How many grounds?

[BeeArmy]

Took this from the non league forum. How many grounds have you visited to watch a game?

I have been to 46 grounds in total (43 of which to watch Barnet). Yeovil this weekend will take it up to 47. I am hoping to get well over 50 by the end of the season.

 

[Richard Cranium]

Not sure in total but only need to do Orient in this league now. Added Yeovil and Barnet so far this season and Wednesday in the cup.

Worked out in the Summer bar Field Mill the ground I've been to most is Cambridge, We play them again in 2 weeks too!

 

[E10rifle]

Two. I don't really like attending matches, but I went to Wembley for the recent playoff final because I got a corporate freebie, and Oxford in '06 because I wanted to masturbate in public at the sight of a team getting relegated to the Conference. One day I hope to get to Brisbane Road, but I can't really be bothered until we get to the Premier League.

 

[The Terminator]

I am up to 147 home and abroad now.

If all goes well, come the end of the season of the current 92 all I'd need would be: WBA, Stoke, Derby, Birmingham, Burton, Cardiff (Did Ninian Park though), Middlesborough, Sunderland, Wigan & Brighton (Did the Withdean a wapping 9 times) to do. I am hoping England get a friendly at Sunderland in May which is looking likely.

 

[Dalendless Shid]

The brilliant Doingthe92 website tells me I'm currently at 218.

More importantly, 90 of the current 92, just York and Accrington left to go!

 

[Wombling Kiwi]

This may come as a surprise, but my total is....................... ONE Kingsmeadow last year......... I have been to 4 A-League grounds around NZ and Australia.

 

[Sestonpoolie]

I've done 54.Fuck knows how many times to places like Bury,Rochdale & Bradford.
Also 8 in The National League & Boston,Stockport in Northern Prem.

 

[Habbinalan]

Last season was a good one for non-U's matches and I finally got my total up to more grounds than years in my life. There are only a few opportunities to add to the total this season but Plymouth on Saturday will take me up to 67 - which will be just 32 of the current 92.

Lifted from my http://www.footballgroundmap.com entry:


First Game
Difficult to be sure. Probably Barrow 1 - 1 Stockport County on 20 August 1966.

World Cup helped switch my allegiance from the oval ball - although I was soon to be playing Rugby League for Askam. That was my first proper Holker Street season - with my first season ticket and Vol 1 No 1 of the Zigger in September 1967.

I do still have my programme for Northern TV Stars XI v Barrow RL XI from 8 March 1964 at Craven Park. No idea of the score but Barrow team had Jimmy Lewthwaite (captain), Frank Castle and Danny Leatherbarrow - my heroes at the time (age 11). TV team included Brian Blessed, Stan Stennet and "Diddy" David Hamilton.

Best Game
Cambridge United 2 - 1 Gateshead Conference Play-off Final 2014. Nothing touches it.

Worst Game
There have been many.

Could be Cambridge United 0 - 2 Torquay Utd Conference Play-off Final 2009 or various surreal Herve Renard managed matches at the Abbey in 2004/5. but the pits was Reading 1 - 0 Barrow on 22 January 1972. An adventure filled first year at Reading University saw my last Barrow match for decades. With Bobby Noble at the heart of a 10 man Barrow defence, they were awful.

Best Ground
Goodison Park - home to Everton

Knowledgeable fans, lots of banter, great atmosphere (if a little quiet at times). Old fashioned ground in old fashioned location. Chips and curry sauce outside and pies inside also come up to scratch.

Worst Ground
Cressing Road (Amlin Stadium) - home to Braintree Town, Braintree Town Reserves

Epitomises the worst of the worst in Conference Football. The ground that most U's would least like to return to - especially as it was often our Boxing Day/New Year fixture.

 

[Tom_CUFC]

179 including 30 overseas, 72 of the 92, which is a damning indictment of how long we were in non-league for...(and what a sad little life I lead)

 

[Meadow]

50 or so, about 2/3 non league.

 

[Moomin]

I've done exactly 40 of the current 92 and I've also done 13 teams' old grounds including Highbury, Ninian Park, the Goldstone Ground etc.

In addition to those I've been to a number of non league grounds past and present such as the McCain Stadium, Feethams, Edgar Street and of course Plainmoor.

I think my favourite current ground has to be Hillsborough. Made so much better by seeing Troy Archibald-Henville run from inside his own half to score a 90th minute winner and then for seconds later to see manager Paul Tisdale come on as a sub. Utter piss-take.

The best ground that's no longer with us was Stoke's Victoria Ground. My god that home end was amazing. Such a shame so many quality grounds have been demolished.

 

[djs]

78 of the current 92.
25 previous grounds of the current 92.
a couple of hundred or so non league grounds.

I've seen Luton play on 114 different grounds (plus 1 for reserves, and 1 for youth!), 68 of which are of the current 92.

 

[Sestonpoolie]

The best ground that's no longer with us was Stoke's Victoria Ground. My god that home end was amazing. Such a shame so many quality grounds have been demolished.

Was indeed.There was 18,000 when they could have sealed the championship & we beat them 1-0.
Great atmosphere'
The side terrace at Huddersfield's Leeds Road was huge.

 

[HertsCobbler]

http://www.ninetytwoclub.org.uk/

This has the proper rules. So if I read it say Grimsby are promoted back to the Football League - I have to revisit it?!
As I read it friendlies do not count therefore I have to write off Arsenal for the Emirates Cup and Norwich v Cobblers as a friendly?

 

[AtaturkOzgutson]

I make it 30 of the 92.

Having spent a decade in the Conference, you can probably double that with places I've visited with U's that never made it to the league.

Cressing Road (Amlin Stadium) - home to Braintree Town, Braintree Town Reserves

Epitomises the worst of the worst in Conference Football. The ground that most U's would least like to return to - especially as it was often our Boxing Day/New Year fixture.

It's bad, but it's not Southport, Stafford Rangers, Histon, Canvey Island or....well, I could go on. At least Braintree is only an hour away!

 

[Vanni]

http://www.ninetytwoclub.org.uk/

This has the proper rules. So if I read it say Grimsby are promoted back to the Football League - I have to revisit it?!
As I read it friendlies do not count therefore I have to write off Arsenal for the Emirates Cup and Norwich v Cobblers as a friendly?

Yep, it's a bit silly I think. It would be understandable if Grimsby are playing in a new ground, but I don't see why it doesn't count when they haven't.

 

[Vanni]

179 including 30 overseas, 72 of the 92, which is a damning indictment of how long we were in non-league for...(and what a sad little life I lead)

Hey, 30 overseas grounds is very impressive Tom. Which foreign stadium did you like the most? And the worst one?

 

[eric read]

Two. I don't really like attending matches, but I went to Wembley for the recent playoff final because I got a corporate freebie, and Oxford in '06 because I wanted to masturbate in public at the sight of a team getting relegated to the Conference. One day I hope to get to Brisbane Road, but I can't really be bothered until we get to the Premier League.

You really are a wanker.

 

[Tom_CUFC]

Hey, 30 overseas grounds is very impressive Tom. Which foreign stadium did you like the most? And the worst one?

Depends how you interpret best and worst, in terms of the pure stadium then it's Dortmund (dull choice I know but it lives up to the hype), from an atmospheric perspective there's plenty for different reasons, though the best atmosphere I've been in was the Vienna derby at Rapid's (now old) stadium. Worst aesthetically was Admira Wacker, but all round was probably Villarreal the other week, soulless home support and we couldn't see the goal in front of us (although that was partly because of the ultras' banners),

Will have another one to add to the list in February provided Rapid Vienna don't get Dortmund (been) or Shakhtar (fuck that) in the next round of the Europa League.

 

[Glasshalffullpools]

I agree with Seston regarding Huddersfields side terrace ....you could easily imagine that being rammed in the 50s ......interesting that the new ground which is built about 6 feet further up the road has retained the large single side stand , albeit all seated

 

[E10rifle]

You really are a wanker.

Not much choice about that old bean, living as I do with mater and my receding, lank, greasy hair being somewhat offputting for the laydeez (even the nerdy teenage ones I spend all my days trying to chat up whilst we play COD online).

 

[Look Out There Are Llamas]

The brilliant Doingthe92 website tells me I'm currently at 218.

More importantly, 90 of the current 92, just York and Accrington left to go!

Does this include Denham Ladies?

 

[oakroader]

been to barcelona's camp nou stadium...
as you walk up to it you wonder what all the fuss is about?
how can it hold so many people?
when you get inside,climb a couple of flight of stairs......
boom!!!!
the pitch is about half a mile below you .

 

[BigDaveCUFC]

I never add these up anymore as a lot of the grounds I've been to are either gone or updated.

but I must say I do miss some of them grounds like Feethams and the McCain, good proper Lower League Grounds.

 

[JSMITH083]

my footballgroundmap has me at 49 at the moment, QPR set to become my 50th on Tuesday evening.
The ones I've visited not in the 92;

Darlington Arena
Stafford Rangers
Tranmere (who were when I went last year)
Kidderminster
Gateshead

and Highfield Road of Coventry as my only ground now not in existence.

And then out of the country;

Signal Iduna Park (Dortmund)
Vicente Calderon (Atletico)
Amsterdam Arena (Ajax)Hoping to get a few more of the London (ish) ones ticked off in my last uni year down here- the likes of Brentford, Barnet, Bromley, Crystal Palace and Colchester definitely being looked at.

 

[JSMITH083]

Does this include Denham Ladies?

Do ours either this season or next, we should be moving after next season and you'll miss what is a genuinely good away day if you don't get to visit BC

 

[Habbinalan]

I make it 30 of the 92.

Having spent a decade in the Conference, you can probably double that with places I've visited with U's that never made it to the league.



It's bad, but it's not Southport, Stafford Rangers, Histon, Canvey Island or....well, I could go on. At least Braintree is only an hour away!

Braintree gets the vote as worst for the "stands," the setting, the pubs, the football, the memories, the results, the Christmas fixtures and in particular the Quag End -

I've always enjoyed Southport as it's on the way home to see Dad, perfect for a double header at somewhere like Goodison Park or the JJB, a good night out and I quite like the ground (decent pitch - especially now Everton groundstaff look after it). Also, I have happy memories of playing them as a league club.

Stafford is a distant memory. It was where I first saw a buzzard from the terrace and the weather was nice the couple of times we played there - but it is the pits and I'm glad we're unlikely to go again.

I'm happy with Histon as a ground. I used to enjoy popping down to see a few City home matches there and, further back, joining the away fans for Histon's matches with teams like Workington, Durham, etc. when they didn't clash with U's fixtures.

I never stood on the legendary Canvey terrace but it offers a chance to sample the whelks and you can't put the home of the Feelgoods down as the worst.

 

[Vanni]

Depends how you interpret best and worst, in terms of the pure stadium then it's Dortmund (dull choice I know but it lives up to the hype), from an atmospheric perspective there's plenty for different reasons, though the best atmosphere I've been in was the Vienna derby at Rapid's (now old) stadium. Worst aesthetically was Admira Wacker, but all round was probably Villarreal the other week, soulless home support and we couldn't see the goal in front of us (although that was partly because of the ultras' banners),

Will have another one to add to the list in February provided Rapid Vienna don't get Dortmund (been) or Shakhtar (fuck that) in the next round of the Europa League.

Then you have the same interpretation of best/worst as I have, as you have Dortmund (nice ground, electric atmosphere) as best and Villareal (very quiet support and a nothing special ground) as worst. But, tbf,Villareal like to claim that they are a very friendly family club, and there's nothing wrong with that, but the downside is that we all know that families don't generate a lot of noise and support.

I googled Admira Wacker's ground and it doesn't look that bad. For proper ugly grounds I refer you to most of the football grounds in Italy and other Med. countries like Greece. Sure, the big sides like Milan, Juventus and nearly all of the other Serie A sides have decent enough grounds, although they are mostly uncovered, but the Second and Third Division sides have awful grounds. You know the type; concrete seating, dilapidated stands, poor facilities all round. To make things worse, these sides aren't well supported and look silly playing in front of a few hundreds in 20,000 seater grounds.

 

[AtaturkOzgutson]

^ The problem is judging the Nou Camp or San Siro by our standards. They're both incredibly drab stadiums, with poor facilities, that need big overhauls (well, Milan look like pensioning off their european elite status for something small, but that's beside the point) despite being visually impressive otherwise.

As for Braintree, the Orange Tree was a great pub, you could park there and walk 2 mins to the ground! Although, Histon as an experience obviously was quite skewed by the fact it's part of our own city. I still can't forgive Baldwin instructing our fans with tickets to be locked out.

Every time I went there for any other reason, it was more than adequate. Odious club at the time, which doesn't help, but Histon/Impington remains one of my favourite parts of Greater Cambridge.

Southport was an open terrace on a grim Tuesday, we lost, and there was no double header, just a 250 mile journey home. Stafford had four different obstructions to the view (roof pillars, end fences, camera gantry and floodlights), and was one of the places, along with Hayes, where it felt like the away fans were the only ones to even be there.

*shrug* Horses for courses. I imagine there will be a time when I pine for shitty non-league grounds where you can do what you please. But not yet.

 

[Murphy]

44/92 for me, including five in the PL which I'm quite surprised at! In League Two I'm only missing Yeovil, County, Newport and Luton of the current crop, with Wimbledon my most visited to date - seen us play five times there. Aside from that, also been to Accrington three times which obviously stands as a personal highlight.

Been to Roots Hall five times as well for my sins.