Mavericks & Mullets; or, how I learned to forget about the cold and focus on the football instead.

Baby it's cold outside, but at least there was no doubt on this occasion that my chosen match would actually take place.

As I leave the house and feel the cold air on my face, I take an executive decision to run back inside and throw on another layer. Good decision, Ian, because this is the first properly cold weekend of the season. When the clouds clear at this time of year the temperature plummets downwards as the cold air rushes in unencumbered from the sea.

I'd even got my flask out that morning, but the array of potential hot drinks at my disposal wasn't especially impressive, to the point that I wondered whether I could get away with taking a flask of gravy in with me. Somebody on Twitter even pointed out that, with Christmas just round the corner and a Toby Carvery barely a couple of hundred yards from the ground, I could stop off on the way through and get some pigs in blankets to drop in it. Festive, warming, and creative.

I decide to leave the flask at home in the end.

Worthing United are Worthing's 'other' team. They're probably best known, sadly, for tragedy. Two of their players were driving along the Shoreham bypass on their way to a match in August 2015 when a plane crashed into the road, killing them both, along with nine others. The pilot survived, and despite the fact that the court in his trial hearing that he had a "cavalier attitude" to safety and played "fast and loose" with the rules, he was acquitted of manslaughter in 2019. Nevertheless, last year the coroner ruled that the eleven had been unlawfully killed, describing Hill's flying as "exceptionally bad" and the airshow's safety plan as "not fit for purpose".

The airshow hasn't been held since. It was part of life round here, to see old planes buzzing around in the days and weeks building up to it at the end of August. I remember being at an FA Cup match between Shoreham and Kingstonian in about 2008 and seeing a Lancaster Bomber pass no more than a couple of hundred feet over the ground, low enough for me to be able to clearly read the lettering on its underside. I remember thinking at the time that it didn't seem safe, for these very old planes to circling around so low over a built-up area. I don't take any pleasure in having been proved right about that.

I still remember the first game after that crash. They had more than a thousand people turn up for an FA Vase match against East Preston which was put back to a Sunday afternoon and had to be made all-ticket. There was a memorial before the game and then two minute's silence, but the silence continued after the referee blew for kick-off, only really finishing when their opponents took the lead and the shouts from around the pitch started to grow, as if something had to happen in order to start to wake everyone up from this living nightmare and get the team playing football again. They came back to win 2-1. Eight years on, the whole incident still hangs heavily over the club. The stand is named for the players who were killed, and a little memorial garden sits at the bottom the steps from the changing rooms and bar.

After several weeks during which Saturday mornings have been greeted with such ominous messages as “GAME OFF” and “MATCH POSTPONED” trending on social media, on this occasion that sense of foreboding had been replaced in the trending charts by the somewhat jollier “£10 ADULTS”. I wasn’t even going to be paying that much. Down at this level of the game, the sixth step of the non-league game and ten full divisions from the Premier League, it’s only six quid to get win, and the programme comes free of charge, the sort of public service that you half-feel should be government subsidised.

But that programme is worth the cost of admission alone, including a list of number ones On This Day from which that of Gary Glitter hasn’t been removed (I wonder how many other football programmes this season have mentioned him), a "What's the connection" page of pictures of people all called Adam except for Robin out of the TV version of Batman (played by Burt Ward rather than Adam West, who I presume is who they were thinking of when they compiled these pictures together in the first place), a description of Xabi Alonso as a “handsome devil” (no dispute here), Dominic Cummings as a “political advisor with poor eyesight” (I could think of other things I could call him, but again no dispute here), and a mention that today is also the 79th birthday of Beverly 'Bev' Bevan, former drummer with The Move and ELO. Happy birthday, Bev. Happy Bevday. This, I make a mental note to myself, is how you write a football programme.

Whereas most of my matches this season have had some degree of an element of adventure about them, this journey does not. I’ve walked these streets before. It’s a half hour walk from my house near the seafront to Lyons Way, and it’s a walk of little distinction which involves crossing the dual-carriageway Upper Brighton Road and weaving your way through Sainsbury's car park. Ah, so this is what it feels like to support Reading.

The top half of the SFCL Division One is a bit congested, and with games in hand both teams could still consider themselves to be in the mix. A mixture of postponements due to the weather and the increasingly intrusive nature of cup competitions throughout the first couple of months of the season have left the league table looking somewhat lopsided. Worthing United are just above Arundel in the top half, and both have games in hand on the teams above them. It’s also worth briefly mentioning that non-league nicknames are the best of all nicknames; this particular match is the Mavericks vs the Mullets.

And sure enough, there’s nothing between these two teams. Both have chances, but it does occasionally feel a little like they’re primarily concerned with taking it in turns to kick lumps out of each other. But the refereeing at this level is more patient than at higher levels, so only a handful of yellow cards are given out, despite the increasingly desperate sounding squawks of anger coming from both dugouts.

I both like and dislike Lyons Way, too. It does afford some lovely views of the South Downs (two horses stand on the hill up behind the dugouts, occasionally looking up from their grazing), and I really like the fact that the main stairway up to the pitch is a combined players and fans entrance, meaning that walking up makes it feel like you might be going out to play yourself.

But like a few other grounds at this level it's three-sided, with one end a nettle-infested grass bank that's completely closed off to the public, while the somewhat elevated position of the ground is less than ideal on a cold day, especially if you choose to sit in the breeze-block, plastic and tin stand, where any breeze blows straight through you, chilling you to the bones.

But while the crowd may be small (at the time of writing no figure has been confirmed, but it’s doubtful that it was much greater than 100), it’s certain rambunctious, with the feeling that some in attendance may have been in the clubhouse (or an alternative nearby hostelry) for an hour or two before the game. There’s plenty of shouting at the players, and a little of the players giving it some back, but it’s all in good humour and you get the feeling that everybody round here knows everybody else. It feels intimate and homely when you’re among the crowd yourself.

Both have chances and half-chances, but there are no goals. I can’t remember the last time I went to a goalless draw. The date of my last one is definitely something to be measured in years rather than weeks. During the second half, I flick through the two teams’ results for the season and establish that the only goalless draw that either has played this season was… against each other, at the start of August. As the clock ticks past five—there were delays in both halves—it feels as though my streak without a 0-0 draw is going to come to an end, but three minutes into stoppage-time Arundel swing a corner from the right which is headed into the roof of the goal, and they snatch all three points.

In Sainsbury’s, an older woman looks at me the manner that you might someone who you think may be about to commit armed robbery but who hasn’t given any indication that they’re in possession of a gun yet. Small wonder, really. I have four top layers on, two of which have hoods, and I’m cursing the coldness under my breath.

“Go and stand by the rotisserie chickens if you want to warm up”, she offers, once she’s persuaded herself that I’m not going to pull on a balaclava helmet and tell everyone to ‘get on the floor’. I end up buying the constituent ingredients of a carvery that I don’t already have at home. And yes, yes it does include pigs in blankets.

By the time I get back I’m glad I went, although my extremities may be forgiven having a somewhat different opinion (mental note: ask for gloves for Christmas). Forgetting to turn the heating off before I left means that I’m hit by a blast of hot air as I open the front door from our central heating (which has two positions; ‘off’ and ‘indoor Amazon rainforest during midsummer simulator’), defrosting me in seconds. The cost of this moment of forgetfulness might even have cost me more than the cost of getting into the football and a programme. Whether this is down to my brain being addled by the cold or the two pints of beer I sank rather too quickly, I’ll leave to your imaginations.

Next time, Toby. Next time.