Year 1 children from schools around the Bradley Stoke area entered teams into the Football Festival at the Bradley Stoke Community Festival over the weekend – organised by Martin Lee and other Bradley Stoke Youth FC (BSYFC) coaches. A total of 13 different schools took part, with 10-minute matches throughout the day, which were enjoyed by everyone who was there.
Throughout the year, the teams had enjoyed coaching from the BSYFC staff who went to different schools to run football clubs and sessions. This was when the awards were given to each school, although being presented at the end of the tournament on Saturday afternoon. Various awards were presented, such as ‘Festival of Football winners’ and ‘School Club Link’. These were not awarded for the footballing results at the Festival, as the children are too young and some are better than others.
The schools’ matches were played throughout the day on three different pitches that were set up on the top field at the Jubilee Centre whilst the rest of the Community Festival was going down on the bottom two fields, where live music and a demonstration arena kept the crowds happy with various different shows.
Photo: Football Festival trophy winners. [Photo credit: Robert Harris]
Listen to Connor Summers’s interview with Football Festival organiser Martin Lee:
Audio clip courtesy of Connor Summers and Bradley Stoke Radio
There were also several other sports on show at the Community Festival, including a Whitlock Martial Arts demonstration, a St Mary’s Old Boy’s RFC rugby demonstration and a cheerleading and gymnastics demonstration that filled up the other sports sections over the course of the weekend, along with the Bradley Stoke 10K Run on the Sunday morning that was won by Andrew Cooke of Bristol & West running club.
Cricket: Bradley Stoke Cricket Club (BSCC)
Of course, Bradley Stoke Cricket Club were in action this weekend as well, as they had league matches on Saturday and Sunday in addition to the charity match on the Sunday afternoon in which the BSCC President’s XI beat the Mayor’s XI in the last over of the game.
In the Saturday league matches, the First Team secured their first win of the season away to Portishead, beating the home side by six wickets. The home team were put into bat and bowled out by a relatively low 136 on a beautiful sunny day at the Lake Grounds. Wayne Passmore was the pick of the bowlers picking up four wickets. With a small total to reach, the Bradley Stoke openers scored 50 in the first 8 overs, however, not long after that, being dismissed in quick succession. S Davis came in at number 3 and top scored with a solid 34 meaning Bradley Stoke reached the total with 23 overs still to bowl.
The Second Team were hoping to continue their table topping start to the season with a win at home against Failand and Portbury. The away team batted first with a low total of 156, the pick of the bowlers was Barry Radford who picked up three wickets for just 29 runs and also showed his batting skills winning the game for the home side on the last ball of the game, leaving him and his batting partner on a combined total of 53 not out ensuring that the Second Team end up on winning ways.
In the Sunday League match, and the game of the weekend undoubtedly, where the Sunday League team were playing away at Pottern where Bradley Stoke batted first and posted an astonishing 423-9 with some help from teenager Joe Coles who posted an impressive 255 which helped them kick start the first innings. In the second innings with Bradley Stoke fielding, the batting was also to a very high level where the home side posted an impressive 378 with help from 181 which was hit by Ed Fruen.
Cricket: Festival Charity Match
In the first innings of the game, the Mayor’s XI were put into bat and batted very well at the start of the innings with Goodwin and Mawer scoring 29 and 30 before being dismissed. Then there was a middle order collapse where four different batsman scored zero, falling to the same spinner George Mailing, who took five wickets.
Then came a more stable batting partnership at the end where batsmen numbers 8 and 10 scored a 49 partnership that earned the Mayor’s XI a creditable 135 in their 20 overs.
In the second innings of the game, Bradley Stoke made some solid scores in bat and although the game went all the way down to the last over, victory did end up going to Bradley Stoke.
 | Article by Connor Summers |
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Disappointed there was no year 3/4 girls football completion this year