Damage in the Box!: BALA TOWN (Maes Tegid)

Gary Speed 1969 - 2011

To be honest, football seemed quite irrelevant today as en-route to Bala the news broke on the radio that Gary Speed had died. For an all too brief period, I had the pleasure of seeing Gary Speed play for Everton and fullfilling every Evertonian's dream of going from the Goodison terraces to wearing the famous royal blue shirt.

Obviously the acrimonious nature of his departure back in January 1998 tainted his relationship in the eyes of many Evertonians and he was subjected to, with hindsight, unfair abuse on his subsequent visits. I have to confess to barracking him on his initial return with Newcastle.

Gary Speed was painted as the villain of the piece but the fact that he chose to keep his own council, rather than, as he stated at the time "damage the good name of Everton Football Club" by giving his side of the story, showed him to be the bigger man. Bigger than the people who barracked him.

Today put it all into perspective. I just hope you forgave us. Thoughts are with your family and friends. Rest in peace Blue.

Onto the trivial matter of a game of football. It was another "Sunday bonus" of a chance to head to a ground last visited in the dim and distant past. Maes Tegid has had quite a bit of work done to it since my last visit in 2004, when they were a Cymru Alliance outfit.

The ground now has seats along one side of the pitch, a covered terrace behind the goal and hard standing all the way around.

From memory the only thing I can recall from my last trip are the changing rooms, with the overhang (still in place) and the fact you couldn't walk around the pitch without getting your feet very wet and/or muddy, oh and Flint were 5-0 down at Half Time!

Full-time outfit Neath were the visitors today but there was no such joy on the goals front, as the game somehow ended goalless. After an impeccably observed minutes silence in tribute to Gary Speed, the visitors had the best chances of a lacklustre first period, hitting the woodwork twice. Craig Hughes smashed a shot against the crossbar before Chris Jones did the same from a free kick.

The second half was more entertaining as Bala took control of the game, substitute Stef Edwards being the catalyst as he caused plenty of problems for the Neath defence.

Bala hit the woodwork twice themselves in the second and missed numerous other chances. Edwards was the first to hit the post, followed by Stephen Brown. Brown also missed a sitter, when it seemed easier to score and on another day Mark Connolly may have had a hat-trick.

In the end both teams had to settle for a point, but as mentioned at the beginning, it was all really irrelevant today.