The moment when everything is ruined again

Taking the rough with the smooth. Life teaches you that you ought to do so. But when you're a football supporter, it's something that is tough to do.

This morning, I woke expectant of a Whitby win. We'd grown used to winning again. The feel good factor has been building up, and a trip to face Skelmersdale brought with it the optimism that we might just be the first team to win there this season. How wrong could I be?

A full bus. A rarity on Whitby away days!

The truth is, we really did play well. Yes, we didn't have a great amount of chances, but we were comfortable. Graeme Armstrong continued his lethal goalscoring form, netting his 23rd of the season. Not bad, right? Craig Farrell is also showing glimpses of getting back to his best, after scoring his third goal in 2 games. Positive signs right there. It wasn't all positive though, especially in the 87th minute. All afternoon we'd been giving away stupid free-kicks (the referee didn't help at times by giving the softer "fouls"), so it was only a matter of time before we were punished. When we were, it opened the floodgates. Tom Ince netted a beauty of a free-kick, although I feel Blandy could have done better with it. 2-2 led to 3-2, with substitute Ince playing a role again. With the wind taken totally out of our sails, 3-2 led to 4-2 and a feeling of shellshock... Or a feeling of being hit in the knackers by a Craig Farrell free-kick. Not nice. I won't dwell on the game anymore though, but what I will say is, the play-offs are still there for the taking, as Darren told me in his post-match interview. Onwards and upwards is the best way to look at it! As a final note on it, I'd like to thank Skelmersdale for their excellent hospitality. It's nice to go somewhere and have a laugh with the opposition fans.

Skelmersdale United. Not the best ground I've visited, but the natives were nice...

One bit of Northern League news that made me chuckle today was about ex-Whitby player, Leon Scott. When previewing the Darlington game today, the Northern Echo stated that Scott would not be included in Darlington's squad due to "modelling commitments". If that happened whilst he was with Whitby, the Shed would torture him. Maybe just say work commitments next time, Leon...

This, or football? Yeah, poor choice Leon.

On to the professional game, I avidly watched about 5 minutes of Middlesbrough-Leeds today with our chairman, a Boro supporter. Safe to say, neither of us were too impressed by the game, and promptly stopped watching. The game was summed up by a) Noel Hunt "playing" up front for Leeds, and b) Leeds not having a shot on target all game. Put two and two together on that one; you'll get four every time. Bring back Michael Ricketts, at least he gave us a laugh whilst being useless.

"Your dad's a Hunt, and so are you..."

A lot of complaining has taken place today about Whatsapp servers going down. All I will say is, it's a Facebook company now. Don't expect the world, you will be disappointed.

I don't particularly like Facebook, but unfortunately, it's a useful tool for me, which therefore means it's unlikely that I'll be deactivating it any time soon.. For instance, it helped me to get Paul 'Yakka' Pitman back into the Whitby Town public eye. Since my first contact, after finding him on Facebook, he has had numerous interviews for the club media section, and has even returned to the Turnbull, for the first time since leaving. If I hadn't found him on Facebook, he'd have remained without any contact with the club, and as the club's greatest ever player, that would have been a great shame. Next task, get David Campbell his testimonial, and get 'Yakka' back onto the hallowed Turnbull turf. I just want that one chance to see him play... A legend of the club, that I've never seen play!

The return of the Yack... It was all down to Facebook initially...

So, until next time, that's my lot.
Enjoy the late blog...
Paul