Micky's Pembrokeshire
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Bluebirds welcome ‘ground hopper’ Bob!
An interested spectator at Haverfordwest County’s disappointing draw with Cardiff Corinthians was Bob Mewse, the latest ‘ground hopper’ to turn up at the Conygar Bridge Meadow to watch a match.
Bob hails from Bristol and is a self-confessed Bristol City fan since he was 14, when he moved to the city from Watford and changed his footballing allegiance as well. In the intervening 45 years he has followed City all over the country and a measure of his steadfastness can be gauged from the fact that, apart from one month in October 2005, when he was out of the country, he hasn’t missed another home match in 14 years!
Right choice and a warm welcome
This match was actually Bob’s 128th of the season so far and his visit to the county town was based on a close study of the weather situation on the BBC. The choice was either Haverfordwest or a match in the Cymru Alliance but with snow a possibility further north in Wales he plumped for the Bluebirds!
Then it was a short trip to the train station to Filton Abbey Wood and a day return to Newport, where he booked an ‘Over 55’ day return on Aviva trains and strolled across to the Conygar Bridge Meadow Stadium, where he met commercial director David Hughes and several regular Bluebirds’ fans, who made him welcome and caused him to comment that in general he has found Welsh fans to be very friendly.
Over 400 grounds and still counting
Over a cup of coffee supplied by Veronica Ellis and Co he told PembrokeshireSport.co.uk that he now had only 11 grounds to visit from the three divisions of the Welsh League but none had looked better than the Bridge Meadow. He has also visited almost all of the Western League, the South Western League and the Southern League in his tally of over 400 clubs visited, which includes five Scottish teams and once across on the ferry for a Republic of Ireland versus Malta match. Also on his list is one rugby match because whilst he was travelling in Cardiff he couldn’t resist paying a visit to the new stadium to watch Cardiff Blues play!
At one stage this included 89 of the 92 top league clubs in the old Football League but with so many teams having changed grounds or new teams joined the set-up he has fallen well away from that figure of 97%!
Clive Thomas made amends
In all his time of travelling around grounds he has only had to put up with one late cancellation and that came when former legendary Welsh ref Clive Thomas decided, just ten minutes before kick-off, that Bristol City’s match at Torquay couldn’t take place – but was totally forgiven since he signed Bob’s match programme!
When the game ended Bob was looking forward to a look around the town of Haverfordwest, a quick snack then the train journeys back to Bristol which saw him getting home before ten o’clock – and it really was nice to see such a gentleman of football drop in at the Conygar Bridge Meadow Stadium to watch Haverfordwest County!
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