Anywhere but home

Originally written in early 2022.

2021 was a year of change for me. There were highs, and certainly there were lows, although all things considered I was very glad to have left the year in a better place mentally, physically, and financially, than when I started.

I try to avoid putting too much of my personal life online, and I like to keep this blog on the topic of football as much as possible, but with a few significant changes in my life over the last six months I thought these ramblings would be worth sharing. I’m trying to not make this over-bloated, and hopefully this can still be an interesting read, along with an insight into my life, but there’s still some memories (for good or bad reasons) that are best kept as memories. With that being said, what is there left for me to talk about?

Moving house, changing jobs, and football, of course.

I returned home in the U.K. in April 2021 after spending a six-month stint in southern Spain, shortly after the game in this article (https://adayinthelifeofafootballtherapist.sport.blog/2021/04/27/los-ultimos-dias/) had taken place in fact, which started the quest of searching for a new job, along with getting our family home ready to sell. I’m a Sports Therapist by trade, and had always worked in football, but, I wanted to break from that life. I’ve actually worked and performed at a variety of events previously, with acting (particularly in Pantomimes) being a passion of mine over that has developed over the last few years. I was able to gain work locally in Tamworth on my return, and I’ll remain forever grateful to Statfold Barn Railway for taking me on board last year (2021), and I’m hopeful that my involvement was mutually beneficial. The summer also saw me acquire a rather unique experience in the events industry, as I joined the Dinosaur Experiences team to become a Ranger across the summer holidays.

Once the summer was over, our attention focussed solely on the house move. It was a long and arduous process in the end, and my parents changed their minds multiple times over which area of the country to live in, however, I believe that they made the right choice eventually (after some convincing by yours truly). The moving date seemed to take an age to come around, by which point we were all over the place with different jobs, trips, birthdays and so on, but the move date came and went as intended (not without its dramas), meaning it was done and dusted nonetheless. After spending a lot of time and effort it took to get everything sorted and packed, it was then time to get it all moved into the correct places and unpacked once more, the joys…

Even though the new house was away from Tamworth, I would remain around the area for much of the next month as Christmas drew nearer, with a very successful Santa’s Express event taking place at Statfold, including a manic final week where I worked a total of sixty-six hours in the run up to Christmas Day. Finishing on the 23rd December meant that my family’s first full day all together in our new home was on Christmas Eve, which did feel quite special for us, as we visited our newly local thearte to watch their Pantomime Aladdin, which coincidently was the last show that I performed pre-pandemic.

We were all looking forward to starting our next adventure together.

Since I was leaving Tamworth, and the area as a whole, it did mean that I wouldn’t be able to continue my role at Newhall United, which had been an enjoyable journey after their return in 2020. Moving to a new place does mean starting again in terms of finding work, being social, and finding local sports teams to follow. Thankfully, the area that we had chosen was fairly familiar to us, and somewhere which I’ve already visited on numerous occasions.

Almost everyone who I’ve spoken to about moving has asked the same two questions, and this is how it’s gone; “Where are you moving to?” “Telford” “Why Telford?” “Errr, why not?”. There’s no stand-alone reason for us to move there, but a combination of factors had made the decision a sensible once, primarily since it suits all of our needs.

If you’ve made it this far into the article without closing it, then I applaud you. Anyway, onto the footballing action…

Since I’ve made the move I’ve been able to watch six football matches at 5 different grounds around Telford / Shropshire, between Boxing Day and the first weekend of February. This is the first period in seven years that I haven’t actively been involved in working for a football club, with the majority of that time (not including whilst I was in Spain) spent working at games every Saturday. So, how am I going to celebrate not having to work for a football club on a Saturday? Spend the time watching football instead. Realistically this will only be available to me for a limited time, since I’m likely going to be working every weekend between April and September, but I’m trying to make the most of it while I can. 

The first match I was able to catch locally was on Boxing Day when AFC Telford United hosted Chester in the National League North, in what was my second visit to the New Bucks Head. The first visit was very memorable for a number of reasons, it was a midweek fixture against Gateshead back in around February 2013 that proved to be freezing cold and an uneventful game, finishing 0-0. I was hoping a re-visit would leave me with some better memories…

Thankfully, it did, although we weren’t able to see a home win. Mistakes will cost you at any level of the game, and Telford were made to pay for theirs in this match, with Chester taking a 3-1 victory to continue the Buck’s poor run of results which left them bottom of the table. Telford would however go on to survive in the National League North for another season, after being almost certain for the drop at that point.

I only had to wait three days for my next game, another re-visit, this time to Shropshire’s largest club. The packed Christmas schedule may be my favourite time to watch football as you’ll usually find something on any given day, and a midweek round of football league fixtures saw Shrewsbury Town host Accrington Stanley on a cold Wednesday evening. Regular companion Dan made the journey up from Burton and stopped at our new place en-route, before making roughly a 30 min journey west to the New Meadow. It coincided with being a day after his birthday, so what better for a birthday treat than him visiting a new ground!

Even though Shrewsbury’s ground is an out of town “new build”, I really like what they’ve done with the ground, and still have fond memories of visiting there at least twice when I was younger, the most recent being a League 2 Play-Off Semi-Final game against Plymouth Argyle (which they lost). The Accrington game wasn’t as notable though, the hosts desperately needed points and the visitors set up to not lose the game, so a goalless draw actually did suit both teams on the night. There wasn’t much action to report on in this one, but it was an enjoyable visit nonetheless, and what better of a birthday treat than a 0-0 draw…

So that’s that then, a life update that’s over 18 months late, and reading this back is being back more of the memories of this time of transition in my life. I could say that my life is now in the next chapter, and I’m very proud of how far I’ve come.

Maybe I’ll have to get round to writing more about football soon?

Chris