Corsham Town P-P Deal Town - We’ve been here twice now and there’s no way we’re going to be travelling another 200 miles to get here next week and a possibility for it to being called off, insists Deal Town chair Natalie Benville

Corsham Town – Deal Town
Location	Southbank, Lacock Road, Corsham, Wiltshire SN13 9HS
Kickoff	21/01/2023 15:00

CORSHAM TOWN  P-P  DEAL TOWN
The Isuzu FA Vase Fourth Round
Saturday 21 January 2023
Stephen McCartney reports from Southbank

DEAL TOWN chair Natalie Benville says she will be contacting The Football Association on Monday morning to persuade them to give the club home advantage in this FA Vase Fourth Round tie.

The seventh-placed Southern Counties East Football League Premier Division outfit have made two wasted trips to Wiltshire during the past seven days, with the host club not staging pitch inspections prior to the Kent club’s departure, only for them to arrive at Southbank to be told that the match referee has deemed the playing surface unplayable on both occasions.

The visiting party stayed overnight in a nearby Chippenham hotel last weekend to prepare for the game and arrived at a waterlogged Southbank ground just before 12:30, only for the match referee to inspect the pitch and deem the pitch unplayable.

The Hellenic League Premier Division hosts announced at 14:30 yesterday that the playing surface had passed an inspection – but Benville confirmed today that Deal Town requested another pitch inspection at seven o’clock this morning to prevent them from travelling as the pitch was frozen.

Their coach departed the Kent coastal town at 07:45 this morning and around 50 travelling supporters have made a second wasted near 400-mile round trip.

The match referee turned up late, just 69 minutes before the scheduled kick-off and came out of his dressing room five minutes later to inspect the frozen pitch and officially called the game off at 14:05.

“The only words are fuming,” insisted Benville, who is also a non-executive director at the Kent Football Association.

“We’ve had constant contact with Corsham all week. We’ve pushed and pushed to have a back-up for a 3G (artificial pitch). We pushed for a seven o’clock pitch inspection this morning. We were told it wasn’t needed, the pitch ‘was absolutely playable yesterday’.

“We’ve travelled nearly 200 miles to get here. It was clear the minute we got here the pitch was not playable, another wasted journey.

“We’ll be speaking to The FA on Monday to see what we do. It’s just unacceptable!

“This level (last 32) in The FA Vase, we should be able to arrange pitch inspections before people travel and not allow us to get here for the second time running for then (the game) to be called off.”

Corsham Town are quick to post videos of their playing surface a day before both games – but the silence is deafening when it comes to waiting for them to apologise for these two farces.

Their club website said: "Postponed - the weather beats us again....Waiting to hear from The FA about new date."

Benville said: “We try to allow the players to be best prepared as possible and unfortunately this week it just wasn’t viable to be able to let them stay up here the night before and thank the lord we didn’t – it would’ve been another wasted trip and cost the club.

Deal Town attract the largest home support in their division, playing in the ninth-tier of English football.

“The club is all run by volunteers so the support that we’ve had has just been unbelievable and I feel so, so sorry for the fans yet again that have travelled all this way for then to be cancelled and postponed.

“All I can say is I’m sorry. We’ve got your back, you’ve got our back and we’ll look into something that we can do just to show our appreciation to you, but I’m just so sorry you’re in this situation again.”

This is Corsham Town’s first foray in the last 32 of a national Cup competition and to have one late postponement is bad enough but a second just a week later is simply just unacceptable!

A segment of The FA Vase Rules are in red font.

"If the competing Clubs are not able to play the match at the ground of the Home Club on the scheduled or agreed date, the Clubs can agree to: a. play the match at the ground of the Visiting Club or an alternative ground on the original date; or b. postpone or reschedule the match (to be played at the ground of either the Home Club, the Visiting Club or an alternative ground) to another date within eight days of the date fixed for playing the round (the “Postponement Window”), provided that in each case the consent of The Association has been obtained.

Clubs should seek to agree arrangements and alternative options such as back-up date and having an artificial football turf pitch on stand-by to ensure the match can be played within the Postponement Window.

(iv) If the Clubs cannot agree on a date for the postponed or rescheduled match within the Postponement Window, the default date is the Tuesday immediately following the date fixed for playing the round in the Qualifying Competition, First and Second Rounds Proper. In the Third, Fourth, Fifth and Sixth Rounds Proper the default date for a postponed or rescheduled match shall be the Saturday immediately following the date fixed for playing the round. If a match cannot be played on either a Tuesday or Saturday due to a ground sharing agreement, the default date is the Wednesday or Sunday (as appropriate).

(v) If a postponed or rescheduled match is further postponed, or if one or both Clubs are not able or willing to compete in a match within the Postponement Window, the National Game Board shall take such action as it deems appropriate (in its absolute discretion).”

Deal Town's chair has every right to put her views across and ask The FA to stage the game at The Charles Sports Ground next Saturday.

“We’ve been here twice now and there’s no way we’re going to be travelling another 200 miles to get here next week and a possibility for it to being called off!”

Benville is also open to playing the game on a neutral venue that has an artificial pitch to ensure the game is played.

For example, National League South side Slough Town are not at home next Saturday.  The Berkshire town is 122 miles from Deal, 81 miles away from Corsham and play on an artifical pitch.

“Absolutely. If there’s an option to do that (play at a neutral venue) we’ll look into that. It’s whatever works for our players.  They’re the ones who have been really put out, along with our fans, so anywhere nearer home than Corsham will clearly be beneficial to us.

“I try to see positives in most situations and they generally believed the pitch was playable.  Honestly, they (The FA) should’ve taken it out of their hands and allowed a referee to make that decision for them, instead of making us have a wasted journey.”

Wiltshire, meanwhile, was also covered in a blanket of fog and the floodlighting was struggling to peer through the gloomy conditions at Lacock Road - and young kids’ were playing football within the frozen part of the pitch before and during the pitch inspection.

A “fuming,” Deal Town manager Steve King revealed he knew the writing was on the wall as soon as he stepped onto the pitch two and a half hours before kick-off.

“I can sort of understand last week but we’ve turned up to a ground now two weeks running, last week there was a swimming pool on it and it was never going to be playable and today, within about a minute of walking on to the pitch it was never going to be playable,” said King.

“How a decision hasn’t been made this morning before we’ve travelled – or even when we’re on the road for an hour or so, we can at least get ourselves and our supporters turned back.

“I don’t think it’s good enough!”

King added: “It’s cost a lot of money for our supporters, they’re the ones I feel sorry for at the end of the day.

“We’ve got another 50, 60, 70 people down here today and that pitch isn’t playable!

“I’ve been teaching 20 years and I would have never had taken my kids’ out on that and I don’t know how people think this morning or whatever time it was, it was going to be playable and it was going to thaw.

“You’ve got Chippenham, a National League South club, called off at ten o’clock, you’ve got Bristol Rovers, a Football League club, called off.

“I understand teams want to get games on but we’ve travelled 200 miles, two weeks running. It’s cost the club significant thousands and thousands of pounds for coaches and for travel and I don’t think there’s been any common sense at any point.

“This isn’t touch and go out there, I’m afraid, it’s not safe, it’s not playable and I’m frustrated and upset for the people that have travelled, especially we’re in January and in a cost of living crisis and it’s not cheap – it’s not acceptable!

“We did request a seven o’clock pitch inspection this morning but we were told it was ok at three o’clock yesterday afternoon. ‘It would be fine’, so there wasn’t a pitch inspection at all today despite us requesting that.

With Chippenham Town’s home game against Worthing called off in the morning, while Worthing cancelled their supporter bus on Friday, Corsham Town were offering reduced admission prices for today’s FA Vase tie for Chippenham Town's season ticket holders, via a posting on Corsham Town’s Twitter account - it hasn't been updated since the decision was made to postpone the fixture.

Corsham are a big playing budget club in their division – one of their players came from Norwich in Norfolk to play in this game!

King said: “What can I say? I do get it and I understand that it’s a big game and I’m sure Corsham saw the other games off locally this morning but I walked on the pitch at half-past-12 when I got here and I walked down that far end (rugby pitch end of the ground) and this game was never being played on a month of Sunday’s!

“How somebody at this football club hasn’t been on the pitch this morning and thought ‘this game is never being played,’ I don’t understand.

“This is two weeks running and everything we’ve heard from Corsham both weeks is ‘it will be absolutely fine, it will be absolutely fine’, and they haven’t taken any responsibility when it’s not fine.

“We don’t know other League’s but I certainly think in SCEFL (Southern Counties East Football league) that we try to afford our opponents a little bit more respect and if there’s doubt and you look at the distances travelled and you take that into account – it’s very, very frustrating.”

You always read comments from home fans claiming the away club were not up for playing in such conditions.

King insisted: “We want to play a game of football, we wanted to play a game of football here.  You could see we had a couple of boys kitted up ready to go until the referee made the decision. We wanted to play a game, we wanted to play the game last week.

“For me, it’s the cost for the fans and for the football club.  It’s been unnecessary two weeks running but anybody who looked at the forecast last week would’ve thought if the pitch is just touch and go on the Friday morning, it would be off because it was going to rain for 11 hours.  We’ve been looking at the forecast all of this week and when you could see the fog in here today and the forecast but we’ll do what we’re told and we go and be prepped again.

“I’m just incredibly disappointed for the fans that have travelled in their numbers, a lot of them for two weeks running. It’s not the cost of once, it’s the cost of twice and that’s where my thoughts are at the minute with the cost of the football club and the fans to come five hours twice and not play a game of football.”

Meanwhile, the winners will hold home advantage in the last 16 after Brixham AFC beat Combined Counties League Premier Division South side Raynes Park Vale 2-0 at home today.

Devon-based Brixham are sitting in fourth-place in the South West Peninsula League Premier Division East table.

Last 16 ties are due to take place on Saturday 11 February 2023.


Corsham Town:

Goals:

Booked:

Deal Town:

Goals:

Booked:

Attendance:
Referee: Mr Antony Smith
Assistants: Mr Daniel Spyer & Mr Michael Halford
Fourth Official: Mr William Payne