For my final game of 2025, I decided to head back up the M1 to Leicestershire for a Leicestershire & Rutland Challenge Cup quarter-final tie between GNG Oadby Town and Barwell. Despite this being a local derby with just over 11 miles between the grounds, it's not been a frequent fixture in recent years. There are currently two divisions separating the clubs, although neither club is exactly setting their respective league alight this season. Oadby play in the United Counties Premier South (Step 5) and are currently sitting second from bottom. Barwell play in the Southern league Premier Central (Step 3) and are currently placed 16th, eight points above the relegation spots. The teams last met in a league match during the 2009-10 Midland Alliance season. Barwell won both encounters, 6-0 at home and 3-1 away, on their way to taking the title and gaining promotion. They met more recently in this competition, with Barwell also coming out on top, winning 3-0 at Kirkby Road. The only other meeting of note in recent times, was an FA Vase clash in the 2006-07 season. Oadby gained a creditable 0-0 draw at Barwell, but then went down 2-0 at home in the replay.

​It was clear from the off that Oadby were not going to respect the two tier difference in the teams, and flew out of the blocks from the off. Their high-tempo play seemed to rock Barwell a little in the opening encounters, although the only attempt on target in the first ten minutes came when Taylor Shilcock tested Finn Osborn from distance. The home side looked dangerous on both flanks, especially on the left, where the pace of Mario Mendez was recognised early on by the Barwell defence.
Having made it through the opening third unscathed, Barwell then came close to grabbing the first goal themselves when a left-wing corner was only marginally too high for Sidik Atcha at the far post. A few minutes later, Oadby's Rizvan Hussain also tested out Osborn, with a quick turn and shot from the edge4 of the area.
Just before the half-hour, Barwell's Tyree Wilson produced a delightful piece of skill, controlling a long ball with his cheat before sending a dipping volley goalward, only for GNG stopper, Adam Binks, to match it with an equally impressive acrobatic save.
Oadby continued to look slightly the more dangerous team, their pace up front causing the visitors plenty of nervy moments. That said, as we approached the 40 minute mark, Barwell captain Kane Richards was sent clear by Wilson, only to see his driven cross evade everyone in the centre. Almost immediately afterwards, Oadby had a real chance when Stanley Mugisha intercepted a stray pass on the halfway line, raced clear and sent in a vicious drive that required Osborn to go full-length to tip the ball around the post.
It looked as if the Step 5 side were going to go into the break level until, with two minutes remaining in the half, Tyrell Waite drove down the Barwell left, taking the ball to the by-line before cutting back for Tyree Wilson, who struck the ball first-time, on the run, into the top corner. A great finish, even if slightly against the run of play. 0-1. To add salt into those wounds, three minutes into added time Oadby gave the ball away deep inside their own half and were immediately and clinically punished. The ball was quickly fed into Anthony Dwyer, who made no mistake with the finish. 0-2

HT GNG Oadby Town 0 Barwell 2. The Step 5 side more than held their own for just over 40 minutes but were then undone by a quality finish and a momentary lapse of concentration at the back. That was the difference. Barwell showed their higher-ranked status by taking their chances.

It was clear early on in the second half that Barwell were not planning to give Oadby a chance to get back into the game. In the first half the visitors had been rattled by Town's attacking approach, but there seemed to be a new steel to the Barwell side in the second half. With a two goal lead, they didn't necessarily need to go looking for goals,  they could just tighten the game up.
Around ten minutes in, Richards almost combined with Waite to add to the lead and, a few minutes later, Hussain brought a good save out of Osborn once again. On the hour a Barwell short corner routine ended with Dwyer flashing a shot wide. Then, on 63 minutes, Oadby were inches away from getting back into the game when a long throw from the right was flicked on twice before reaching Hussain, who's scissor kick clipped the top of the bar on its way out. Was that the big chance for the home team to get back into the game? As it turned out, yes it was. Both teams had half chances, but the only target hit was one of the Barwell supporters behind the Oadby goal.

FT GNG Oadby Town 0 Barwell 2. A semi-final berth secured by Barwell, but it was certainly not plain-sailing. Oadby defied the two step gap, by pushing their visitors all the way. On this display, it's hard to understand how Oadby can be in the relegation zone of their league. If they continue to play like this, they will surely pull clear. Their next game is a massive relegation 6-pointer at home to bottom side Bugbrooke St Michaels, who beat them 2-1 at Camp Hill back in August. Barwell, meanwhile, travel to leaders Spalding United on Saturday, in their first meeting this season.

GNG Oadby Town: 1.Binks, 2.Shilcock, 3.Anbhavne, 4.Kpolom-A-Kpolom, Gill(c), 7.Nnjai, 8.Jennings, 9.Mugisha, 10.Hussain, 11.Mendez, 14.Baker, 15. Apetorgor, 17.Jaga Singh, 18. Hanif, 19.Jeva Singh, 20.Dhami.
Barwell: 1.Osborn, 3.Reeve, 5.Atcha, 6.Mancinelli, 7.Hayes, 8.Hill, 10.Richards(c), 11.Wilson, 15.Dwyer, 16.Singh. Subs: 2.McDonald, 4.Cook, 12.Stockley, 19.Seaton

The Ground
GNG Oadby Town play their home games at The Riverside Football Ground which is situated in the Braunstone Town area of Leicester, south-west of the city centre. Accessed via the entrance to Ellesmere College, there's a small car park alongside the ground with extra parking on the side of the access route and in front of the college. The ground is accessed via a single gate just to the side of the main building that houses all of the facilities, clubhouse, snack bar and changing areas. There are two covered spectator areas, the main stand on the left-hand side as you enter and a covered standing area situated behind, and just to the right, of the car park end goal. The dugouts are opposite the main stand. The playing surface looks to be pretty much flat, with no discernible slopes.

The Programme
A 28-page magazine with full-colour, glossy outer pages, costing £2.00. The programme contains all of the standard articles, a welcome message, history of both clubs and this season's statistics for both the first-team and youth teams. There's also an article from the Non-League Paper and an interesting piece from Martyn Green about data analytics. Add to that a brief match report from the last meeting of the teams, back in January 2015, and there's plenty of interesting reading for the half-time break.

Ground Number: 474
Att: 
Entrance: £6.00
Programme: £2.00

​With Christmas done, it was time to get back to some football on Saturday and, as I already had to be in the Midlands, I decided to dip back into the Midland Football League. A quick glance at the fixture list revealed an attractive looking tie that also gave me the chance to see the Division Two leaders, Northfield Town, and take in a new ground, Shenley Lane, at the same time. Northfield started the day seven points clear at the top of the table, having taken 40 points from their 15 games, losing just once. Their opponents, Bolehall Swifts, began the day in ninth spot with 15 points from 14 games. Recent form and this season's previous meeting both favoured the home side. Northfield had won their last seven games whilst Swifts had won just twice in the same period. The meeting at Rene Road back in August had ended in a 3-1 win for Town.
Despite this being my first visit to Shenley Lane, I had seen both Northfield and Bolehall play twice before, the last of which was Bolehall's 2-1 home win over Lane head three years ago (Swifts Win By A Head). Previously I had seen Swifts lose 5-0 at Atherstone Town back in 2018 (Swifts No Match For Adders). As for Northfield, I saw them play in the Midland League Challenge Cup Final at Coventry Sphinx in May 2017, a game they lost 2-1 to NKF Burbage (Do You Know Who I Am?). I then saw them lose again in a Smedley Crooke Memorial Cup game at higher-ranked Quorn (On The Rebound).

​There was an icy blast blowing across Shenley Lane as the game started. However, it was only Bolehall who were caught cold, as the home side made a blistering start. Only 3 minutes were on the clock when left-back Rhys Forbes dinked a delightful ball through the middle, perfectly into the path of James Ward, who calmly slotted past Liam Moss. 1-0.
Swifts had barely got their breath back when, four minutes later, Town doubled their advantage. Jamie Molyneux put a hopeful ball into the six-yard box, which should have been tidied up by the Bolehall defence. However, they made a mess of it, presenting James Ward with another opportunity, which he duly took. 2-0
Two down within seven minutes and having barely been out of their half, Bolehall needed to steady the ship quickly, which they managed to do, at least for a further ten minutes or so. However, with only 18 minutes gone, they found themselves three down. Molyneux did very well to control a lofted pass, turning inside his man before playing in Liam Spink, who slotted the ball under the advancing Liam Moss. 3-0 and, at this point, it felt like it could end in a cricket score.
Credit to Bolehall though. They were rattled, but did manage to get some kind of foothold on the game. Thomas Walker, in the home goal, was still largely a spectator, but at least Swifts had stemmed the flow of goals. Just pas the half-hour mark, Spink was disappointed not to have grabbed his second goal, but only had six more minutes to wait, before once again being given the opportunity to fire past Moss. This time he took it, burying the ball into the bottom corner. 4-0.

HT Northfield Town 4 Bolehall Swifts 0. Northfield got off to a fast start and dominated the half. Having not stretched the home defence at all, Swifts will be looking at damage limitation in the second half.

​After a short break to warm up back in the clubhouse, the decent-sized crowd was ready to head back out for the second half, fully expecting to see Northfield score a few more. They did hit the ground running in the second period and, with less than a minute gone Ward came very close to getting his hat-trick, being denied by a very good save by Moss. The Bolehall keeper had clearly decided that conceding four was enough for one day. A few minutes later he was at full stretch to tip a another goal bound effort over the bar, as Northfield went in search of more goals.
Just past the hour though, even Moss was helpless as a cross looped over him toward the far post where both James Ward and Adam Bourn were coming in, unmarked. However, with the goal gaping the two Town players managed to get in each other's way and the chance was gone. Minutes after this Moss was again on his toes, keeping the score at four, with another fine save.
With just over twenty minutes remaining, Northfield decided to throw a little spice into proceedings. A Bolehall raid, which to be fair to the visitors was a much more common occurrence than in the first half, led to the referee pointing to the spot. From the opposite end the exact reason was unclear and the home defence clearly didn't agree with the decision. Bradley Hendry, particularly, made his feelings known and received a sin-bin for his comments. Lewis Moss ignored the protests and calmly slotted home the spot-kick. 4-1. Their was then a small melee in the aftermath of the penalty, which resulted in Liam Spink seeing red. So, suddenly, after being in complete control, Northfield's lead had been reduced and they were now down to nine players for the next 10 minutes.
The home side dug in well, however, and apart from a James Aucott-Hermann effort that went close, they held off the visitors well before being restored back to ten players with 11 minutes left. They then held their own well for the remaining minutes to take the points.

FT Northfield Town 4 Bolehall Swifts 1. Swifts made some improvement in the second half and, at the point that Northfield went down to nine, briefly looked like they meant business. However, the home side had done the damage early on and, in all fairness, could easily have doubled their tally if not for the effort of Bolehall keeper Liam Moss. My third time watching Northfield turned out to be lucky for them, after watching the lose twice previously.
Northfield remain seven clear, after nearest rivals Cadbury Athletic also won. Bolehall stay in ninth spot. Next up, Northfield travel to third placed Birmingham United, who they beat 4-2 at The Lane earlier in the season. Bolehall go to seventh placed Inkberrow, who are just a point ahead of them. The reverse fixture ended in a goalless draw.

Northfield Town: 1.Walker, 2.Forbes, 15.Tabberner, 4.McPike, 5.Hendry, 6.Cameron, 7.Ward, 8.Westwood(c), 9.Molyneux, 10.Spink, 11.Bourn. Subs: Green, McDonald, Prince, Hanks, Halpin
Bolehall Swifts: 1.Liam Moss, 2.Holmes, 3.Symonds, 4.Lewis Moss, 5.Brehany(c), 20.Soloman, 7.Radbourne, 8.Latham, 9.A.Baker, 10 Aucott-Hermann, 11.Barrett. Subs: 12.Baker-Yearwood, 13.Bennett, 14.K.Baker, 15.Orman, 21.Robinson

The Ground
Shenley Lane Sports Ground, or The Lane, is situated just to the north of Northfield town centre, in the south-west corner of Birmingham. There's a good-sized car park in front of the community centre with further parking available in surrounding streets, just a short walk away. Access to the football ground is not immediately obvious. You have to go into the community centre, through the bar and then head towards the toilets at the rear, where you'll see an exit door. There's a small hut where you can pay your entry fee before walking behind the main stand to enter the ground. The stand you walk behind is a brick-built structure that houses both covered standing and some bench seating. It occupies a space between the goal and corner flag, rather than being directly behind the goal. Access is available around the whole pitch, but there's only further cover available to the left, on the Black Haynes Road side. Here you find the dugouts, plus a low-roofed stand that sits between the dugouts. The pitch slopes across the playing surface, from left to right as you look from the entrance. Overall, it's a good facility with a couple of quirks in the unusual access route and the slightly rickety stand between the dugouts.


Ground Number: 473
Att: 68
Entrance: £5.00
Programme: N/A

​One thing is for sure, you don't always get the kind of warm welcome at a grassroots ground than you do at Glen Villa. Stepping out of my car, I barely walked 10 steps before I was greeted by Villa manager Jonny Morgan who immediately invited me into the clubhouse and made me a cup of tea. He then proceeded to arrange delivery of the team sheets and, with the help of his assistant manager, made further tea for an assortment of supporters and ground-hoppers, one of whom was none other than Tim Burgin. If you are regular reader, you may remember Tim from a previous blog. He is the Stourbridge based former West Brom season ticket holder that I chatted with at Tuffley Rovers back in July (Tuff Lesson For Cribbs). For two supporters of the famous blue & white stripes, it's odd that we always seem meet up at the grounds of teams that play in claret and blue.
The game today was the reversal of the reversal that happened last month. The original fixture was reversed after Villa's pitch got waterlogged. BotP had the pleasure of watching that match (Reversal Of Fortune), which Villa won 4-2. On that day Villa were in fourth, St Patricks were top of the league. Fast forward a month, and nothing had changed in terms of league positions. Both teams had won every game since that meeting. Villa had played just two but had showed some great goalscoring form, putting 7 past Saffron Dynamo Reserves and 8 past Hinckley Rovers Development. St Patricks had played four games, also winning all of them, scoring 18 goals and conceding just 5.
Consequently, today's fixture was probably of greater importance to Glen Villa, who trailed the leaders by 11 points but had a game in hand. Victory today would certainly lift them to within sight. Defeat would leave them trailing, and possibly even out of the promotion race.

​The team line-ups were not massively different to the meeting at The Emerald Centre last month. However, the visitors had top scorer Ryan Shilton on the bench, whilst Kane Pedan, who scored on debut last weekend, did start. This proved to be a significant change, especially early on in the game. Whilst Villa started sluggishly, Pedan was clearly wide awake. A second-minute snapshot, that flew wide, was a very early warning sign for the hosts. A minute later, Pedan drew a good save from Ben Perkins. Again the warning was not heeded because, with only 5 minutes gone, Pedan made certain with the third attempt, drilling a strike beyond the reach of Perkins to put St Patricks in front. 0-1.
The goal seemed to wake Villa up a little. They were behind in the 6th minute of the reverse fixture, so there was no need to panic just yet. However, despite starting to look a little more lively, passes were not hitting their mark, 50-50s were being lost, and no real impression was being made on the visitor's defence. In fact, it was almost on the stroke of the half-hour before Villa got a strike on target. Even then, Cameron Greiff, on the stretch, couldn't find enough purchase to test Paul Davis.
At the other end, Perkins had to be at his very best to acrobatically tip over Elijah Morton's close range header following a right-wing corner. Davis then had to replicate the save when he was almost deceived by George Parker's deflected free-kick, tipping that over for a corner too, as the home side attempted to get level before the break. As it happened, they had their captain Cameron Greiff to thank for only being a goal down at the interval. The striker, back to defend a corner, had to bravely throw his head at an in swinging corner that almost snuck in at the near post. Luckily for Villa, only Greiff ended up in the back of the net.

HT Glen Villa 0 St Patricks 1. Villa were very slow out of the blocks and paid the price by conceding early on. They slowly built into the game but couldn't find a way back in. St Patricks always looked dangerous, especially Pedan, who caused the home side a lot of problems.

​After a welcome trip back to the clubhouse to warm up a little, the second half was soon under way. I think most of the assembled spectators were expecting a Glen Villa reaction to the first-half, in which they'd not appeared to get up to full steam at any point. However, it was St Patricks who got the first strike off in anger with Rossa O'Donovan hitting the target, only for Perkins to make a comfortable save.
Villa were still not firing on all cylinders and, just past the hour, they paid the price for their wayward passing. Losing the ball deep inside their own half, their defence was split asunder by the driving run of Elijah Morton, who had latched onto the errant pass. Perkins was out smartly to make an excellent block but, unfortunately for the goalkeeper, the ball fell invitingly for Kane Pedan, who smashed it back past a defender on the line. 0-2
The second goal was the killer. Whilst not playing well, Villa could feasibly have got a single goal back. The way the game had gone so far, two goals looked to be out of reach for them. Of course, they didn't give it up but, try as they might, they couldn't find any rhythm and they struggled to put any pressure on Paul Davis's goal. They did finally make the goalkeeper work in the 83rd minute when George Parker managed to get a strike on target. Even so, it was a relatively comfortable stop for Davis. Pedan then almost picked up his hat-trick when his dipping volley was expertly turned over by Perkins.
The action in the third minute of added time summed up the home side's afternoon. George Parker superbly took down a long ball, controlling it and turning in a fluid movement before striking low across the goal. Davis was beaten but the ball came back off the foot of the far post, and that was that. Game over.

FT Glen Villa 0 St Patricks 2. Whilst it's fair to say that Villa never really got up to speed, credit has to be given to St Patricks, who managed the game excellently. After getting an early lead, they controlled the tempo whilst ensuring that they restricted the home side's chances to get back into it. The three points leaves St Patricks seven points clear at the top, although Community Football Academy do have a game in hand and Loughborough Dynamo, 12 points adrift, have three in hand. Glen Villa remain in fourth but are now 14 points off the top with just one game in hand.
Both teams have a rest before taking back to the field on January 3rd. Glen Villa are back at home, where 9th placed Heather St Johns Reserves are the visitors. The sides fought out a 3-3 draw in the reverse fixture. St Patricks make the journey over to Whetstone Athletic, who are currently 7th. St Patricks won the reverse fixture 4-1 at the end of November.


Glen Villa: 1.Perkins, 4.Langton, 5.Inskip, 6.Payton, 7.Castor, 8.Greiff(c), 9.J.Parker, 10.G.Parker, 11.Morton, 16.Stephen-Hales, 18.Frank-Nwaigwe. Subs: 2.Morrish, 12.Garratt, 14.Mason, 17.Cosgrove
St Patricks: 1.Davis, 13.Ridley, 30.Nicholls, 15.Higgins, 11.McMahon, 6.Doy, 5.Morton, 2.Higgins, 9.O'Donovan, 8.Doherty, 10. Pedan. Subs: 16.Brennan, 3.Pelos, 7.Shilton, 14.Byron, 12.Makombe

​The Ground
Glen Villa are based in the village of Great Glen, a few miles to the south-east of Leicester. They share the Great Glen Recreational Ground with the local cricket and tennis clubs. Accessed via service road off Fordview Close, there's a reasonably-sized car park situated to the rear of the social club and changing room buildings, and next to a children's play park. The club, or The Shed as the sign says, is a cozy place with the walls plastered with photos, pennants and other reminders of the club's past. The football pitch is a short walk away, past the cricket square and towards the far reaches of the recreation ground. Whist not restricted to the near side of the ground, spectators generally seem to gather there, behind the respect barrier. The opposite side, where the teams make  camp, is backed by trees and bushes. The pitch itself slopes down from right to left as you look from the club.


Ground Number: 472
Att: 
Entrance: N/A
Programme: N/A