andybaha
Active member
With the Albion away I thought I would pop along to Withdean to take in Whitehawk against Lewes.
I found it really depressing. The whole south stand, the east and family stands, all the toilet blocks and most of the portacabins have all gone. You would hardly believe that the Albion were ever there. The pitch looked crap and they hadn't bothered to cut the grass beyond the sidelines so the linos were running through grass about a foot high. There was no PA and no catering of any kind. Strangely, the away stand is still there.
I know Withdean was totally innadequate but it did have a buzz about it on match days with 7,000 there. It was almost impossible to think that just over three months ago we were having our promotion party there.
Whilst I only have to think about the cold rainy days when we came home soaked to our underpants to hate the place, I also have some fond memories and it was the ground where I got to introduce my kids to the Albion.
I'm not sure what the future of the place is now it's back in the hands of the council. It's a bloody big and costly place to have just so a few people can run round it a couple of evenings a week. There didn't appear to be enough facilities left to host any kind of event. We had to go in the Sportsman to have a slash.
I wonder if Darren Freeman had a thought, yesterday, for the first ever league game at Withdean when he scored a hat-trick in front of a packed south stand.
I found it really depressing. The whole south stand, the east and family stands, all the toilet blocks and most of the portacabins have all gone. You would hardly believe that the Albion were ever there. The pitch looked crap and they hadn't bothered to cut the grass beyond the sidelines so the linos were running through grass about a foot high. There was no PA and no catering of any kind. Strangely, the away stand is still there.
I know Withdean was totally innadequate but it did have a buzz about it on match days with 7,000 there. It was almost impossible to think that just over three months ago we were having our promotion party there.
Whilst I only have to think about the cold rainy days when we came home soaked to our underpants to hate the place, I also have some fond memories and it was the ground where I got to introduce my kids to the Albion.
I'm not sure what the future of the place is now it's back in the hands of the council. It's a bloody big and costly place to have just so a few people can run round it a couple of evenings a week. There didn't appear to be enough facilities left to host any kind of event. We had to go in the Sportsman to have a slash.
I wonder if Darren Freeman had a thought, yesterday, for the first ever league game at Withdean when he scored a hat-trick in front of a packed south stand.
