CRAIG BIDDLESTONE

Crystal Palace fought out a goalless draw. But this is where the fun starts - Queens Park (yes, the Scottish team) and Donington School couldn’t arrange a suitable venue, so both were allowed through to the second round, Royal Engineers and Wanderers also both went through also due to Reigate Primary and Harrow Chequers dropping out, and Hampstead Heathens were given a bye.

The competition was overly southern-centric, with the strange exception of Queens Park of course, and in more bizarre fashion Queens Park were again drawn against Donington School in the second round, but Donington decided to drop out all together so Queens Park advanced to the third round without kicking a ball!

The other second round results saw Crystal Palace win 3-0 at home to Maidenhead, Wanderers win 1-0 at Clapham Rovers, Royal. Engineers win 5-0 at Hitchin, and Hampstead Heathens win 1-0 at Barnes, after drawing 1-1, at Barnes!

This meant there were 5 teams left in the 3rd round - now we all know that doesn’t work, so unbelievably Queens Park received another bye so had got to the semi-finals, of the

English FA Cup without even playing a game. To add to the confusion (because 5 has to go in to 4, surely?), Wanderers and Crystal Palace drew 0-0, but no replay was needed as both teams were allowed to progress to the semi’s on the back of that result, and Royal Engineers made up the four with a 3-0 win at home to Hampstead Heathens.

On to the semi’s, both games were played at Kennington Oval, but there was yet more bizarreness in the inaugural competition as despite Queens Park and Wanderers drawing 0-0 the Scottish side withdrew as they couldn’t afford a second trip down to London, and this despite Wanderers offering to play an extra 30 minutes. The other game between Crystal Palace and Royal Engineers also ended goalless, with Engineers winning the replay 3-0 at the same venue.

All of the excitement of the earlier rounds made the final look dull, Wanderers winning 1-0 against Royal Engineers at Kennington Oval after a 15th minute goal from Morton Betts.

So that history lesson has ended, and thankfully today’s modern competition doesn’t have anywhere near the amount of

Craig Biddlestone

controversy (Roger Milford, 1991 being the exception!) - the last time anything newsworthy happened was when Man Utd refused to play in 2000 because they were busy abroad!

On to today, and whilst it’s our first competitive home game of the season, the two home games after this will seem a little different in the ground - mainly because I’m on holiday. I’m not one for willingly missing Ossett United home games but as a volunteer both family time and family holidays are certainly higher in the priority list - plus I need some sun, and we aren’t getting a lot of that at the moment!

Following the success of last weeks half-time playlist (hit songs from 1961), today’s selection as chosen by one of our season ticket holders will be hit songs from 1998.

Enjoy the songs, and the game.