Non league Day and Reasons for Regular Nonleague football Chipstead 1 Barking 1 FA Trophy Dogs Come Too
If I were a clever writer I would arrive at some witty headline that encompasses dogs and Barkingfc. 
Non league day has become a regular date in the calendar when International football means no top level games and crowds are higher.
Although a Brentford fan I manage to catch 10-15 non league games a season and am no stranger to positive reasons to watch non league. Let me summarise the key reasons why far more spectators should visit Chipstead:
- Entrance a very fair £9 including a programme. Some clubs such as Carshalton have moved away from paper programmes to e-programmes for obvious reasons.
- Free car parking at the ground
- Dogs are welcome. Today there were at least 4 dogs there. All on leads and having a good time, with some fields around the ground ( with access) meaning that it was a good thing to let them walk before the game.
- Friendly spectators. Folks can and do walk around the whole ground, and of course seats in the small stand are free.
- Football quality is good. Some fans who do not frequent non league games may imagine overweight pub teams kicking each other to bits. This analogy is totally wrong. There was high skill level, good organisation, 100% effort all game and some excellent individual skill.
- Chipstead play an open and attacking brand of football. They use their wingers and have a traditional old fashioned centre forward (Alan Tait). In short echelons higher in entertainment than for example the hideous international fare provided by England.
- There are players to watch. The player catching the eye today was Leon Lalor-Dell, a skilful pacy left winger, who scored the Chipstead goal, and made what should have been another 3-4 goals.
There is nothing wrong with watching higher class league football, but why not take in the occasional non league game too? And if you fancy finding a tree stump behind the main stand. Especially if your dog needs a day out.
Where else do stewards take the word of a paying customer as to what exactly is in a bag they are carrying in? Where else do Northern football fans, well Halifax ones from Yorkshire wear shorts to football matches in the winter?
This and a multitude of other curious spectacles were observed at the Woking v Halifax game this weekend.
Then along side one side of the pitch are two small ancient looking stands that I am sure were there 50 years ago, looking quaint but maybe not fit for purpose really being honest. 
Normal covered terracing behind the other goal is matched with low level terracing along the other side of the pitch. It is almost as though no one can decide which decade the ground lives in nor which level of football it is fit for. A nice surprise was that there was no segregation with Woking and Halifax fans mixing freely. Banter was heard though it was difficult to make out easily much of what the Halifax fans were saying. This for me is good though. I prefer the lack of segregation which encourages a normal approach to football instead of treating each game like some kind of warfare.
chris1957
Arcticterntalk.org 