Cambridge United v Morecambe, Abbey Stadium, League One, 3:00pm Saturday 14th Jan

[_Stefan_Kuntz]

With Morecambe being 19th, Cambridge United 20th and 21st placed Accrington Stanley being 2 points behind them both and having 2 games in hand, this should be a real match.

Forget about the intensity of the Rome, Madrid, North London, Manchester and Glasgow derbies. Cambridge United v Morecambe is the fixture for the genuine football enthusiast.

[Psaw]

A corker, and we can all be in Morecambes corner. Morecambe cant be far from Carlisle can it,? Do you have beaches by Carlisle? , with theatres, rides, cinemas holiday camps etc?

I expect not.

[_Stefan_Kuntz]

I am from Kendal. From there I could f­art into Morecambe.

https://goo.gl/maps/KxgGTBKJvbwtepueA

[Psaw]

Why dont you watch Morecambe, its an incredible ninety miles to Carlisle. All those country parks, gad, you chaps are lucky.

[Psaw]

Carlisle might as well be in Afghanistan.

[_Stefan_Kuntz]

It is 46 miles from Kendal to Carlisle United's Brunton Park. It is 25 miles from Kendal to Morecambe's ground. It is 71 miles from Carlisle to Morecambe.

As a child / youth I watched Kendal Town (nee Netherfield) playing in the Lancashire Combination > Northern Premier League against Morecambe as the enemy. Then when I could do so I started to be a Carlisle United supporter and it remains so. In 2007 Morecambe got into League Two but it made no difference to me. Now as a Kendalian and Carlisle United supporter I no longer regard Morecambe as the enemy.

[Blackdogblue]

Cambridge might as well be in the middle of the Atlantic Ocean 😎

Morecambe’s ground reminds me of Disney Studios theme park… looks impressive from the front but it’s just a facade… Oxford get the chant we’ve got more stands than you & Fleetwood is a bit bizarre as well…

[Psaw]

As a child i followed all the leagues very closely, and i remember Netherfield, i had no idea it was Kendal, not that id know where that was at that age.

They always struggled or were mid table. What sort of ground did you have in the 60s, gates etc. Whats become of them? I remember Great Harwood, whats happened there? The lower leagues are more intriguing than the upper ones.

[_Stefan_Kuntz]

As a child i followed all the leagues very closely, and i remember Netherfield, i had no idea it was Kendal, not that id know where that was at that age.

They always struggled or were mid table. What sort of ground did you have in the 60s, gates etc. Whats become of them? I remember Great Harwood, whats happened there? The lower leagues are more intriguing than the upper ones.

From the mid-60s to the early 70s Netherfield got crowds of 1,000. When playing Morecambe it was over 2,000.

Netherfield was originally the works team of K Shoemakers. The company owned significant land and various sporting clubs were set up on this land, initially for the workers but eventually anyone could join / play. Gradually these clubs became independent of the company, except for being on the land, which was eventually covenanted for these sporting purposes. K Shoemakers was taken over by Clarkes. By 2000 it was closed down. The various sporting clubs are safe on the land by virtue of the covenant. In 2000 it was decided to change the football club's name from Netherfield (a district of Kendal) to Kendal Town. The building of the clubhouse was funded by K Shoemakers in their time and it is still an impressive facility.

The team is now 20,000 leagues under where it was in the early 1970s. It had been a member of the Lancashire Combination and was a founder member of the Northern Premier League when the national game below Football League level began to get organised in the early 1970s. Nationally there was then the next step below the 4th division being the Northern Premier League, the Southern League and the Isthmian League (biggest clubs around the south east), these three leagues being the same level. Netherfield struggled, their best finish being 10th but eventually the natural order of things occurred and they began a steady stream of relegations.

The Kendal Town football club is very unlikely to fold. Clarkes cannot overturn the covenant on the ground, so it has a home indefinitely. But it cannot prosper because football supporters find it so easy to get to Lancashire, where a cornucopia of football delights are to be found. Traditionally Kendal was divided between Preston North End and Carlisle United. Now that Morecambe are in the EFL there are Kendal folk who are Morecambe supporters.

A long time ago Netherfield had a player called Joe Finney. He was from Preston. This was in the days before instant communication was common. On one match day Joe Finney could not make the gig so a youth arrived with a note from Joe apologising and stating that the bearer of the note was Joe's brother Tom, who could play. The manager said "Nay lad tha's too small".

[Psaw]

Crikey, Finney started at Netherfield? I expect the old Netherfield ground was a small grandstand and the rest was just hard standing. Cambridge suffers from being close to London, mostly its Arsenal or Tottenham, most of the blokes i play walking football with are west ham.

As a t een i went to Tottenham, but wasnt bothered.
Kendall Town sound like Ely City, with potential, but needs a cash boost by someone. Thanks for making the effort to reply.