Pub Football

I must admit that if Darlo are playing live on the telly, I much prefer to watch it from the comfort of my front room - that way, it's less of a journey home if we lose.

However both John Wilson and I got an email from Jamie, landlord of Hoopers Bar in Camberwell, a week or two ago asking if we'd like to watch the Carling Cup game against Leeds United round his gaff?

We've had a few trips to Hoopers over the past few years - it's not exactly local to us but is close if we're visiting Champion Hill Stadium, the home of Dulwich Hamlet FC - and so Jamie knows that we're both Darlo fans.

John was keen - so was I - so we take up Jamie's kind offer and decamp to SE5 for the evening, along with our respective significant others. He's got some decent beer on - an elderflower-flavoured ale from Dark Star which is extremely more-ish.

Before the game starts we bump into Andy, the former landlord of the Gardeners Arms in Lewes. Some DAFTS may remember our memorable visit to this pub a few years ago - so enjoyable it became the first "non-league" winner of the DAFTS Pub Of The Year.

(left) Andy, formerly of the Gardeners Arms, Lewes

Andy is a veritable football enthusiast - he supports Swindon as well as Berwick Rangers (and Lewes FC until recently) and goes to almost all of their games plus various others which last season amounted to to over 160 competitive football games.

Tonight he's off to the first home game of Fisher FC - back from the dead after going into liquidation during the summer - who are playing the mighty Beckenham Town at the Champion Hill Stadium. A visit to Hoopers is therefore an obvious pre-match move.

The pre-match preamble from Sky sees old boy Robbie Blake as one of the studio pundits and he's looking a tad nervous - no doubt he's still showing the scars of being descended on by Neil Johnson during a pre-season tour on the Isle of Man several years ago and wondering if it will happen again. Don't worry son, he's safely ensconced in Norway these days.

The game kicks off and after a nervy start we begin to move the ball around with a little bit of confidence - not much penetration but Lee Thorpe is competing well in the air and Dowson is working hard.

In defence Miller and Foster deal quite well with the threat from Showunmi and Knight generally copes fairly well with all that was sent in his direction. Going in nil-nil at half-time was heartening and was without doubt an improvement over the first 45 mins at Aldershot.

In the second half, Leeds came out and went at Darlo with a purpose and this soon told - a narrow escape as a shot hit the woodwork and then the goal - Knight and Foster hesitated allowing Showunmi to nip between them and prod the ball into the net. Very soft.

Windass came on, followed by young Curtis Main, and it spurred Darlo into action - Dowson slotted the ball neatly past Higgs and into the net but was offside - Windass then wasted a good chance from a free-kick. At the death Bower should have done better with a header from a corner but it wasn't to be.

Overall it was an encouraging performance following on from the opening day of the season - most areas showed some signs of improvement but there is still a lot of sloppiness to be cut out.