Why not make a weekend of….Hereford

Serving Suggestion: Use the Oxford United Fixture list as a touring itinerary of our amazing country and..

So bad, it’s GOOD:

Virtual tour of the town: http://www.visitherefordshire.co.uk/tours/hereford/hereford.htm

Things to do and see: Highlights are listed below:   

• Hereford Cathedral – One of England’s finest Norman Cathedrals
• Sufton Court –  Explore the park and grounds of this Palladian mansion
• Mappa Mundi Exhibition – See the world famous medieval map of the world
• Cider Museum and King Offa Distillery– A museum to Cider making, you can sample the stuff too
• Forest of Dean – It has trees and other vegetation, possibly some animals too
• Crazy golf – At “Adventure golf” –  TGS bowling: http://www.tgsbowling.co.uk/adventure.htm
• Ross on Wye – Half an hour down the A49 is the beautiful town of Ross-On-Wye.  There is lot’s to see here and some great walks
• Amazing Hedge Puzzle – It’s at Ross.  Allow plenty of time, best not to get lost in a maze before the game

A searchable list with links to most of the places above (and many more) can be found here:

http://www.visitherefordshire.co.uk/thedms.asp?dms=10&groupid=2&param1=1

Looking for somewhere to stay?:

http://www.tripadvisor.com/Tourism-g186302-Hereford_Herefordshire_England-Vacations.html

NB: I happen to know that the Premier Inn is full for the weekend so don’t bother

Looking for something nice to eat:

http://www.toptable.com/venues/?l=2215

 I want pubs near the ground: 

http://awaydays-client.salgo.net/away-ground-guide.html#hereford-united

 How do I get to the ground?: 

http://www.herefordunited.co.uk/page/Directions/0,,10835,00.html

 I want to go on the train: 

 http://ojp.nationalrail.co.uk/en/s/timetable/times

NB: The 9:21 and 11:21 from Oxford Station goes direct to Hereford (no changes) and arrive 2 hours 20 mins later.  The ground is walking distance from the station:

 Come out of the station and turn left and down the road towards the Safeway supermarket. Cut through the Safeway car park (heading left) and follow the pedestrian walkway out of the store out onto Commercial Road. Go left down Commercial Road, where you will pass the Merton Hotel on your right and a Wetherspoons pub on your left. At the top of the road at the traffic lights, turn right (against the direction of the traffic) into Blueschool Street. Keep walking along here until you come to a set of lights and a multi storey car park opposite and to the right (this is Widemarsh Street). Cross over and bear slightly right and cut up a walkway between the car park and Garrick House (council offices) where you come into a car park (if you head left you will find the Newmarket Pub) head right and walk out the car park. Turn left and you can’t miss the ground, it’s on your right.

 History and stuff:

 If “Oxford” means the ford where the Oxen cross, then presumably Hereford is the part of a river where the “Here” cross.  “Here”, in Saxon meaning army.  Unsurprisingly then, Hereford has seen a lot of military action with the Welsh (and even the Danish) having a go at various points throughout early history.

Hereford is famous for being the home of the “Map of Munters” which was a medieval map showing where the ugliest folk of the known world reside.   Apparently, Swindon was on it.

More recently the towns of Hereford and Worcester merged to become one massive building society, providing employment to those that had otherwise been employed in the wool trade.

As a reward for reading this far, I suggest you go to YouTube and type in Hereford Rap – click on this: “Rford n B hereford rap hereford song”.  It’s very educational but is only for a mature audience – do not do this if you are under 18.

What’s missing from this guide?: Add your comments below! 

SEE U’s THERE!

Score one and Morecambe

It was always going to be like that.  We knew that the team  performances deserved more points and today the first win came in style.  On the support side of things (which I’m more qualified to talk about) we did enough. 

Special mention must go to @SwissYellow and @YellowBeanz for their flag action, which can be witnessed in the video:

A little rant about children’s attendance at matches:

There’s been some talk in the week on the Yellows Forum about children at matches and swearing in the crowd.  I can see both sides of this.  As a parent I like to take my son to football, it’s always been a dream and you can’t really explain the pride you get in seeing your own off-spring in  a yellow shirt.  When I take him, I try to protect him from the bad language, but truth be said; it’s a football game, and he’s never going to escape it completely.  We talk about it and he’s cool, he certainly never uses the words he hears at home.

Today, however, was a different kettle of fish because said lad did not come.   After two pints in the Priory (MAN that was good, my first time and I hope not the last) I was up for a good old-school shout in the stands.  This is where I feel empathy for those that are not happy with children around them.  Football is, and always has been my outlet.  Most people who know me, know I’m a pretty laid back sort of person.  If football didn’t exist, then that may not be the case – football is my release. 

Referee’s play a VITAL role in the community.  It’s nothing to do with how they direct a match, but how they are an actual living person that it’s officially OK to shout and scream at.  Sort of, please visit:  http://www.thefa.com/RESPECT

When it comes to children at matches it really comes down to the parents responsibility – if you don’t want them to hear the language take them to another part of the stand or ground where it’s less likely.  [OK, climb down off soap box and pack it away.]  Thanks for listening.

Coming soon……… “Why not make a weekend of………Hereford”

How NOT to support

Well holiday’s are over and like the renegade master I am quite literally “back once again”.

Over this short break I reflected on the season so far, and on the whole (having missed Accrington and Aldershot) I have an overwhelming feeling of pride, especially in the fans and our magnificent support.  However, not everybody ‘supports’ in the same way.  On casting my mind back to the first game against Burton I recall hearing this: “You’re *****ing useless [player’s name]. I don’t care what you say.”

The comment was shouted (in my ear) by a fan behind me at a player who I have decided to leave unnamed.  This response was caused by the aforementioned player losing control of the ball on the line, and conceding a throw in.

The fan is NOT pictured!

 Now, the guy who shouted, clearly cared about the outcome of the match. He had travelled a considerable distance at great expense to watch his team – he is clearly a ‘fan’ and a ‘follower’ of Oxford United. However, at that precise moment could you really call him a supporter? His statement was in no way ‘supportive’, and I should add that the player in question could not in any way be described as useless either in performance with our club, or that particular game.

 During the course of work I have made many mistakes, it is part and process of learning, and how we gain experience. Not once can I remember any of my managers or colleagues after such an event screaming at me, “You’re ****ing useless Walker, I don’t care what you say”. So, I don’t know what it would feel like, but I can guess.  I guess it feels like I do in that dream where everybody is standing around me in a circle, pointing and laughing while I stand there not wearing a stitch of clothing.

 I think I would feel defensive, insecure, and maybe lose confidence in myself. Is that how we want our players to feel? On the other hand I guess you might also feel defiant; “Useless am I? Watch this”. Maybe that’s what said fan had in mind. However, I think on balance the statement, if heard, would have more of a negative affect than positive.

The most interesting part of what he said though, is the second sentence. “I don’t care what you say”. It was actually almost not another sentence.  In fact the way it was said, if written properly, would have no punctuation. It was almost as if he ends EVERY sentence like that. “I’m going down the pub I don’t care what you say”, “We’re not watching X Factor I don’t care what you say”, “The scent of the freesia is by far superior to the scent of the common rose I don’t care what you say”. What I’m getting at here, is that the statement came out too easily, as if he is always having to defend what he says. He doesn’t “care what you say”, because, in most cases (from his experience) you are very likely to disagree with him.

Nope, he's not in this picture either

 I appreciate that I may be coming across as a bit holier than thou on this. I have no problem at all with him airing his opinion, but I think he should be educated to the effect that his statements may have on the outcome of a match. We all know that there are players that need to be encouraged, whose heads go down a bit too easily. Sometimes you feel, that one clumsy statement like this could be the tipping point for a player to lose motivation, and when you only have 11 on the pitch, that’s significant.

 So what would I suggest to the man in question? Keep your passion, but channel it differently. Think before you speak, encourage instead of berating. A better, supportive, thing to have said in this instance would have been “Unlucky [players name] ”. If we all pull together like this, especially in adversity, and SUPPORT the players rather than berate them, then that could make a hell of a difference. I’m sure that’s what the team would want from it’s 12th man.  I don’t care what you say.

Blog Holiday

Thanks for visiting, but this blog is currently on holiday.

We all have to go sometime, and your resident blogger chose Accrington as the game to miss.  Normal service resumes with Morecambe, and coming soon…. “Why not make a weekend of….Hereford”

If YOU are going to the seaside why not draw a massive sand ox.  Find out how in the post “How to draw an Ox”.

Of West Ham and the 12th Man

It’s 10:45 and we’re still on the Tube when my I-Phone finally connects to the Twitter servers. It says I have ninety new tweets. With a swipe of my thumb I see them all scrolling past. Two words are trending: “gutted” and “proud”.  My hands are still sore from the very firm hand shake of the last West Ham fan (of many) who felt compelled to tell me how great our support was and how unlucky we were.

 Chatter on the tube is lethargic in nature, most U’s fans were exhausted. With the exception of half time, I’d been on my feet for five hours. When at last a tube seat presented itself I looked back at the video footage from the game. We were, again, magnificent. The 12th Man thing is well publicised in terms of how the fan base have raised money for the club and players, but the greater focus of what being the “12th Man” ACTUALLY means on the terraces, is sometimes forgotten. Last night we raised the bar again. If only we could replicate this sort of passion in our own ground….

Excellent Support from the Oxford Fans at Wycombe

I was told it was customary for visiting supporters to visit the White Horse before the game at Wycombe, so here’s some pictures from there:

Now to the game and a quote from Oxford defender Harry Worley on our support: “The fans were 10/10 again, unreal, thanks for your support”.  It’s true that we, the fans, gave our best performance of the season to date.  We raised the volume and sang from start to finish.  The usual scores on the doors are below:

 

This is the welcome the fans gave the players when they came out, perhaps you might even see yourself:

Here’s a bit of in match support.  Greetings from the folk of Oxfordshire:

And here’s one of the many missed chances.  On balance I think Oxford probably deserved the win, hitting the woodwork twice and being denied many times by Wycombe’s keeper who had the game of his life.  Our performances on the pitch continue to improve and our first league win can not be far away:

That’s all for now.  See you all in East London on Tuesday!  Cor blimey guvnor, let’s all have a knees up.

How To Draw an Ox

I believe we have one of the best football badges in the country. It meets all the criteria of being distinctive, inspiring and most importantly; easy to draw.

The central Ox figure was in fact designed for this very purpose. In 1979 Desmond Morris created the Ox basing it on a Greek Mycenaean bull design, paying close attention to how it could be easily recreated. This has led to generation after generation drawing it on their lunch boxes, pencil cases or any empty space.

 A couple of years ago I did a piece in the match day programme on how to draw an Ox, but now with the enablement of technology let’s take it to the next level and with the help of Chris Wilder himself, I present a video tutorial on “How to Draw an Oxford United Ox”:

Our home return to the football league – vs Bury

I wrote after the Burton game that it didn’t feel like we were back in the football league.  Well now it does.

[Content advisory: May contain personal opinion on performance of the team]

We played well yesterday and in the words of @yellowtim if we play like that every week, we’ll win more than we lose.  In the conference I reckon you’d probably win them all, but the margins are now that much finer.  A single missed opportunity, or a drive to push on and get a winner, could be the difference to winning and losing.  Here’s the scenes as the players took to the field, taken from the fence end of the South Stand for a change:

This brings me on nicely, to to my regular “rate the fans” section, which may be seen as controversial.  You are always welcome to comment on my scores if you disagree, by using the comments link below this post.  Overall, I do not think we gave the team the home return to the football league that they should have.  There was nothing wrong with the attendance, but it’s the volume of noise that always seems to let us down at home.

That’s all for now, check back in mid-week for some new blog action and in a weeks time for thoughts and pictures from Wycombe.  There will not  be a “Why not make a weekend of….” blog post for Wycombe for obvious reasons.  COYY.

It’s West Ham in the Carling

Oxford United draw the happy hammers in the league cup. Week commencing 23rd

Gas leak causes U’s explosion in the Oxford area

What a night to open our home campaign!  6 – 1 against Bristol Rovers, a team from a higher league.  Moments like this don’t come along very often so enjoy.  My rating of our performance (the fans) as ever is below.  Along with a couple of new videos:

We had some goals to celebrate – here’s how we reacted to number 5:

Next up, league action with Bury….