the Britannia Stadium.

Leek, Newcastle and Kidsgrove will have to wait until New Years Day before they next attempt to play.

Leek and Kidsgrove clash at the Seddon Stadium whilst Newcastle make the short trip to Market Drayton Town.

North Staffs Football brings you the news about games that have been called off as soon as we get it. Let us know your score predictions.

Festive period kicks off

With all of our side’s itching to play after postponements, the festive period kicks off with a Boxing Day feast.

Stoke City travel to managerless Blackburn Rovers in search of a win to leapfrog the Lancashire outfit.

In League Two, Port Vale have a home tie against strugglers Lincoln City and Burton Albion travel to an in-form Northampton side.

In the Blue Square North, Stafford Rangers have a home match against Telford AFC.

The Evo Stik First Division South will play their matches on December 27 where Leek Town host their match with Belper (34 days since they last kicked a ball) and Newcastle host a derby clash with Kidsgrove Athletic.

North Staffs Football will keep you informed of any postponements, but let us know your score predictions from our games.

Tonight’s fixtures OFF

Tonight’s Evo Stik First Division South matches have been postponed following further snow and ice.

Kidsgrove Athletic‘s Seddon Stadium, Newcastle Town’s Lyme Valley Stadium and Leek Town‘s Harrison Park has all failed to recover in time for their league fixtures.

Harrison Park Pic: Hampton Productions

Kidsgrove were due to play Romulus, Newcastle faced Glapwell and Leek hosted their match with Market Drayton Town.

The side’s will have to wait until Boxing Day for another chance of play and for Neil Cox’s Leek Town side, they will be itching at the thought having not kicked a ball in anger for over a month now.

A date for the re-arranged fixtures is yet to be decided.

This week’s games at a glance

The only action scheduled for this week is for our non-league side’s.

On Tuesday (December 21) Kidsgrove Athletic, Leek Town and Newcastle Town are all set to host matches but all are a major doubt with the second wave of the big freeze gripping the county.

Kidsgrove Athletic vs Romulus

Leek Town vs Market Drayton Town

Newcastle Town vs Glapwell

All matches are scheduled for a 7.45pm kick-off.

North Staffs Football will bring you the news over postponements as soon as we get it. Do football matches get called off too easily nowadays? Or not? Let North Staffs Football know.

To have a look at some of the pictures from the Emirates Stadium where Stoke City were due to play Arsenal click below.

Peter Ward stresses Shotton will stay put

Peter Ward has stressed that striker Liam Shotton will stay at Kidsgrove Athletic despite interest from rivals Newcastle Town.

Liam Shotton

Shotton has bagged nine goals for Grove this season and Ward revealed that Newcastle had been in touch with the 23-year-old front man.

Ward said: “We have got Newcastle Town after Liam, but he is not going anywhere.

“We spoke to Liam and he is happy here, and he has a part to play with us.

“He would be in the same situation at Newcastle having to compete with Chris Budrys and Alan Nagington.”

Newcastle Town vs Chester postponed

Newcastle Town’s clash with Chester has been postponed after heavy snow overnight.

The league cup second-round fixture has been moved to December 14.

Cold snap puts a freeze on matches

Town’s assistant manager Dorian Garner has said their clash with Glapwell on Saturday is also a major doubt.

He added: “Unless there is a dramatic change in the weather there is no way we will play.

I would give us a 30% chance of playing at the moment.”

The Newcastle squad won’t be having a few days off though, as they take part in a spinning class at Total Fitness.

And Garner says this is part and parcel of the winter period at a non-league club.

He added: “This is the british weather we have to expect.

“The lads will go to total fitness who are really good with us, and we either do spinning or aerobic classes, as well using the gym facilities.”

Weather permitting Newcastle match against Glapwell will be a 3.00pm kick-off.

Weekend round-up as non-league side’s freeze

The weekend’s cold snap, with below-freezing temperatures and snow for some caused havoc for Saturday football matches.

Officials across the county have had to call a number of games off due to frozen pitches as temperatures as low as minus 7C hit Staffordshire.

In the Evo-Stik First Division South, Leek Town‘s charity match against Glapwell was postponed as freezing weather in Mansfield left officials with no choice but to call the game off.

Cold snap puts a freeze on matches

Stafford Rangers ‘s match at Harrogate Town also fell foul to the weather and was cancelled following a pitch inspection at 8.30am on Saturday (November 27) morning due to a frozen pitch.

 

Newcastle Town‘s trip to Belper Town was cancelled after a 9.00am pitch inspection due to a frozen pitch – in which Belper’s ground was under four inches of snow.

Kidsgrove Athletic‘s match at Shepshed Dynamo was also ruled out after a 10.30am pitch inspection.

Stoke City kept their game on against Manchester City and salvaged a point at the Britannia Stadium thanks to Matthew Etherington’s injury-time goal.

After a goalless first-half the visitors looked to have nicked all three points through Micah Richards’s superb strike, but Etherington latched onto Tuncay Sanli’s back-heel to smash the ball into the net.

In League Two there was better news for Crewe fans who made the trip to Lancashire-outfit Morecambe.

Clayton Donaldson fired Alex into an early lead four minutes in, and Byron Moore doubled the advantage on the stroke of half-time.

Morecambe halved the deficit through Chris Shuker but plaudits go to Alex stopper Rhys Taylor who saved Phil Jevons’s penalty to give Dario Gradi’s men all three points.

Burton Albion progressed to the lucrative third-round of the FA Cup with a 3-1 win at the Pirelli against Chesterfield.

Aaron Webster and Jacques Maghoma sent the Brewers into a 2-0 lead at half-time, but Chesterfield made it a nervy end after Jordan Bowery’s late strike.

The match was sealed though as James Collins broke past the visitors defence and curled the ball around the Spireites keeper.

Port Vale were in action on Friday night (November 26) but they scraped into the third-round as well with a 1-0 win over Accrington Stanley, thanks to Justin Richards’s first-half strike.

Did you go to any of the games? Let North Staffs Football know what you think and listen to our weekend report below:
http://www.onmvoice.com/player/player.swf?a=34905&ap=0&color=default

Curzon Ashton Football Club, who play in the Evo-Stik Premier Division have their own way of combating the freezing conditions:

Cold snap puts freeze on football fixtures

Cold snap puts a freeze on matches

Overnight snow coupled with temperatures as low as minus 6C have resulted in three of our matches to fall foul of the conditions.

Leek Town‘s charity match against Glapwell has been postponed as freezing weather in Mansfield left officials with no choice but to call the game off.

Stafford Rangers ‘s match at Harrogate Town was cancelled following a pitch inspection at 8.30am due to a frozen pitch.

Newcastle Town‘s trip to Belper Town was cancelled after a 9.00am pitch inspection due to a frozen pitch.Belper’s ground was under four inches of snow.

Kidsgrove Athletic‘s match at Shepshed Dynamo has also been ruled out after a 10.30am pitch inspection.

Grove boss Peter Ward spoke to StaffsLive on his way to the game and said: “We expected the game to be off.

“The lads will be training this afternoon, but I can see us missing all next week’s games as well because this weather is set for at least ten days.”

Newcastle Town assistant manager Dorian Garner said their players will not be getting an easy afternoon though.

He added: “We’ve booked the hall at Newcastle College just in case this would happen and the players will have a bit of a sweat on when they finish later on.”

Burton Albion‘s second-round FA Cup match at the Pirelli Stadium against Chesterfield will go ahead and Stoke City’s clash with Manchester City is also expected to avoid any problems – both are a 3pm kick-off.

Town boss slams players after Staffs Cup defeat

Newcastle Town boss Greg Clowes slammed the performance of his players after crashing out of the Staffordshire Senior Cup to the hands of local rivals Kidsgrove Athletic, writes Matt Dodd.

The holders of the cup could only make it to the quarter-final stage this time around, and Clowes was bitterly disappointed with his side’s performance on Tuesday (Nov 16) night, admitting that “anyone could have beaten us.”

He added: “We didn’t turn up. Considering we were defending our cup which we won last year, the players didn’t show any desire to retain it. I’ve given them a few home truths.

“I don’t think it was that Kidsgrove played so well, it was the fact that we were so poor – and that’s fair play to Kidsgrove for making us look so poor.”

Town never really took control of the game and a goal on the hour from Kidsgrove’s top-scorer Dave Walker was enough to secure a deserved win for the Grove.

Greg Clowes

Clowes said: “In the end losing 1-0 flattered us tonight. On another night if they had taken their chances it could have been an embarrassing defeat.

“We’ve been knocked out of the competition without even turning up. That’s the most frustrating part of it, the fact that we worked so hard to win last year and anyone could have beaten us tonight on that performance.

“We wanted to stay in this trophy tonight. I did, unfortunately the players didn’t.”

Castle will now shift their focus back to the league, and despite being in fifth place with games in hand on the teams around them, Clowes was pessimistic about his side’s chances this season given the performance against Kidsgrove.

Clowes admitted that promotion could be out of contention based on his side’s performance.

He said: “On that performance we won’t win anything.

“It’s been a bit like Jekyll and Hyde at the moment. The same squad overturned a very good side on Saturday away from home, but the same group of players have turned in a performance like that tonight which is unacceptable.”

Loughborough Dynamo are the visitors to the Lyme Valley Stadium on Saturday, and Castle will be looking to erase the memory of Tuesday night with a convincing performance.

Clowes said: “There are things to work on – big game on Saturday. As far as I’m concerned I’ve forgot about this result already and we look forward to Saturday.”

To see comments from Kidsgrove’s manager Peter Ward click here.

New striker set to move to Newcastle Town

Newcastle Town manager Greg Clowes is set to announce a new signing after striker Scott Malone heads back to Port Vale.

Town are hoping to extend the Vale loanee’s term at the club but Clowes has said he wants more competition for places in the squad.

Lyme Valley Stadium

He added: “If we lose Scott (Malone) then we only have two strikers, so we are bringing in a lad from a league above to add competition to the squad.

“He is as good as anything we’ve got at the moment and we are hoping he will come in and improve the side.”

Town will replay their League Cup match with Chester City on Nov 30 after City failed to get to last week’s game due to traffic congestion.