Saturday 5th November 2011, at Field MillBlue Square Bet Premier
Mansfield Town (0) 1
Matt Green 55
Cambridge United (0) 2
Harrison Dunk 57, 62
Admission £15, Programme £3
Attendance 2046 (237 from Cambridge)
Mansfield Town: Alan Marriott, Kieron Freeman, Ritchie Sutton, Ben Futcher, Luke O'Neil, Lindon Meikle, Adam Murray, Anthony Howell, Nick Hegarty, Matt Green, Ross Dyer.
Subs: Shane Redmond, John Thompson, Paul Connor, Paul Bolland, Louis Moult.
Mansfield Town (0) 1
Matt Green 55
Cambridge United (0) 2
Harrison Dunk 57, 62
Admission £15, Programme £3
Attendance 2046 (237 from Cambridge)
Mansfield Town: Alan Marriott, Kieron Freeman, Ritchie Sutton, Ben Futcher, Luke O'Neil, Lindon Meikle, Adam Murray, Anthony Howell, Nick Hegarty, Matt Green, Ross Dyer.Subs: Shane Redmond, John Thompson, Paul Connor, Paul Bolland, Louis Moult.
Cambridge United: Danny Naisbitt, Kevin Roberts, Josh Coulson, Michael Wylde, Rory McAuley, Harrison Dunk, Rossi Jarvis, Tom Shaw, Ashley Carew, Luke Berry, Michael Gash. Subs: Jonathon Thorpe, Blaine Hudson, Jordan Patrick, Adam Marriott, Ryan Charles.
'If I hide behind this post will anyone notice what I'm wearing?'The first half was much of a muchness at times.
Cambridge went first and had a spell where they created a few half decent chances, particularly from free kicks around the Mansfield box, but none of it amounted to anything ... though Luke Berry did have an effort that cannoned off the post when Michael Gash had set him up with a well measured chip on 15 minutes.
Then the Stags had their turn to be creative in the final third without applying the finishing touches.
New signing Nick Hegarty had the best chance of the half, but with just the keeper to beat he blazed the ball over the crossbar.
Hegarty's previous club was St. Mirren, who he joined from Grimsby Town, but hopefully the switch to a higher standard of football in the BSBP to that he has been used to in the SPL won't be too difficult a transition for the player to make ;-)
Cambridge went first and had a spell where they created a few half decent chances, particularly from free kicks around the Mansfield box, but none of it amounted to anything ... though Luke Berry did have an effort that cannoned off the post when Michael Gash had set him up with a well measured chip on 15 minutes.
Then the Stags had their turn to be creative in the final third without applying the finishing touches.
New signing Nick Hegarty had the best chance of the half, but with just the keeper to beat he blazed the ball over the crossbar.
Hegarty's previous club was St. Mirren, who he joined from Grimsby Town, but hopefully the switch to a higher standard of football in the BSBP to that he has been used to in the SPL won't be too difficult a transition for the player to make ;-)
Though the first half was a bit grim at times, the over reaction of a few outspoken onlookers beggared belief.I came to the conclusion a long time ago (years ago actually), that there is a section of the Field Mill crowd who just turn out to have a damn good moan.
Regardless of how hard the team are trying, or how many chances they're creating, all this very vocal minority want to do is criticise and rant and rave.
The club should give these sort of people a section of their own in the ground, away from the rest of us, because, not to put too fine a point on it, they just bloody annoy everybody else who is there to watch the game.
The majority of Mansfield Town fans are fine ... no honestly! But the club are 'blessed' with more than their fair share of short fused, knee jerk reactionary, pathologically unhinged, terminally angry types, who have lost all sense of proportion and rationale ... if they ever had any in the first place.
The blood pressure of some of the more extreme cases must be off the scale.
The problem with all seater grounds, that don't allow you the right to roam, is that if you are sat within earshot of one (or more) of these cretins, you're stuck with them for the duration.A lot of people ask me, why more often than not, I sit in sections of the ground set aside for the home fans when the Stags are playing away, instead of in the visiting supporters section.
Well ... praise where it's due, those who turn up regularly to follow the club everywhere and anywhere and those who 'sing their hearts out for the lads' at away games are a credit to Mansfield Town, but I could point out at least a dozen reasons for wanting to sit somewhere else and I'm damn sure a lot of other Mansfield fans could identify the same fuck-wits too.
As if having to listen to the 'boo-boy' element wasn't bad enough, at half time the tannoy announcer played a track by that obese, talentless, screechy Adele creature, at a volume that bordered on over the top loudness to the point of vulgarity ... a bit like Adele herself then.I despair at the day the whaling fleet missed Adele with their harpoon arsenal and let her slip through the net, to give gross, sewer mouthed, fat, unattractive women the world over a role model to aspire to ... a bit like the 'lady' who sits a few rows in front of us at Field Mill then ;-)
The Cambridge defence are breached by Matt GreenBut Mansfield's joy was short lived and Harrison Dunk had equalised and then put the visitors in front within seven minutes.
Dunk crusied past two static defenders and smashed home the his first goal across Alan Marriott, his second was the end result of some great work out on the left and some neat passing between Rossi Jarvis and Luke Berry.
The home crowd were stunned.
The 237 noisy fans in the away end were bouncing with joy.
The natives started getting restless ... and as the pressure mounted on the Stags team to force an equaliser, the volume of the insults rose too.The referee, Darren Bond, made a couple of glaring errors that thwarted two attacks for the home side.
That is not me making excuses for the result, I hasten to add.
Mr Bond is only human ... but they were blatant mistakes.
A wave of attacks on the Cambridge goal came to nothing.
On 81 minutes, Ross Dyer headed a close range effort over the bar and the imbecile element in the crowd inwardly rejoiced as they found a new individual to pick on.
Ross Dyer shouldn't take it too personally though, these same people have been getting off on singling out players from their own team to throw abuse at since time began.
There is no logical thought put into their selection process, it is seemingly very random.
But I suppose it would have to be, because people such as this don't understand the concept of the word logic.
Dyer bust a gut to get on the end of that cross, but the fickle few who turned on him, had been busting a gut to find a scapegoat all afternoon and they weren't going to let facts and no small amount of effort on Dyer's part, clear their blurred view of the bigger picture.
They had a new victim now, hook, line and sinker. And I suspect that even if Keiron Dyer had scored a hat trick in the remaining 8 minutes, some of them would still have rubbished it.
Ross Dyer heads over the bar from close range late in the game... and the Field Mill 'boo boys' crawled out of the woodwork
What is the point of paying good money ... and let's make no bones about it, the £18/£15 admission price to watch non league football at Field Mill is bloody expensive ... if your sole purpose for being in the ground, is to rant abuse at the players and management of the team you claim to support from the outset?
If going to football makes you feel so miserable, why don't you just stay at home instead?
Try vidi-printer, ceefax, or twitter rage as an alternative and give the rest of us a break!
The game finished and Cambridge were victorious, by a narrow margin of two goals to one (Luke Berry's injury time third goal for the visitors had been disallowed), despite the Stags throwing everything at Naisbitt's goal in their search for an equaliser.
To quote the live match updates on the CUFC website;
"Mansfield are putting the U's under some intense pressure now and win a corner, which is cleared away. Can we hold on?"
Try vidi-printer, ceefax, or twitter rage as an alternative and give the rest of us a break!
The game finished and Cambridge were victorious, by a narrow margin of two goals to one (Luke Berry's injury time third goal for the visitors had been disallowed), despite the Stags throwing everything at Naisbitt's goal in their search for an equaliser.
To quote the live match updates on the CUFC website;
"Mansfield are putting the U's under some intense pressure now and win a corner, which is cleared away. Can we hold on?"
The answer to that is, yes, they bloody well could!
The visiting fans, who had been singing all afternoon and deserve a lot of praise for their vocal backing, celebrated, whilst the aforementioned angry minority vented their spleen on the Stags players and management as they left the pitch.
Dyer, inevitably and, unbelievably, even Paul Cox were singled out for some of the more over the top outbursts.
What kind of red mist gets inside the psyche of a middle aged man, to make him to race down to the touch line from his seat, openly seeking an angry confrontation with the manager of a football team, who has just seen his side lose a match, unluckily, against a team who are third in the league table?
Cambridge United had it easy today, they only had 11 players to beat.
Mansfield Town by comparison, were up against a resilient visiting team, a referee who missed a clear handball in the penalty area and awarded Cambridge a goal kick when their centre half headed the ball over his own bar ... and had an angry mob of their own so called fans to win over too.
Field Mill, 5th November 2011, not exactly the most enjoyable afternoon I've ever spent watching football.
I really would consider watching Stags games from the away end at Field Mill in future to avoid being in the close proximity of certain people, if the stewards down there were such a miserable bunch of heavy handed kill joys.
I can handle defeat, just about, if the team I support have been putting the effort in ... and they certainly did today.
But, I'm getting increasingly fed up of some of the mouthy imbeciles who attach themselves to Mansfield Town, who genuinely seem to hate the team they claim to support at times and who let their anger manifest itself in such a bizarre, OTT and very public way.
They have no class and no brains.
Surely after all the football club as endured over the last few years, a worrying time when the Stags came very close to going out of existence altogether, it's time for everyone to be singing from the same hymn sheet and pulling in the same direction ... alas, a grossly stupid, but very noisy element, the enemy within, can't understand that.
But hey! Don't let the facts get in the way of a good tantrum :-(
Lets hope the angry minority don't put people off attending games at Field Mill, although, maybe that would serve to starve them of the audience such attention seeking head cases crave.
Oh well ... onwards and upwards, bad day at the office n' all that ... and the Stags have a blank Saturday next week because of all the players they've got away on international duty (or something like that) to work on a few things before their next BSBP game.
NEXT UP - A variety of 11th hour decisions over the week, England v Spain at Wembley on Saturday.
The visiting fans, who had been singing all afternoon and deserve a lot of praise for their vocal backing, celebrated, whilst the aforementioned angry minority vented their spleen on the Stags players and management as they left the pitch.Dyer, inevitably and, unbelievably, even Paul Cox were singled out for some of the more over the top outbursts.
What kind of red mist gets inside the psyche of a middle aged man, to make him to race down to the touch line from his seat, openly seeking an angry confrontation with the manager of a football team, who has just seen his side lose a match, unluckily, against a team who are third in the league table?
Cambridge United had it easy today, they only had 11 players to beat.
Mansfield Town by comparison, were up against a resilient visiting team, a referee who missed a clear handball in the penalty area and awarded Cambridge a goal kick when their centre half headed the ball over his own bar ... and had an angry mob of their own so called fans to win over too.
Field Mill, 5th November 2011, not exactly the most enjoyable afternoon I've ever spent watching football.I really would consider watching Stags games from the away end at Field Mill in future to avoid being in the close proximity of certain people, if the stewards down there were such a miserable bunch of heavy handed kill joys.
I can handle defeat, just about, if the team I support have been putting the effort in ... and they certainly did today.
But, I'm getting increasingly fed up of some of the mouthy imbeciles who attach themselves to Mansfield Town, who genuinely seem to hate the team they claim to support at times and who let their anger manifest itself in such a bizarre, OTT and very public way.
They have no class and no brains.
Surely after all the football club as endured over the last few years, a worrying time when the Stags came very close to going out of existence altogether, it's time for everyone to be singing from the same hymn sheet and pulling in the same direction ... alas, a grossly stupid, but very noisy element, the enemy within, can't understand that.But hey! Don't let the facts get in the way of a good tantrum :-(
Lets hope the angry minority don't put people off attending games at Field Mill, although, maybe that would serve to starve them of the audience such attention seeking head cases crave.
Oh well ... onwards and upwards, bad day at the office n' all that ... and the Stags have a blank Saturday next week because of all the players they've got away on international duty (or something like that) to work on a few things before their next BSBP game.
NEXT UP - A variety of 11th hour decisions over the week, England v Spain at Wembley on Saturday.
