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Published: February 26th 2017
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I have had an enforced absence from the football obscurities of Eastern Europe of late. The closest I have been is watching Shepshed Dynamo, if that counts? There hasn't been a great deal of time for travel recently. A family bereavement and unrelated illness of another, curtailed any provisional plans. There are always provisional plans. If Mohammed cannot go to the mountain, the mountain can come to him. I scoured the lower leagues for inspiration and hatched a plan to see another Dynamo play. Loughborough Dynamo that is!
In the old East, Dynamo was the prefix for the clubs under the control of Secret Police. There were many incarnations - Dynamo Berlin, Dinamo Bucharest and perhaps the most famous in Britain .......Moscow Dynamo. As puppets of a less than friendly section of the state apparatus, they were usually universally despised in their home countries in Communist times. In the immediate aftermath of the Second World War in the climate of post conflict good relations, Moscow Dynamo arrived on these shores to play a series of friendlies. The footballing public flocked to see this curiosity, as they played a series of exhibition matches against Glasgow Rangers, Chelsea, Arsenal and
Cardiff. They stunned huge crowds with their skills and confounded tradition by coming out to warm up, at a time when pre-match loosening up was possibly restricted to lighting up a fag! They even presented opposition players with a bunch of flowers each. The pleasantries stopped there. After a diplomatic 3 - 3 draw in the opener at Stamford Bridge, Cardiff were gubbed 10 - 1!
What has all that got to do with Loughborough, you ask? The Moscow men came back on another tour in 1955 and left an indelible mark on this section of the East Midlands without even visiting. The Football Association had relaxed their rules after 1950 and given permission for the use of floodlights at games. The clubs keen to test whether there was public appetite for games on an evening, lined up a series of glamorous friendlies against exotic opposition. In view of the financial success and huge crowds of the Moscow visit in 1946, they were first on many a list of invitees. Wolverhampton Wanderers, top dogs of the English league at the time, lined up the Muscovites. The boys of Uncle Joe gratefully accepted and no doubt brought a
sizeable entourage of “assistants” to indulge in a bit of Cold War observing. The team didn’t quite dazzle the locals this time and Wolves beat them fair and square. English opposition had possibly upped their warm up by this point to standing against a warm radiator for 10 minutes, before lighting up a fag! Meanwhile in Loughborough, students at the Grammar School were inspired. A football club was formed – named after Dynamo and wearing the black and gold of Wolverhampton Wanderers.
Plan in hand, I put it to the Other Half. There were snow flurries in the air and it was bitterly cold. However, she was obviously keen to get out of the house and didn’t immediately pour scorn
. “As long as we can have a wander round town first, I’ll come with you”. I seized the moment and we set off. Loughborough is now full of awkward parking restrictions, designed to discourage visits. However, the Saturday market survives and a healthy number of stalls were trying to justify being out in the cold to turn a profit. The snow flurries had stopped, but the temperature wasn’t rising. After a brief wander, the Other Half treated
me to a light lunch to warm us up. We pointed the car towards the NSG, known otherwise as the Nanpantan Sports Ground, on the western outskirts of town. A word of warning for public transport users, it is in possibly the most inconvenient location and a million miles from the Rail Station. There was plenty of space in the car park at the complex, which comprised of 2 football grounds and the Brush Bowls Club. Brush Engineering were once a dominant employer with a multitude of sports facilities for the employees.
I was disappointed that there was no large club emblem on the entrance to the NSG. The Dynamo emblem retains that curvaceous “D”, synonymous with a Communist sports club. I had to satisfy myself with a plain Welcome to Loughborough Dynamo on a background of the Evostik League. A local league game was ongoing on the pitch behind. Admission was £7 to walk through a proper turnstile. The clubhouse and changing rooms were behind one goal to the right. A small bank of 3 rows of seats were attached. The Other Half always likes to know the seat count before she attends and I had
assured her that a likely crowd of circa 110 would mean she would be fairly safe in securing a seat, should she desire. In her eyes all grounds should have the ratio as seen at Leicester Road FC, where the usual crowd can fit into the number of seats at least 6 times over. The front row mind here were covered in the morning sky moisture, so that could complicate matters. The social club was warm and welcoming. A bar in one corner, a tea bar in another. A separate room was provided for visiting Directors. Jeff Stelling beamed down from 2 TVs, enthusiastically extolling the virtues of the afternoon football on Sky. As usual, he probably wished he was at Hartlepool. We bought a couple of drinks and sat down at a spare table. The guy opposite was supping his pint of lager. The old Manchester City badge lapel badge he was wearing caught my eye. The life of a football fan is never simple. He had been on route to Buxton to watch Frickley Athletic in Evostik Premier. It was snowed off, so he turned round at Derby caught a train to Loughborough and discovered my point earlier
– it is a long walk to Loughborough Dynamo from the Rail Station. He caught a taxi. I advised his luck had changed and we could drop him on the way back.
The Brexit debate was in full swing in the seats behind the goal. The regulars were calling for the head of the local MP, who seemed to have voted with their head but against the “will of the people” in the recent Parliamentary endorsement of the foolishness. It was causing a great deal of distress in certain quarters, even to the extent that they weren’t going to vote at the next Election. The conversation moved on to the current plight down the road at the King Power. Champions to chumps. Claudio was not getting a vote of confidence. The attentions turned to Chasetown FC. Dynamo entered the field in their traditional gold and black looking every inch the Dynamo Dresden of the East Midlands. The visitors had brought a reasonable following and were bossing the early play. However, the class act wearing 10 in midfield for Dynamo looked the most likely to create a breakthrough. The other player who caught the eye was the “international”
in the Dynamo midfield. The international call up by Bermuda had made him worthy of comment each time he touched the ball. The first goal was a scrappy deflection when it came, but they all count when you need the points. The best chance of a Chasetown equaliser resulted in the 2
nd Dynamo breakaway goal on the stroke of half time. The majority of the crowd filtered into the social club for a warm and to listen to more wise words from Mr Stelling and company.
The scoreline in goals remained unchanged in the 2
nd half. Dynamo hung on and gained a numerical player advantage late on, after a complete breakdown in discipline by the Chasetown substitute. After a clash of legs as the 2 players wheeled away from a throw in, the Chasetown player lashed out with a kick at his opposition. I was about 5 yards away. The referee was looking at the incident 5 yards on the other side. The red card was inevitable. The slim prospect of a Chasetown fightback had just evaporated. The offender clutched at straws with his excuses.
Appendix 1 Evostik Premier League (First Division South) Loughborough Dynamo FC 2 Chasetown FC 0
Date: 11 February 2017 @ 1500 Hours Venue: NSG, Loughborough
Attendance: 120
Goals: 1-0 A Hodgkinson (35'), 2-0 K Demidh (45')
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