IMBER COURT
RYMAN LEAGUE PREMIER DIVISION
FEBRUARY 28, 2015
GROUND No 166
I GUESS it was inevitable that "I fought the law, and the law won..." should blast out from the speakers as Metropolitan Police FC and their rivals walked onto the pitch for the start of the game.
Considerably more of a surprise were the tall, imposing, old school floodlight pylons that marked the corners of the Imber Court ground (three of them, anyway - there's a new-style skinny one, added 20 years after the others, on one corner).
I really wasn't expecting them, but that's the first glimpse of the ground you get as you walk from Thames Ditton station along the well-to-do Embercourt Road, with its £1m houses, gravel driveways and pristine Porsche Cayennes.
With such luxuries to protect, I bet the locals are particularly reassured to have a sizeable local presence from the boys in blue in the form of the Metropolitan Police Sports and Social club, within which the ground is situated.
Though the floodlight pylons dominate the skyline, finding the entrance to the ground wasn't especially easy. What looked like the way in was actually a route to the Met's police horse training facility - the original purpose of Imber Court before the sports and social side was developed.
In the event we walked through the entrance of the sports and social club and came out the other side which, it transpired, brought us out to an indoor swimming pool which was close to the ground entrance.
The bar was back inside the building we'd just exited so, after buying programmes to peruse over a pint from a steward on the other side of the surrounding wall of the ground, we headed back indoors and enjoyed a delightful pint of Old Golden Hen. A special offer meant we could enjoy a second pint for £1.50 which struck me as A) an offer I couldn't refuse and B) rather ironic that we were being encouraged to drink more alcohol by the Police.
On entering the ground you find yourself in the covered terrace behind one goal. To the left and straight ahead are shallow standing areas while to the right is a modern grandstand - built in the 1990s and housing around 300 seats - plus a tea bar (at 80p for a cuppa, the cops are definitely not robbers) and loos.
In the last decade or so the club has relaxed its policy of only fielding serving bobbies, to the extent that players with jobs outside the force are in the vast majority. They're still true to their law-enforcing principles however - players with a criminal record need not apply.
But the team is still the Met's representative on the football pitch - and maybe that's the reason they struggle to attract more than a few hardy die-hards through the turnstiles. It must be difficult to sell the club to the local community when you're effectively the Police Force's works team rather than a team representing a town, village or area. Today's attendance was 108, which was quite decent by their standards.
The programme is glossy and a reasonable read, the ground is neat, tidy and well proportioned and the bar, with its comfy seats, Sky TV and real ale, is a delight. A set-up like this definitely deserves greater support.
Looking back at the covered terrace, the well-groomed trees peeking out over the top look at first glance like a grass covering, and it reminds you of the way they covered air raid shelters with grass during the War to disguise them from enemy bombers. So perhaps they're trying to hide it and that's the real reason they don't get bigger crowds!
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