In his first post for Hopper’s Guide this season, Steve Sharman seeks some post-summer holiday recovery time at Woodside Road, home to the Blues of Bishop’s Stortford, as they take on Real Bedford in the FA Cup.
It’s September, and it’s raining. The summer holidays are over, the kids are back at school, and it’s almost cold enough to break out the big coat.
As much as I enjoy the metronomic bounce-thud of the trampoline against my office wall, KPop Demon Hunters on repeat, and having my toenails painted all the colours of the rainbow by my never-endingly creative daughters, it’s time to get back to business: travelling to random parts of the country to stand in the freezing cold, in the horizontal rain, to watch 22 fellas run around a field booting a glorified pigs bladder up in the air.
The habitual voyeur that is known as… Groundhopping.
Tonight, with free reign over the car stereo for the first time in six weeks and a choice of grounds to head for, I’ve opted to fully reject the teeny-pop that has haunted all my waking moments for the last six weeks in favour of an ear-drum shattering playlist centred on Breaking Benjamin and Bullet for my Valentine, and an FA Cup First Qualifying Round replay at Woodside Road between Bishop’s Stortford and Real Bedford to quench my football thirst.
The sides met at Bedford just three days ago and could not be separated in 90 minutes, ending in a 1-1 draw. No such stalemate will be allowed this evening; the tie will be settled tonight, with the winners facing a trip to Hemel Hempstead Town in the second qualifying round.
Bishop’s Stortford: The Blue Brazil?
Formed over 150 years ago in 1874, the Blues of Bishop’s Stortford – the Blue Brazil, as one banner proudly proclaims – have a long and colourful history. Having spent decades moving between the Hertfordshire County League, the Delphian League, and the Athenian League, the club settled into a 32-year run in the Isthmian League, bouncing between Division One and the Premier Division before the creation of the regional conference divisions saw them placed in the Conference South for the 2004/05 season.
Stortford’s geographical location places them somewhat at the mercy of the vagaries of the FA’s allocation whims. Having spent seven seasons in the National League South, the Blues were transferred to the National League North for the 2011/12 and 2012/13 seasons before another reshuffle saw them back in the South division. Stortford were relegated at the end of the 2016/17 season and were placed in the Southern League for a single season, before being transferred to the Isthmian Premier.
The 2022/23 season saw the Blues storm to the title, but promotion saw them placed in the National League North; away trips to far-flung exotic places such as Darlington, Spennymoor, and South Shields proved a heavy burden on the club’s finances. The resulting on-field collapse meant they finished rock bottom with just 21 points, shipping a whopping 112 goals in the process, dropping Stortford to where we find them today, in the Southern League Premier Central.
Somewhat against the odds, the Blues have had a very good start to the 2025/26 season, sitting pretty with a 100% record in the league after four games, scoring 11 goals and conceding just once. Coming into tonight, Stortford remain unbeaten this season.
Real Bedford: The Bitcoin Brazil?
By contrast, Real Bedford – at least in the current iteration of the club – has a short but somewhat spectacular history. The Pirates have only been in existence for three years and, remarkably, have never failed to win the league or scored fewer than 100 goals in a league season.
The roots of the club that have become Real Bedford, however, go far deeper.
Bedford United were formed in 1957 and joined the United Counties League in the early 1970s. The club joined the South Midland League in the 1989/90 season, and remained until a merger with the Spartan League created the Spartan South Midland League, where Bedford were placed in the Premier Division North.
In 2002, Bedford United merged with Unione Sportiva Valerio to become Bedford United & Valerio. A further name change in 2006 – to Bedford Valerio United – was short-lived, as in 2007 the ‘Valerio United’ was dropped and the club became simply Bedford Football Club.
And so it remained until 2022, when Bitcoin magnate Peter McCormack took over, added the suffix ‘Real’, and made bold claims of Premier League Ambitions. Although the Premier League is still some distance away, there is no denying that the rapid progress has been impressive. However, some will point to the huge investment in the club – most notably $4.5 million from the Winklevoss twins – as unfairly distorting the playing field, and accuse the owner of buying rather than earning success.
Perhaps not so far from the Premier League after all…
The first season for Real Bedford was the 2022/23 season, during which the newly rebranded Pirates won the Spartan South Midlands League Division One title, earning promotion to the Premier Division. More success followed in the 2023/24 season as Real Bedford once again finished as champions, sealing promotion to the Southern League. The 2024/25 season saw a third consecutive success, as the Pirates claimed the Southern League Division One Central title, resulting in promotion to the Premier Central Division.
Life at step three has proved slightly tougher for Real Bedford, with the Pirates only accruing five points from their opening five league games prior to tonight.
FA Cup Pedigree
Bishop’s Stortford are no strangers to the main draw of the FA Cup, having made the first round proper on no fewer than 14 occasions. The Blues first achieved this in the 1970/71 season, beating Canvey Island, Bromley, Dartford, and Cheshunt before losing 6-1 at Reading. Despite regular first-round appearances, Stortford have made the second round on only two occasions, and have progressed to the third round just once. In the 1982/83 season, the Blues beat Harlow Town, Reading – which to this day remains their only victory over a league side – and Slough Town, before succumbing to a 2-1 home defeat against Middlesbrough, following a valiant 2-2 draw at the long since demolished Ayresome Park.
Real Bedford, on the other hand – somewhat unsurprisingly given their short existence – have little FA Cup history to draw on. Indeed, entering this season’s competition in the first qualifying round means that, regardless of the result tonight, this is the Pirates’ deepest run in the competition to date, having entered the FA Cup on two previous occasions and failed to progress past the preliminary rounds.
The Pirates have only a single FA Cup victory to their name, a 4-3 victory over FC Clacton in the 2023/24 extra preliminary round (although it should be noted Bedford United also made the first qualifying round in 2000/01, before losing 1-0 at Ipswich Wanderers).
When your past is so short, history is there to be written.
The Ground
Having suitably battered my eardrums whilst bombing down the A120, I approach the end of the journey, which means I need to turn down the tunes so I can concentrate on where I’m going.
Woodside Road is situated just off junction 8 of the M11, close to Birchanger Green Services; convenient for those with a weak bladder or an insatiable hunger, and also very close to Stansted airport, for any international hoppers considering a trip to Bishop’s Stortford. The town is easily accessible by train, being only about 40 minutes from both London Liverpool Street and Cambridge. Woodside Road is then a short bus ride from the station.
The ground is pretty easy for me to find despite the airborne distraction of planes taking off overhead. I pay £3 to park in the stadium car park, and even though I’m not particularly early, it feels like there are loads of spaces. I baulk slightly at the £15 match ticket, but then remember this is the FA Cup, where split gate receipts can sometimes lead to elevated prices.
Woodside Road is a tidy little ground. There’s covered terracing at each end – the far end (from the turnstiles) is the Andy Barnes Stand, named after lifelong Blues fan Andy Barnes, who once went over ten years without missing a game and raised thousands for charity, but sadly passed away in 2007, aged just 34. The main stand – the Brian Bayford Stand – sits behind the dugouts and is named after a Stortford legend who, spanning across decades, served as a player, reserve team secretary, assistant secretary, secretary, and club President.
The light autumn rain helps make the pitch look great as Fatboy Slim’s ‘Right Here, Right Now’ welcomes the teams onto the pitch. I’m still in the food hut queue; the burgers look rubbish, so I settle on just a cup of tea, but it takes ages as the staff are having a mare with the urn and are literally making all the hot drinks from boiling a little kitchen kettle on repeat. Respect for how hard both the staff and the kettle are working.
It’s almost time for kick-off and I’m excited to see if Bedford are the real deal, or if Stortford will give them the blues. (Editor inserts a groan on behalf of everyone reading)
The Game
Under floodlights on a glistening surface, the home side line up all in blue with white trim, whilst the visitors are in gold shirts, black shorts and socks. It’s weird, despite being born in Bedford, I have zero affinity for Real Bedford. Perhaps it’s new money disdain, or maybe it’s the fact that I moved down south at just ten, with Derby County being the only team for me. Either way, the absence of any sort of birthplace heartstring tug is a little surprising.
Bedford should score early, forcing the home keeper into a good save within the first five minutes. A good run from winger Obi Onyeagwara inspires the first rendition of Allez Les Blues from the home fans, but it’s the away team who settle into the game, dictating the tempo from the middle of the park.
Around 20 minutes in, a nasty clash of heads involving Bedford summer signing Connor Tee results in a lengthy stoppage that gives the home fans an opportunity to run through their repertoire of anti-Bedford songs, including ‘just a fake Bedford Town’, ‘dirty northern bastards’, suggestions on which orifice the cryptocurrency should be inserted into, and my personal favourite, the erudite and eloquent ‘crypto club, wank wank wank’.
The terraces get more creative when focusing on the Pirates’ long-haired, headband-wearing centre-back Drew Richardson, efforts including ‘where’s your parrot gone?’, ‘shiver your f*cking timbers’, and a passionate roar of ‘get back in your Black Pearl’, which was met with much confusion and needed to be comprehensively explained. Jack Sparrow would be spinning on the end of his plank.
We’ve barely got going again after the stoppage when there is another injury, and the pauses are really disrupting the rhythm of the game. Connor Tee eventually succumbs to the bang on the head he experienced following his substitution, and looks visibly dazed as he makes his way around the perimeter of the pitch. Just as the half looks set to end goalless, Stortford player Luka Chalwell rises highest to meet a cross but somehow heads the ball in the wrong direction, which more or less sums up the half.
We go to the break at 0-0.
Second Half
The teams come out for the second half, and the assistant referee checks the net – a quaint old tradition surely only useful for Sunday League football where pegs go missing and net ties come undone.
I count five Bedford supporters behind the goal they are attacking, and the travelling fans almost have something to cheer when, early in the second half, a super pass frees the marauding fullback who squares a neat ball across the box, but somehow, the Bedford player manages to miss the target. A few minutes later, a long ball from the Bedford back-line seems to have been dealt with by the home side; however, after averting the initial danger, the Stortford defender inexplicably cedes possession to the visiting striker, but somehow the Pirates contrive to look that gift horse straight in the mouth, and fail to find the target.
Two big let-offs for Stortford, and the score remains 0–0.
Within moments of Bedford making a mess of the chance, Stortford launch a swift counter-attack, but the ball into the box is behind everyone. The opportunity seems to have passed, but striker Brad Russell keeps the ball alive, works a yard of space, and smashes a great finish into the roof of the net to give Stortford the lead.
1-0, to the Blue Brazil!
The Blues now have their tails up, flying into tackles and fighting for every ball, while the crowd responds in kind, cheering every challenge and sensing victory. Bedford needs to hold on. I wander a bit further along the touchline to move closer to the goal Stortford are attacking, and find myself standing next to the Bedford owner, who looks just like any other football fan. He’s leaning on the barrier, wearing a black hoodie, Converse sneakers, and a gold baseball cap. No director’s box needed here.
The visitors weather the storm and begin to press for an equaliser. Another one-on-one is missed, and as we enter the last ten, it’s all Bedford. The crowd has quietened, and it’s the host’s turn to hold on. Home stopper Adam Hayton is having a very good evening, producing more than a couple of high-quality saves to keep his team in front. Bedford forces a late corner, and when the delivery fails to beat the first man, the relief around the ground is clear, and the players know that was the last chance.
The whistle blows for full-time, 1-0.
Match Gallery
Steve apologises for the quality of some of the photographs and has since procured a new potato.
End of the Road
And so it finishes 1-0; it’s the Blues of Bishop’s Stortford who earn a place in the next round of the FA Cup and a trip to Hemel Hempstead, and Bedford who kiss goodbye to the chance of a cup run.
In truth, Bedford has only themselves to blame.
The visitors were on top for most of the game, but a combination of good goalkeeping and profligate finishing kept the scoresheet blank. Stortford, on the other hand, were on top for perhaps 10-15 minutes in the middle of the second half, and were able to register a strike that ultimately proved to be the difference between the sides.
As I join the automotive melee battling to escape the car park and think about the night, I laugh to myself at how many of the characters here tonight can be found at every non-league club up and down the country; the old men in club ties and blazers who haven’t missed a game in 20 years but still don’t trust a fella in white boots, the young girl in the tea hut who smiles sweetly at every customer whilst silently screaming blue murder at the overworked old kettle.
There’s definitely something special about non-league football.
It’s good to be back.
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