If the rain doesn't get you, the bus washer will

The Boxing Day fixture is a long standing part of the football programme. For those of a non sporting persuasion, the Boxing Day sales take a similar part in the calendar. That is, at least, for those with their own transport. Public transport remains patchy, with no trains, and buses depending on your location. London has a full service, other cities vary, and anywhere else has none. Liverpool had a Sunday service on most routes, between about 10am and 7pm. The information from Merseytravel was not as helpful as it might have been, with the booklet only giving times at the start and end of the routes, and only some routes uploaded to the Traveline database, leaving times at intermediate stopping points something of a lottery.

This year, Prescot Cables were playing away to Cammell Laird, on a bus route that was running, next to the Crosville (now First, soon to be Stagecoach) garage in Rock Ferry.

St Peter's Church, opposite the ground

A small but select group of independently travelling supporters made our way to the game, via Gallaghers Pub and Barbers in Birkenhead, something of a favourite for us when we visit the Wirral. Unfortunately, the barber's side was closed, as I could have done with a trim, but the range available from the pub side provided more than adequate compensation.

Cammell Laird seem to illustrate that a club with a profitable social club and small attendances will often do better than one with larger attendances and a lack of social facilities. We arrived at the well appointed Lairds Social Club expecting the game to be off, as it had been raining heavily for a couple of hours, not to mention for a few days beforehand. Looking out of the window, the bowling green looked in pristine condition, which had me wondering whether it is possible to play bowls in the rain. It might be better not to do so if the former World Champion David Bryant CBE is playing, as the rain would extinguish his trademark pipe.

Joining us in the bar was former Cables manager Dave Ridler, on holiday from his job with the Liverpool International Football Academy in Cairo. I assume he joined the 38 people who fitted themselves into the ground, the lowest attendance in the Division so far this season. At least there was plenty of room when the rain meant that everyone, apart from our intrepid musical section (Rod and Richard) made use of the available cover.

Fortunately, the covered standing is by the side of the pitch, at the end Prescot were attacking, so I had a good view of our attacks on goal.

Marlin Piana is denied by the goalkeeper

Our first goal was scored by Carl Furlong, in his first appearance for the club.

Carl Furlong

I did not capture the goal, the closest I came to it was Anthony Shinks crossing in, but the angle meant we would not recognise him without a team sheet. I captured him later, in a shot that sums up conditions in the first half.

Anthony Shinks

Despite the rain, I was happy with the light: sunset a few minutes later makes all the difference. The earliest sunset of the year was for the Radcliffe game a couple of weeks ago. In these latitudes, sunset starts to get later 7-10 days before the shortest day, and sunrise only starts getting earlier 7-10 days after it, although the latter point does not concern us for football.

Dave Owens, also making his Cables debut

The rain eased off for the second half, so I took up a position away from the cover. With 3 floodlight pylons on each side, the best position is about a quarter of the way along the pitch. This is level with the bus washer in the garage, so one usually gets a good spraying as buses return to the garage. Fortunately, on the Bank Holiday, they must have decided the buses had not accumulated enough mileage to need washing, or First decided to sell them dirt and all, so I stayed dry.

I did not capture Prescot's second goal either, a minute into the half, on the "pies before pictures" principle, and as it was a cold wet day, not just a pie, but the last of the soup as well. Marlin Piana, who showed promise on his debut at Radcliffe a couple of weeks ago, fulfilled it with his first goal for Cables. At least I was in the ground to see it, a fair proportion of the crowd were still on their way back from drying off in the social club across the road. With the score at 2-1, it looked like a promising afternoon, and still did even when Cammell Laird equalised again. However, when they went ahead, as Dave Powell explained after the game, we seemed to throw caution to the winds to get a goal back, allowing them to put the game out of reach.

I am not sure if Cammell Laird have improved their floodlights since my last visit. I always thought theirs to be one of the darker grounds, but I was happy with the results to the end of the game. The pylons and heads looked the same, but it is quite possible they have had new bulbs.

Joe Fielding, pictured towards the end of the game

After the game it was back to Gallaghers to squeeze in a pint, about all there was time for before the end of the bus service. As for the haircut, I had that at a Turkish barbers in Liverpool: they even flambée your ears for you!

The rest of the pictures from the game can be seen here.