Towpath

The Canal and River Trust have been redoing the towpath of the Leeds-Liverpool west of Saltaire, which means that for the moment it is looking more like a road, and the bank-side vegetation has suffered. This will all get weathered and softened over the next couple of years. 

The Greylag geese said hello as I was walking past the good boat Hygge on my way to some football at Salts FC. 

For the next couple of months, mid-week evening games can be scheduled at non-floodlit. grassroots grounds. After the wet winter many of the amateur leagues have quite a fixture backlog, hence we have teams playing on a Monday night, and in the case of tonight’s game, playing each other again on Wednesday and then back to the regular Saturday match. Tough on the players, but good for spectators like me who are given more options of (free) games to go and watch in the neighbourhood. 

Since I was last watching a Salts FC game, in August,  they have merged their first and reserve teams, resigned from the WYAFL and consolidated around what had been the reserve team’s spot in Division Two of the Yorkshire Amateur League (YAL). Effectively the club voluntarily gave themselves a mid-season two league demotion, and they are now four tiers lower than when I first came to watch them in 2017 and described them as up and coming! Since then they have been performing well, and climbing the table, and at the start of tonight’s game were sitting third, while the visitors, Gildersome Spurs Old Boys Reserves, were top. For much of the game the teams seemed well matched, but the Spurs were more clinical and ran out 4-2 winners.

Earlier, back at work now after my Easter break, my lunchtime walk in Woodhouse Moor in Leeds brought two more new butterfly species for the year: Speckled Wood and Small White, as well as a couple of Small Tortoiseshell.