Whats been happening this week ?

Jon Froggatt

Saturday saw us on a trip to see Belper beat Long Eaton 2-0 in a pre season friendly at Station Street. A blazing hot day on a rock hard bumpy pitch did not make for great football viewing. A good header from Jon Froggatt put Belper 1-0 at half-time and just after the break Lee Morris robbed a Long Eaton defender and run in to score.

the rest of my photography efforts from the game can be seen here: Long Eaton United v Belper Town

Damien Magee holds off Tomasz Cywka

Our next game was at home on Monday against a Derby County XI. Always a big draw when the highest placed league side in the County pay a visit and this was no exception. A crowd of over 800 saw the Rams run out 4-1 winners although this was without doubt Belpers best performance of the pre season.

My other snaps from this game can be viewed here:

Belper Town v Derby County XI

Programme v Derby County

Apparently we sold about 400 programmes which was pleasing as it was my idea to print one and I wrote the majority of it.Even before the game kicked off there were copies on ebay for £4 + £1.31 p&p which is amazing considering it is an 8 page B&W issue printed on plain paper. The ebay seller was suggesting there was a print run of less than 200.

Next up is todays local derby against neighbours Matlock Town in the last pre season friendly before the real action starts next Saturday away at Newcastle Town in their Lyme Valley Velodrome - an unusual place to watch football, especially from the top of the velodrome on the far side from the main stand.

Talking of cycling (see what I did there ? Velodrome- cycling, this isn't just thrown together you know) i've been clogging around on my old mountain bike for the past four weeks. The bike has languished in the shed for the past 12 years. After two years of jogging around the estate and ending up in agony from achilles tendon problems I decided to Dig out some old cycling gear (including the bike) and bought some new stuff from Decathlon (to replace the mouldy helmet that had also hung in the shed for 12 winters).

For the first two weeks it was just around the two mile circuit of our estate but have ventured a little further for the past two weeks.

Yesterday I stretched it out to a 10.25 mile ride into Heage and back. Managed to get complete the ride in just under 43 minutes, which considering two ascents of Kilburn Road, and the hills into Heage and back into Belper was a decent time, especially considering that I'm on a 15 year old mountain bike (and fast approaching 48 years old).

A trip to Decathlon in the morning saw me drooling over their aluminium framed racing bikes - a snip at £1299 but not sure how long the wheels would hold up on the roads of Belper with my weight on top of them. Looks like I'll be riding the MB for a while longer !

New Belper manager Tommy Taylor

Time to go as we have an Operations Committee meeting before the game today.

After the game there is a Q&A with the new Belper manager Tommy Taylor (ex West Ham centre half)and assistant manager Jon Froggatt. 

I'm taking along my 1975 FA Cup Final Programme (Fulham v West ham United ) & my Charity Shield programme from 1976 (Derby County v West Ham United for Tommy to sign.

Catch you later