And so to the William Scholes Playing Fields in Gatley, otherwise known as Scholes Park (named after a former Gatley resident and estate agent), for a bonus match in the Lancashire and Cheshire Amateur Football League Division One between High Lane FC and Bury Amateur AFC. This match is running alongside Cavaliers v Astley & Tyldesley in Manchester League Division Two on the Athletics Track - a game comfortably won 5-1 by the visitors.
High Lane FC was founded in 1985 as High Lane Juniors Football Club to allow local residents' sons to play in competitive junior football. The club grew over the years and in 2008 became High Lane FC introducing an open age team, initially playing in the East Cheshire Sunday League, and then moving to the Lancs and Cheshire on Saturdays.
Champions of Division 3 in 2014, and then winning Division 2 the following year, Lane are currently top of the First Division this time, albeit having played more games than their rivals.
Bury Amateur
AFC had two predecessors - Bury Athenaeum who lasted six seasons starting in
1903 and Bury Doric's who played one pre World War I campaign and never
resurfaced. The Ammies were established on 28 February 1921 at the town's Derby
Hotel, playing at the old Golf Links on Manchester Road.
The club won three successive Central championships in the Lancashire Amateur League between 1924 and 1926. During this period the Ammies merged with Bury Sports Club in 1925, but it was not a happy relationship and was terminated in 1934, and the team relocated to Redvales, off Manchester Road. Another move to the Warth Riverside Ground, betwixt the River Irwell and the Manchester to Bury electrified railway came about two years later in 1936.
Further championships were won after World War II, but the team became groundless in 1965, and was forced to play their fixtures at the Lancashire Fusiliers Regiment barracks. Bury won two more championships in 1985 and 1990.
But the club's long term future was secured early in the Millennium with the amalgamation with Prestwich-based junior club, Drinkwater Warriors, and the Ammies now play at Drinkwater Park in Prestwich. Joining the Manchester League in 2008 Bury won the First Division in their second season to be promoted to the Premier - but the first team quit to become Bury A F C in 2011.
However the rest of Bury Amateur AFC remained unchanged, playing in the Lancashire and Cheshire Amateur Football League. As runners up in Division Three in 2013 the side was promoted, and then moved up to Division One a year after, where they remain, currently lying mid-table.
Storm Otto
has wreaked its havoc with trampolines on the railway line and tarpaulins on
the overhead wires. But still beyond House of Boba and Cheshire Stoves &
Fires I reach Timperley village centre and the iconic Frank Sidebottom statue.
Thereafter it's Altrincham Kersal RUFC, Baguley, home of Wythenshawe Town (a third game later on for the second half - it finishes 3-0 v Litherland REMYCA), then Wythenshawe Park, Menorah Synagogue and Sharston, home of Wythenshawe Amateurs and Hellermann Tyton before I arrive at Gatley - numberplates en route are CA2 1 WUF and L99 GND, with a gardener advertising himself as The Lawn Ranger... Honeybear Nursery, the Horse and Farrier and the old Tatton cinema - now a Co-op - precede a right turn, by the railway station, into Oakwood Avenue and then Beech Avenue, at the end of which is Scholes Park.
Scholes Park hosts four football pitches, a strange children's slide and a grassed over athletics track, where Cavaliers play, plus a sports club building with changing rooms. The top end is bounded by the Airport railway line - a steady stream of passenger services and one freight today - above is the flight path and with plenty of parking it really is Planes, Trains and Automobiles !!
The crowd
barely scrapes double figures on a mild, cloudy afternoon, with the home fans
seemingly not knowing who today's opponents are... The game kicks off at four
minutes to two, with Lane in blue and black, Bury in red and black.
It's a tight, feisty, noisy affair with a flurry of yellow cards - but no goals, mainly due to some breathtaking saves from Bury keeper Liam White. That is until the 90th minute when Ammies' Anthony O'Brien breaks free on the right and hits a rising, stunning piledriver into the top corner - Bury Amateur snatch the points 1-0 and High Lane fall to third in the table.
