Field Mill: Mansfield Town 1-2 Liverpool

Mansfield Town 1-2 Bristol Rovers

With a spare Saturday afternoon available, we looked at the fixtures and saw inform Mansfield Town were at home to Bristol Rovers. I (Ross) last visited Mansfield Town’s Field Mill in January 2008 when they took on top flight Middlesbrough in the FA Cup fifth round ending in a 2-0 reverse to Middlesbrough. Adrian last visited as recent as 2013, again in the FA Cup, being defeated 2-1 against Liverpool.

Being a fairly short journey, we left at 10:30am making our way up the M1 northbound. Prior to our journey, we noticed we were yet to visit Basford United who play in Nottingham on Greenwich Avenue. Being on the way to Mansfield, we decided to pay a visit. Basford United’s Greenwich Avenue has been redeveloped with new changing rooms, stands and is now completely enclosed with turnstiles.

We continued our venture north visiting Hucknall Town on the way. Having visited before, we decided to take the opportunity to get new photos of Watnall Road. Remaining unchanged since our previous visited (and once again locked up), we noticed what looks like an old clubhouse that laid abandoned and overgrown. In May 2015, it was announced that work had started on a new stadium. The club hopes to move into the new stadium just off Aerial Way (across the road from the current 5,000 capacity stadium) for the 2017–18 season.

After our visit, we continued making our way to Mansfield parking on Stella Street just off the A60 Nottingham Road. We walked across the A60 Nottingham Road to the Sainsbury’s supermarket for lunch before briefly visiting the Talbot Inn opposite in attempt to find Adrian’s Mansfield Town friend.

We made our way to Field Mill through the retail park and onto Quarry Lane where the ground is situated. Upon our arrival, we noticed a gate was open and doing the decent thing we asked a nearby steward if we could quickly get a photo inside the ground which he promptly refused (tip – never ask a steward anything!). We continued walking around the ground getting external photos and we even walked up Bishop Street to the rear of the unused Bishop Street Stand to get a few photos.

Once we finished taking photos, the ground was now open and we decided to make our way in through the turnstiles.

Field Mill is believed to be the oldest ground in the Football League, hosting football since 1861, although some reports date it back as far as 1850. The stadium has a capacity of 10,000 when fully open, but due to safety restrictions, it currently holds 8,186.

After plans to relocate to a new all-seater stadium were scrapped, work began in July 1999 to completely modernise Field Mill. The North Stand, Quarry Lane End and West Stand were completely demolished and new stands built in their place, including a two tier stand on the west side of the ground. The redeveloped all-seater stadium was officially opened by John Prescott on 28 July 2001, six months after work had been completed.

In July 2005, safety officials temporarily restricted Field Mill's capacity to 5,000 when fire safety certificates could not be located. The ground's capacity was again reduced in May 2007, from 9,368 to 4,684, when Nottinghamshire County Council, who enforced the reduction, cited a poor standard of stewarding and a lack of a pro-active approach to safety. In July 2007 the capacity was raised to 6,553 following an inspection from safety officials, but was reduced back to 4,684 in September after visiting Chesterfield supporters were given too many tickets by mistake. Field Mill's capacity was then increased to 5,457, and in January 2008 further increased to 7,300 for the FA Cup tie against Middlesbrough after a problem with the turnstiles and other issues were resolved.

The Ian Greaves Stand – currently the largest stand made up of an upper and lower tier, and executive seating. The stand has a capacity of 5,417 (2,764 in the upper tier, and 2,509 in the lower tier).

Quarry Lane End – behind the South goal, housing the home fans, with a capacity of 1,968. The players' tunnel is in the corner of this stand adjacent to the West Stand.

North Stand – behind the opposite goal from the Quarry Lane End, this was traditionally the home terrace although safety issues meant this would swap with the Quarry Lane End and become the away stand. Capacity of 1,910.

Bishop Street Stand – this stand, which runs along the side of the pitch opposite the West Stand, is not in use after being condemned. The dugouts are in front of this stand which is boarded up to prevent access. There are plans to build a new 2,800 capacity stand including new dressing rooms and television facilities; however, no formal steps have been taken to implement such plans.

With Mansfield Town riding high in League 2 at the moment this fixture seemed an ideal opportunity to return to their home stadium.
For fans confused by the ground name, no Mansfield have not moved stadiums!
The One Call Stadium is the shiny new name for Field Mill (even though Field Mill will always be the name that the supporters know it by). It is named after the owners business and like anything else there is a financial advantage for the football club.
The great thing about football and live sport is it can be unpredictable which of course leads to excitement.
This game was feisty, ill-tempered and had plenty of bad feeling, almost a throwback to the 1980’s.
In between there was a bit of football, but 5 yellow cards, 3 red cards and on pitch fight involving most players meant the game won't be remembered for much else other than the more unsavoury parts of the game.
Mansfield should have taken the lead seconds into the game but Matt Green shot over when well-placed and this came to haunt the Stags later when the visitors took the lead. A right wing cross nodded down by Leadbitter was fired home by veteran Jermaine Easter.
However Easter went from hero to villain just before the break when he was red carded by the referee Mark Haywood for a quite ridiculous dive in trying to win a penalty and kicking out at a Mansfield Town player.
Rovers obviously felt a sense of in justice and although were leading seemed in the second half intent on trying to get the numbers even.
Mansfield Town boss Adam Murray in hindsight was a little unwise to have made his 3 substitutions by 56 minutes and his team naive in falling for the trap.
Krystian Pearce sent off for an off the ball incident before the Rovers corner was taken when he attempted to kick a Rovers’ player. It was now as Rovers wanted 10 v 10 on equal terms.
The mayhem continued and a mass brawl a few minutes later saw more yellow cards, one of them former Bolton Wanderers veteran Nicky Hunt, now the Mansfield Town captain. So when Hunt transgressed again, committing a needless foul on the half way line he knew the outcome, another red! It was now 9 v 10 and Bristol Rovers who were leading with a man down were now leading with a man extra, bizarre!
Even more bizarre was the fact that the 9 men managed an equaliser, an excellent left foot shot from centre back Ryan Tafazolli.
This lead to possibly the best part of the game football wise.
Rovers were a bit more positive, Harrison hit the bar, several shots were blocked and in that, determined defending by the home side left back Benning and goalkeeper Jensen resulted in yet another delay whereby both received extensive treatment.
Both players were clearly unfit to continue but had to stay on because Mansfield Town used all their substitutes were now on in effect Mansfield were playing with 7 men!
With 8 minutes of stoppage time to play, it was a case of could Mansfield hold out.
The answer was unfortunately no.
Neither side deserved to particularly win the game but Bristol Rovers did thanks to James Clarke’s cross, powerfully headed home by Matty Taylor. Ironically both players capitalising on the inability of the injured Mansfield players in particular 40 year old Brian Jenson in goal.
What a game!
Best gate of the season so far first defeat at home for Mansfield Town.

After the match, as usual, we made a quick dash for the exits running through the nearby retail park back towards the Nottingham Road and onto Stella Street. Once we reached the car, we drove out the town heading towards the M1 this time going southbound back to junction 23 and home by 6.00pm.

Mansfield Town 0-2 Middlesbrough

This FA Cup 4th round contest was the biggest game Mansfield Town had been involved in for years. The fortunes of the club were at a low ebb, struggling for League 2 survival, against a backdrop of unrest behind the scenes.
Premiership Middlesbrough arrived in North Notts and so did the TV cameras for an early start. Adrian picked me (Ross) up in Coalville and we then made the comparatively short trip north up the M1 entering the town at junction 27 and parking on Stella street.
Adrian met up with his mate Mick who had got us tickets and immediately we were queuing to get into the Main Stand.
Mansfield Town have spent £6.5m on re-development of 3-sides of the ground (Excluding the demolition of the Bishop Road stand). The North stand and Quarry Lane End which are situated between each goal are almost identical single tiered stands. After those two re-developments, work started on the West stand which is a two tiered stand which was opened in February 2001.
Despite the TV coverage the crowd was well above average and there was certainly a buzz around the ground.
Mansfield were not overawed and gave it a good go ,but an early Boro goal from Lee Dong Gook settled the visitors nerves and despite a few near misses at both ends, Boro grabbed another in the second half, an own goal from the luckless Jake Buxton.
Middlesbrough safely through, for the Stags more pressing issues, the battle for football league survival.
With the early kick off, we were now hungry, so we walked into town and ended up in a familiar fast food restaurant, McDonald’s is the only one of these types of places Adrian likes.
A big police presence was visible in the town and we did witness one or two minor incidents.
We left the former mining town in the middle of the afternoon and as light was now fading, made a quick stop over at a non league ground for a photo.
This was Watnall Road the home of Hucknall Town.
My day wasn't completely finished as on the way back to Coalville we stopped off at a relations birthday party.
A long day but another enjoyable trip

Field Mill

Sunday 13 January 2013

Mansfield Town 1-2 Liverpool

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