I've been involved in amateur football for 35 years. I first played for PZ in the City of Manchester Sunday League. Games kicked off (in both senses of the phrase) in the afternoon, and most players had come straight from the pub. I remember playing Parrs Wood, who had a good player called Paul Kirby, who was a year or two above me in junior school. I scored within 10 seconds of the start of that game.
Shortly after, I started my first team - PTL. We played in the Altrincham League, and also the Manchester Saturday Morning League, which I helped to set up, and is still running. I recall Ben Arthurs (RIP) was one of our referees. His son was in Oasis. I started another team from the church I attended in Brooklands, so in my late teens I played Saturday morning and afternoon, and Sunday afternoon. I had a short spell with Whalley Range in the Lancs Amateur League as well, and also played for my works team in the Nalgo Cup.
I ended up as secretary for two teams simultaneously, as well as league secretary, and by the age of 30 I had started refereeing. I used to do my own league on Saturday mornings, plus the Manchester Amateur League, the Manchester League, the Manchester Wednesday League, the Lancs and Cheshire, and the Lancashire League. I eventually progressed to the Unibond League as a linesman. I remember one idiot in a game in Bury, being sent off for hitting an opponent. He ran back on the pitch 15 minutes later with a bottle, attacking the lad he had previously hit. During this time I assisted Jeff Winter, Uriah Rennie, was fourth official at Preston, Old Trafford, and the highlight was to run a line at Maine Road, where I met Francis Lee.
I still play the occasional 7-a-side game at work, and I play every week 11-a-side on an outdoor 3G pitch. I dropped refereeing, but have been secretary of my local junior club for the last 10 years, and I am one of the fixtures secretaries for the Warrington Junior League, which is the largest league in the country, with around 80 clubs and probably more than 700 teams. I tried to relinquish the secretary job at our recent AGM, but nobody stepped forward to take over, so I am still fulfilling this role. It is quite an onerous job running a club with 20 teams and unfortunately, there seems to be fewer and fewer administrators willing to help out in these essential roles. Our job is not made any easier by the FA, who insist each team must have a qualified coach and qualified medic all trained by them. We have a couple of doctors helping out with our teams, but their qualifications do not permit them to oversee their teams unless they have been on the FA course.
The FA blueprint for the future of our game sees teams progress from Under 7s for 2 years at each format of 5v5, then 7v7, then 9v9, and from Under 13s 11-a-side. This has closed many clubs down as they cannot afford to buy extra equipment for all these formats, and cannot attract or afford the extra coaches required following the downsizing of the squads at the lower ages.
Yes, adult football is declining. Junior football is flourishing though, despite the difficulties.
