A train to Hitchin, a rail replacement coach to Luton and a rapid bus ride along the excellent Busway made for a very early arrival at
Episode 11
Sunday 4th December 2022
FA Vase Round 3
Dunstable Town 2 v 3 Tring Athletic
Elliott Mayer; Marc Rister, Jake Bloom
Fortunately the turnstile and the small bar were already in operation at 13.00.
Mr Mayer had been the referee for a match at Biggleswade United which never got under way, the goalkeeper collapsing during the warm-up (fortunately recovering in hospital overnight.) On that occasion it was a tall, fairly mature member of the officials who seemed to be in charge. Clearly he must have been an assistant, as Mr Mayer turned out to be young, short and bearded. On a very cold afternoon, his choice of short sleeves cast doubts on his sanity, but encouraged him to move very rapidly about the pitch. AR2, addressed by the referee at one stage as Jack, went with pretend long sleeves (as detailed by Ref Watcher elsewhere) and black gloves, while wearing his socks Denton style. Mr R15TER went with the sleeves and gloves, but appeared to have commandeered his girlfriend's tights. He might get away with it in Bedfordshire, but there are places where that garment might not "have such kindly judgement given" - Frickley or Maltby, for example.
The Dunstable number 6 made an early bid to take over Mr Mayer's job, rushing, with a colleague, to the scene of a Tring foul, offering voluble advice as to the action to be taken and being reluctant to go away. That finally achieved, Mr Mayer called the Tring number 17 for a long lecture and seemed about to settle for that, but the player may have talked himself into the yellow card that was eventually shown. JCFC was willing Mr Mayer to call the home 6 back to spell out that his intervention was not welcome, but referees do not do that. A splendid run down the right wing enabled Tring to take the lead just after the quarter hour. Number 6 was in the action again on 24 minutes, this time in the role of defence counsel, but his pleadings were again unsuccessful and Mr Mayer rightly showed a yellow to the home number 5. Two minutes later, Tring doubled their lead through a diagonal ball to the right, some nifty footwork and a good shot. Number 6 was no more successful as counsel for the defence when his number 2 was rewarded for a reckless tackle with a sight of Mr Mayer's yellow card.
Dunstable pulled a goal back in the second half, Tring adding a third on 76 minutes. The home side added a second on 84 minutes and continued to push for an equaliser, but Tring held out to proceed to Round 4.
After a well-handled match, it was a chilly JCFC who walked back into town, whence two buses saw him back into his hotel in time to watch the England game. Sadly, as England passed the ball to and fro, allowing Senegal a couple of possible chances, the old fool nodded off and woke to find that England had scored.