{"id":15783,"date":"2014-12-29T13:43:50","date_gmt":"2014-12-29T13:43:50","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.urban75.org\/blog\/?p=15783"},"modified":"2014-12-29T13:54:50","modified_gmt":"2014-12-29T13:54:50","slug":"newport-county-sweep-aside-plymouth-argyle-on-a-dark-and-miserable-boxing-day-afternoon","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.urban75.org\/blog\/newport-county-sweep-aside-plymouth-argyle-on-a-dark-and-miserable-boxing-day-afternoon\/","title":{"rendered":"Newport County sweep aside Plymouth Argyle on a dark and miserable Boxing Day afternoon"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"Newport<\/p>\n

With the\u00a0rebranded and corporatise<\/a>d\u00a0Cardiff City no longer on my sporting agenda<\/a>,\u00a0we travelled to Newport on a wet and cold Boxing Day afternoon to watch the home team take on Plymouth Argyle in League 2.<\/p>\n

<\/p>\n

\"Newport<\/p>\n

Ticket Office and notice for the, err, Superstore<\/em><\/p>\n

Newport play at the Rodney Parade stadium<\/a>, which is shared (and owned) by Newport Rugby Football Club.<\/p>\n

Located close to the centre of town, it’s a curious affair, with the ticket office and main bar a considerable distance from the stands, being situated at the far end of the adjacent training pitch.<\/p>\n

\"Newport<\/p>\n

View from the bar<\/em><\/p>\n

Last time I saw Newport County play was at their old Somerton Park<\/a> ground,\u00a0a splendidly knackered old ground that was full of character.<\/p>\n

Unfortunately, Newport suffered a series of calamities from the\u00a0late 1980s onwards, eventually going bust in 1989 and, after reforming, losing Somerton Park in 1993 over historic rent debts. \u00a0[—<\/a>]<\/p>\n

\"Newport<\/p>\n

The weather outside was frightful, so\u00a0much beer was needed for the upcoming 90 minutes. Here’s a view taken inside the large and rather soulless bar dominated by a large video screen that\u00a0was set up in such a way that you couldn’t see the score in the top right hand corner.<\/p>\n

Mind you, I liked the fact that the Chelsea game was immediately taken off and replaced by the Cardiff Blues vs Newport Gwent Dragons rugby game\u00a0when\u00a0it started.<\/p>\n

\"Newport<\/p>\n

We\u00a0quickly hiked to Gate 3 and took our place in the two-tier Hazell stand, which has just under 2,000 seats and a standing terrace. \u00a0Naturally, we opted to stand.<\/p>\n

\"Newport<\/p>\n

These poor kids had to wave flags about in the pouring rain.<\/p>\n

\"Newport<\/p>\n

The new Bisley stand offers over 2,500 seats and 13 hospitality boxes for the\u00a0brechdan corgimwch<\/em> brigade.<\/p>\n

The attendance\u00a0of 5,020 was Newport’s highest this season<\/a>.<\/p>\n

\"Newport<\/p>\n

The ground’s rugby heritage is reflected in the electronic scoreboard, which remained stuck at 80 minutes. The lower board strangely added a 3 and a 4 to the first and second half times respectively.<\/p>\n

\"Newport<\/p>\n

Newport scored in the 9th minute, prompting the home crowd to remind the travelling\u00a0Plymouth support that it was “1-0 to the sheepshaggers.”<\/p>\n

\"Newport<\/p>\n

It was end to end stuff during the first half, with the rain never stopping. Newport looked the strongest team though, and launched a wave of attacks.<\/p>\n

\"Newport<\/p>\n

Despite the conditions, the pitch was on fabulous condition.<\/p>\n

\"Newport<\/p>\n

Here’s a view of the basic facilities behind the Hazell stand.<\/p>\n

\"Newport<\/p>\n

\"Newport<\/p>\n

Snack bar.<\/p>\n

\"Newport<\/p>\n

Newport continued the pressure as soon as the second half started.<\/p>\n

\"Newport<\/p>\n

Plymouth came close\u00a0not long after the break with their first effort on goal, and only a sprightly save by the Newport ‘keeper prevented them equalising in the 50th minute.<\/p>\n

\"Newport<\/p>\n

Newport still looked to be in command of the game though, and the fella in the bright pink outfit was kept busy all afternoon.<\/p>\n

\"Newport<\/p>\n

\"Newport<\/p>\n

\"Newport<\/p>\n

\"Newport<\/p>\n

The Plymouth supporters were forced to stand on uncovered, open terracing, and with the rain pelting down all afternoon, it must have been a miserable experience.<\/p>\n

They still made a pretty good noise though.<\/p>\n

\"Newport<\/p>\n

Newport made it 2-0 in the 80th minute.<\/p>\n

\"Newport<\/p>\n

\"Newport<\/p>\n

\"Newport<\/p>\n

The\u00a0second goal seemed to knock the stuffing out of Plymouth, who looked resigned to their fate for the final ten minutes.<\/p>\n

\"Newport<\/p>\n

I enjoyed my trip to Rodney Parade – in many respects the atmosphere reminded me of Cardiff City when they were in the old Division Four – and once again I realised that I have no desire to ever go back to the higher divisions.<\/p>\n

Standing on\u00a0open\u00a0terracing is an essential part of the football experience for me, although that experience is at its finest amongst the wonderful Dulwich Hamlet rabble<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Coming soon:<\/strong> Newport’s weird emo-paedobear,\u00a0Spytty the Dog.<\/p>\n

Archive reports:<\/strong>
\nCardiff\u00a0City\u00a02 Plymouth Argyle 2,\u00a0Dec 26th 2006<\/a>
\nCardiff City 1 Plymouth Argyle 0,\u00a0Jan 1st 2008<\/a>
\nCardiff City 1 Plymouth Argyle 0, Dec 28th\u00a02008<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

With the\u00a0rebranded and corporatised\u00a0Cardiff City no longer on my sporting agenda,\u00a0we travelled to Newport on a wet and cold Boxing Day afternoon to watch the home team take on Plymouth … <\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":15785,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2},"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false},"categories":[7,17,193,198],"tags":[1192,1042,1039,1041,1040],"class_list":["post-15783","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-football","category-photos","category-places","category-wales-places","tag-football","tag-league-two","tag-newport-county","tag-plymouth-argyle","tag-rodney-parade"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/www.urban75.org\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2014\/12\/newport-county-plymouth-18.jpg","jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/pQI7P-46z","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_likes_enabled":true,"amp_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.urban75.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/15783","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.urban75.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.urban75.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.urban75.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.urban75.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=15783"}],"version-history":[{"count":9,"href":"https:\/\/www.urban75.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/15783\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":15795,"href":"https:\/\/www.urban75.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/15783\/revisions\/15795"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.urban75.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/15785"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.urban75.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=15783"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.urban75.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=15783"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.urban75.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=15783"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}