Ascot United 4 Little Common 0
Saturday 3rd December 2022
FA Vase Third Round

Due to more train related woes, I had to postpone my planned trip to Hungerford and instead plumped for a more local FA Vase third round tie and a chance to catch up with friends old and new at Ascot United. The hosts have been in a rich vein of form of late, winning eleven on the bounce before this game and seemingly been scoring for fun including being the top scorers in the FA Vase as it stands.

The journey is always good for my step count, I live around six miles away from the Racecourse Ground so, despite it being another dull, damp and dismal day, I decided to walk it. 12,000 steps or so later I made it to the ground, paid my £7 entrance and was warmly greeted once again at the club. The ground and journey are well known to me with the Yellas ladies team being one of the five local teams I’ve been following this season, although this would be my first chance to catch the men’s team in action this season.

I’ll keep the match report short as it was cold, bleeping cold so I didn’t get to take many notes. The first half started brightly with early attacks from both sides but neither managing to trouble either goalkeeper. Ascot started to take control of the game and fashioned a hatful of chances but had only the one goal to show for it at the break. A nice chipped pass from Kai Walters was controlled well by Brendan Matthew and he saw Matt Cruttwell in the visitors goal off his line and delicately lobbed the ball over him. A lovely finish. 1-0
H-T: Ascot United 1 Little Common 0

Any thoughts that the Yellas might pay for not making the most of the chances to add to their lead in the first half were dispelled after just four minutes of the second half with top scorer Matthew doubling their lead. The visitors failed to clear a Sean McCormack corner and Matthew was on hand to stab it home at the far post. 2-0.

Matthew completed his hat-trick on the hour mark after the referee adjudged he’d been pushed in the area and he calmly slotted the penalty down the middle with Cruttwell diving to his right. 3-0.

Ascot took their foot off the pedal and although Little Common made some good chances on the break, they couldn’t find a way past former Portsmouth and Reading goalkeeper Jamie Ashdown in the hosts goal. The Yellas added a fourth with a Marcus Mealing strike from the edge of the area late on and complete a win and a place in the fourth round draw.
F-T: Ascot United 4 Little Common 0

Ascot always looked the more likely to win this and duly delivered. They look a strong team and, with 23 goals in the competition and in cracking form, will be hopeful of an extended run in the FA Vase this season. Little Common are an industrious team who play some nice football and have a pacy attack when breaking. They did make a few good chances but just couldn’t find a way past Ashdown on the day. Good luck to both teams for the rest of the season.

Ipswich Town 2 Peterborough United 1
Saturday 10th December 2022
League One

A rare chance to get away for a weekend and catch up with my beloved Tractor Boys for the second time this season. With the cold and icy spell upon us I’d travelled up on the Friday and had arranged to meet with the Ipswich Town Foundation, who do a lot of charity fundraising for local worthy causes, to donate some of my player portraits. This went well and they chose the five below to use as giveaways or fundraisers when the chance arises. All that was left to do now was to visit my favourite pub, The Greyhound, for a couple of Adnams Old Ales. A good way to end the day!

To match day, and I had more portraits to deliver, this time to the supporters club who will again use them for fundraising, before wandering around the fanzone trying desperately to keep warm on another freezing cold day! At around 12.15 (early kick off because of the World Cup) I joined 24,848 others in the stands for this top six League One clash.

It was a cagey start to the game with Peterborough edging the early exchanges. This continued for much of the first twenty minutes with Town struggling to find any sort of rhythm during which time neither keeper had been called into action. The first real attempt on goal from either side came from the Blues Sone Aluko but his effort from just outside the area went wide of Lucas Bergstrom’s goal. Ipswich started to get on top and went ahead a minute later. A nice move down the right between Kane Vincent Young and Wes Burns found skipper Sam Morsy on the edge of the box and his chipped cross was glanced into the corner of the net by Connor Chaplin. 1-0.

Posh rallied and almost levelled 6 minutes later when a Jonson Clark-Harris free kick from 30 yards clipped the top of the bar. Four minutes later the visitors did level the scoreline. A short corner on the right wasn’t picked up by the Town defence which allowed Kwame Poku space to cross onto the head of the unchallenged Frankie Kent in the six yard box. The Ipswich keeper seeming to lose track of the ball in the lunchtime sunshine as it came over. 1-1.

A strangely subdued first half from the hosts finally kicked into life in the last five minutes with a good spell. A Burns cross was only cleared to the edge of the area where Morsy hit a decent shot but straight into the midriff of Bergstrom. Aluko hit another shot from distance wide of the mark and a tight first half came to a close.
H-T: Ipswich Town 1 Peterborough United 1

The second half started in a similar fashion with no real chances for either side but with Town now being on top. A fantastic run down the right flank from Burns, beating two players along the way woke up the crowd winning a corner, the first in a succession. One of those saw the Tractor Boys retake the lead. Leif Davis curled the kick into a crowded six yard box where it was flicked on by a defender and fell to Connor Chaplin who chested it down and rifled the ball past Bergstrom from around the penalty spot. 2-1.

Posh again went searching for an equaliser and looked dangerous when breaking forward. A Poku free kick was headed past Christian Walton’s post by Ronnie Edwards. Ipswich thought they’d sewn the game up when Freddie Ladapo had the ball in the net late on but this was ruled out for offside. A hard fought game was brought to a close by the referee after 6 minutes of added time where Peterborough threw everything at Ipswich but the hosts managed to see the game out and take an important three points to move to the the top of the league table.
F-T: Ipswich Town 2 Peterborough United 1

A good win for the Blues without being at their best, two good goals from the impressive Chaplin taking him to ten goals this season and a good performance from Kayden Jackson who made a nuisance of himself, constantly hassling the Posh back three and making intelligent runs in behind them especially in the second half. Peterborough look a decent side who will no doubt be involved in play-off contention. One further point, I’ve seen better refereeing in the various levels of non-league this season than the performance from Ollie Yates in this game. Sometimes you really do have to wonder how some referees manage to get as high in the system as they do.

With the news of the Felixstowe game being called off due to a frozen pitch meaning the Ipswich Women’s FA Cup game having to be played behind closed doors at the Ipswich training ground on the Sunday, I decided to leave for home on the Sunday morning and that’s where the fun and games really started…