A Season with Saltdean

On Saturday afternoon at three o’ clock, an oblique but gentle rain sprinkled my glasses as I gazed out upon a rectangle of turf, my pulse quickened by the drama that was sure to unfold as Little Common in merlot-red faced my newly adopted side, Saltdean United – The Tigers, playing in their away kit of purple and black stripes (tigers at a fancy-dress party).

In August, while squelching along a muddy track in the Lake District, my friend, Simon spoke to me of his feelings of detached apathy about the upcoming football season. Normally, the football-fast that fans are forced to endure in a non-tournament summer create desperate hunger pangs for the resumption of the sport we love, but this time, with the doors of Brighton and Hove Albion’s Amex Stadium closed to us, the new season felt somehow unreal. I can see the Amex from the window at the top of my stairs, the curve of its roof bursting above the treeline, but when Brighton are playing home games without me, it’s difficult to believe that the match I’m seeing on my television screen is happening just down the road. If I’m not there living and breathing it, it doesn’t quite feel like it exists.

How do I solve this problem? Well, live football is still out there. You just have to plummet down the divisions to Step 3 of non-league football. Step 1 is the Conference, the division below League Two. Below the Conference, there is a National League North and a National League South and that is Step 2. Anything below that is open to fans. As my wellies made pleasant farting noises in the Cumbrian mud, I cast my mind back to think about a team that held a soft spot in my affections and my thoughts immediately went to Saltdean United. In the late ‘90s, for a couple of seasons, I used to report on local County League games for the local paper, The Sports Argus. It was printed on cream paper which I think was a nod to the famous Italian paper, La Gazetto dello Sport. The internet was emerging, but was not yet the place people went to for up to date information in the way they do today and so, the edition of The Sports Argus, delivered to shops on a Saturday evening was, for many, an opportunity to get the scores from local football matches. What you got from me was a one-hundred word match report of the first half of a County league match which I dictated over the phone at half-time and on the back page of the paper would be all the final scores. If a player scored a ‘worldie’ in the second half, it was completely ignored in my match report. I was given £15 for my efforts (15p a word) and got to enjoy a game of football at a time when travelling to watch Brighton home games at Gillingham’s Priestfield Stadium was beyond my means. Saltdean was always my favourite place to go during this time for two reasons. Firstly, the valley setting of the ground gave it a picturesque romance that no other ground got anywhere near. Sheeps cavorting on the sharp inclines all around were a pleasing backdrop to the game in front of me. They were also one of the most exciting teams to watch: playing attractive football and almost always winning. They’re the only club where I can still remember any of their players’ names: Damien Dobbyn, a skilful midfielder who felt like a County League Gazza to me; Jay Lovett, a floppy-haired winger who seemed to hurdle full-backs’ lunging tackles like an impala and the young striker, Matt Allen, who was rumoured to be on his way to Sheffield United but who ended up working under the same roof as me at Legal and General.

Fast-forward to 2020 and my return to watch Saltdean has coincided with another set of players that could challenge for the crown of County League champions, something Saltdean narrowly missed out on back in the ‘90s. My first visit, however, didn’t suggest the team had the potential that they have since shown. In the 2018/19 unfinished season, Saltdean were 18^th out of twenty teams when lockdown struck and when I saw them lose their opening game, an FA Cup tie against a much better Eastbourne Town team, 3-1, led by their nuisance of a striker, Trevor McCreadie, I thought that a season of struggle lay ahead and in the first few weeks of the season, there were glimmers of good football, but the games they did win felt pretty fortunate. They were solid defensively, but didn’t offer a great deal going forward and the two wins they found were through penalties, a fortuitous own goal and effective set pieces. Two wins, two draws and a loss in the opening five games though meant that they were in the mix at the top of the league, slightly off the pace of leaders, Horley Town.

I’d been enjoying it nonetheless as had Simon. Tuesday night games, we went to on our own, but on Saturdays, we dragged along our children, three eleven-year-old boys. One Tuesday night, we were in for a few treats as we made the 35-munute journey to East Preston. Treat number one was the wonderful burgers that EP served up. Treat number two was the generosity of their defence. Treat number three was a whole host of new signings that Saltdean had made. There were only a couple of recognisable faces in the starting eleven from the opening day and Saltdean had clearly been ambitious in recruiting some top talent. The two stand-out performers on that night were Reece Hallard, a skilful winger with electric pace and that nuisance from Eastbourne Town, Trevor McCreadie, the kind of player that you love to have in your team for his tenacity, pace and potent finishing, but someone you’d hate to have against you because quite simply, he’d properly wind you up. That night, he got himself into a scuffle over nothing, got the opposition player-manager so furious that he had to restrained and banged in a couple of goals. Hallard scored two that night as well and Saltdean triumphed 8-0 and looked invincible.

A few weeks later, Saltdean have won every match, advancing in the Sussex Senior Cup and FA Vase and clambering to the summit of the table. Reece Hallard, for sure, has been the stand-out player, scoring six goals in six games including the brace at East Preston. Trevor McCreadie managed to get himself sent off the game after East Preston and had been on the side-lines for every game since, but away at Little Common was his long-awaited return.

Having reached the top of the table, how would Saltdean cope in the swirling Eastbourne wind? Would it be a leveller that meant Little Common could terrorise the Tigers? Would Trev find the back of the net or would he find himself in the referee’s notebook once again?

The 78 people present were in for another treat – well, a treat if they were a Saltdean fan anyway. Trev was back among the goals: he was first to react when the LC keeper spilled a long-range effort and he tucked the ball into the bottom corner. Then, as the defence backed away from him like he had a skunk down his pants, he unleashed a belter from thirty yards which pinged deliciously off the underside of the crossbar and into the net, surely the best goal I’ve seen at this level: 2-0. LC pulled one back before half-time, but they’d had the substantial advantage of the wind in the first half and now it was Saltdean’s turn to have the twelfth man: Gale Force 6. It was another new signing, Harry Shooman’s turn to shine in this half and he should be grateful that I no longer work for The Sports Argus and now bother with giving the reader second-half detail. Left-back Shooman scored an improbable hat-trick in the second-half, but to be fair to Shooey, he’s far more than a left-back. Despite Saltdean playing a back four, he has the athleticism and energy to be always available defensively and offensively, offering the team the solidity of Stuart Pearce and the attacking verve of John Barnes. The other remarkable detail about his hat-trick was that he scored them all with his right-foot, a close range finish after a neat one-two, a powerful drive from the edge of the area and a wind-assisted cross that swirled over the keeper. Our little cluster of five fans were delighted with the result. The only man seemingly dissatisfied was Trevor who was so, so desperate for a hat-trick himself and seemed personally insulted that the left-back should have the temerity to score three. Trev kept hustling, but when a goal wouldn’t come, he did the next best thing and clattered through the back of a Little Common player and got himself a yellow card.

I’ve loved my Saltdean adventure so far. I’d just wanted to stand at the side of a pitch, chatting with a friend and enjoying a game of football. I’ve got that, but I’ve also got the thrill of a title chase. I’ve briefly exchanged words with the manager, enjoying the fact that I got to tell him that he’d reached the summit of the league as a result of other goals going his way before anyone else got the news in first. I’ve got into a couple of mild and good-natured arguments with opposition players and coaches when I’ve felt that they’ve overstepped the mark in their attempt to mislead the referee and I’ve been there for the drama, not watched it from the comfort of my sofa. The crowd noise has been real even if it’s mostly come from me.  

Here's a photo from Saturday's match. You can see the five of us to the right in the background.