Tomorrow's Opponents: Chadderton

The boards of the Park Road theatre of football get trodden on again tomorrow evening as Cheadle face a tricky league match against Chadderton.

The signs that Chadderton were going to do alright this season were there for Polardin and I to see at the end of last term as they comfortably beat Cheadle 3-0 in a wet and windy night at Andrew Street.

The takeover that was in process at that point was completed at the start of this season and the input of new owners Tony Bhatti and Craig Halliwell has certainly had a positive impact at the club as they come to Park Road sitting pretty in 3rd place and with a 100% away record; their only two defeats all season have come at home to New Mills and Padiham, so they're no mugs by any means.

Off the pitch, Chadderton are having a rough time of it to say the least. Their ground has been repeatedly vandalised and broken into by local youths (who else?) over the past week with one incident involving local youths (them again) throwing stones at players that were taking part in a training match and vandalising the stand at the same time. This has come about due to a dispute over "public space" which, to cut a long story short, means that Chadderton FC have to leave their gates unlocked because the land is designated as "open access".

Local youths being local youths, once the story about the first case of vandalism that contained the words "unlocked gates" hit the local papers they did the predictable thing and descended on the club in their cancerous droves, thus resulting in the ridiculous spate of destruction at Andrew Street over the past week or so. Add to this the local councillor appearing in the local press cleaning the sign outside the ground that declares it as open space and you get the picture of a local football club being set upon by the very people who should be supporting it.

They are considering relocating to another site if this nonsense continues. I don't blame them.

Back to the match. This is a great chance for Cheadle to put the disappointment of Saturday behind them and clock up a result against one of the teams that will probably be "there or thereabouts" at the top of the table come the end of the season. Here's hoping that we can be the team to break Chadderton's immaculate away record.

Come on Cheadle!