Mossley v Warrington Town

Now we know Charlie Anderson's "underwear of choice" !!!!

  ... yes I made it despite all efforts from Royal Mail and the "parcel hungry" customers of Greenfield to cock it up  !!!

The BBC promised me nice weather in the afternoon - after 20 minutes I was suffering from "white finger" (all ten of 'em) in a bitterly cold wind.  Despite that I DID manage to press the shutter button a few times (although at times I had to confirm that my finger WAS on the shutter button - it was that bad !).  Fine performance from the home team against 3rd placed Warrington Town - capped off by a wonder strike from John Bennett to make it 2-2 with just a couple of minutes left (a 40 yard screamer completely missed by me - you just DON'T expect stuff like that ... maybe I should "gamble" - they're always shouting that word on the bench !)  More pictures at

Mossley 2 Warrington Town 2

... just about defrosted now - it's took a while ... might try a walk out with camera tomorrow (after checking the weather of course !!)
.

Tomorrow ...

... is another day (especially in Royal Mail-speak !)

As you (few) may have noticed, I made no game this mid-week - mainly because of the Manchester Derby on Tuesday night) - the only two optons were on Wednesday (Stalybridge lost 3-2 to Guiseley - and Ashton United had a fine 2-1 win at home against Chorley) - and Wednesday is our "Orange 2 for 1" option at the pictures - and I can thoroughly recommend "The Grand Budapest Hotel" - quirky, funny and an excellent story !
.
Tomorrow - only Mossley locally - which helps given our recent "modernisation" at RM ... which is still going pear-shaped on a regular basis ... should be interesting mind as they're taking on Warrington Town who are 3rd in the table at the moment.  Weather looks promising too, so assuming I can get through the sh*te that is "modernisation" at RM tomorrow ... I'll be there ...
.

Mossley v Harrogate RA

From this (1459hrs) ...











to this (1650hrs) ...

 

 
Blimey ... what a day weather-wise ... as if getting wet through at work in the morning/early afternoon wasn't bad enough ... turned up at the ground just in time for pre-kick-off (in fact I HAD turned down a "paid jobbie" at Curzon Ashton ... what with the new working patterns at work, I've been finding increasingly difficult to commit to getting anywhere for 1500 hrs kick-offs - which means a temporary halt at least to my "Non League Paper" commissions - sad I know, but you've gotta put main job first ..).

Fortunately with Mossley only being 5 minutes walk away I cracked it yesterday - in time to take a few pics of the Mossley Athletic JFC under-7s leading out the teams, followed by an impeccable one minutes' silence in memory of Stanley Ashworth ... blue skies and sunshine at this time.

Then the weather went crazy - we had everything in the following 90 minutes - but the most important thing was three points for Mossley.  Pictures at

Mossley 2 Harrogate RA 0

... thence home to dry out EVERYTHING !
.

Ashton United v Barwell ...

 

Ashton's Martin Pilkington ...

Another hammer blow in the Robins' quest for play-off/promotion - a second defeat to struggling Barwell in a matter of weeks ... pics at

Ashton United 0 Barwell 1

The lack of watermarks is due to some slight photographic problems at Ashton - so I'm being nice !!

Midweek football - have been offered a lift to a somewhat unusual game tomorrow night (sadly not Gigg Lane) - we'll see how work pans out ...
.

Meltham Walk Pics ...

... better late than never (I have been watching "The Miners Strike and Me" tonight - and yes I still get angry with Margaret Thatcher - until I remember she's dead ... and that cheers me up).

Enough politics (I could go on but ... no ...) Some pics from Sunday - again using the new cheap and cheerful 18-200 Tamron.

Meltham Walk 09Mar14

Learning to live with the very grainy effect at full range (note to self ... don't go the full 200 - maybe 180 max) - plus it WAS a lovely bright day ... which brings out the haze in the long distance efforts.  Obviously the best option here is to get involved with screw-on filters - but that's an area I've not really got my head around - yet !!  I do have a CPL (circular polarising) filter which fits onto my 77cm diameter lenses - have used it a few times - but no real examples to pull out.  I might try to get one for the 18-200, especially if we get more days like Sunday - I've rough idea of the theory whereby it helps to sort out the contrast,reflections and glare - but then again we don't get too much call for that in this country !!!!

 Quite happy with this one though ...

... a bit of a "smart-arse post-processing effort" involving selecting the rocks - removing the colour and darkening them a bit (!) - and then superimposing them back onto the original pic thus keeping the bright blue sky !  If you look at the original pic ...

... the rocks etc  just look totally 'washed out' compared to the bright blue sky - a CPL on the lens might have helped towards a better contrast without losing the sky ...

Here endeth Wednesday !
.

Curzon Ashton v Northwich Victoria

Chris Rowney escapes his marker ...

A lovely "summer-like" day - but then it dropped cold ... and it DOES get cold on Ashton Moss.  A very well-earned point for the visitors (who are on a bit of a roll) - but Curzon still go seven points clear at the top - pics at

Curzon Ashton 0 Northwich Victoria 0

Loads of snappers I know will always say "Go for Aperture Priority" (especially with an f2.8 lens) when doing stuff in low light - tried it again last night for a bit, but soon gave up.  Personally I feel it tends to over-expose - I guess this can be corrected in Photoshop etc. but I definitely feel more comfy fiddling about in "Shutter Priority" - us non-leaguers don't have the comfort zone of belting floodlights like the Premier League boys ... and whatever we do, it always looks better after a quick run through the 'Noise Reduction Software" ...

Note to self ... must get round to sorting out Sunday walk pics !!
.

Mossley v Wakefield ..

Two points lost - should have done better in the first half ... and got done in the 90th minute for an equaliser - aargh !  Some pictures at

Mossley 2 Wakefield 2

Even managed a quick lens change when Mossley got their penalty - left 70-200 lying around on the terraces (!!) while strapping on the 24-60 and dashing round to get behind the net ...

... and this kind of pic is a bit easier with the the 'Spot AF' focusing option on the EOS 7D - which enables you to really pinpoint your focusing through the goal net - in the past I've sometimes ended up with a very crisply focused goal net and everything else totally blurred !!  I remember "getting lucky" way back in my early days of DSLR at Salford City (September 2008 to be exact !!!) when I was crouched behind the net - Mike Fish making it 4-0 to Mossley ...

Always try to make sure I've got the 24-60 lens in my bag for certain cup-ties where there may well be penalty shoot-outs as well (although these days I can "get posh" and take two camera bodies if I feel the urge - saves the faffing about changing lenses etc !).

Been out for a work around Meltham Moor today - will have a look at pics sometime and load 'em up - - here's a quickie for now ... remember that "converging parallels/vanishing point" topic from a couple of weeks ago - here's another example (Springs Lane - an old causeway where you can see the grooves from the carts that used to move rock from the hillside quarries) ...

There is football tomorrow night as well  - Curzon Ashton continue their quest for the Evo-Stik 1 North title with a home game against Northwich Victoria ...
.

Ashton United v Kings Lynn ,,

 

Dale Johnson on the ball for Ashton

... for a match between two teams in the top six ... 'twas so one-sided as to be untrue - who would have expected a 5-1 mauling ???  OK maybe Ackers and Phillo (Ashton bosses).  A thoroughly enjoyable afternoon out after 6 days of poo at work - sunny but still cold - and a very good performance by the home team. One moan yet again - the only game on in Tameside today but still only 177 speccies turned up -maybe it's just me - and everyone else says "I can't travel today - but I'm NOT going anywhere else" - a shame really - surely we should all support each other on days like this ??? Hey ho ... you missed a good 'un.  Pics from today at

Ashton United 5 Kings Lynn Town 1

Looking like an empty midweek for football - but with Mrs S being away this weekend I may well take camera out for a walk tomorrow - looking for some good quality local pic ... for reasons that may  appear at a later date.

VERY VERY  late edit (after several shandies !!)   A pic from Jez (Ashton snapper)...

The "thumbs up" is good - but I just love the 'shadow' !!

.