The Ground Junkie!: Dairylea Dunkers at

When the fixtures for the Vanarama National League finally came out in July, I was pleased to see that our first game of the season was in Chester, a ground which was on my mind to go to. Mainly because there was a few Chester mates who I wanted to meet after speaking online.

I got a lift up to Chester from with fellow Braintree fans Ben, Garry and Richard. We left at about 9:30 and our first stop on the road was at Corley services, where we met another car load of Iron fans. Including Dan Turner who's been on this blog previously.

Believe it or not but also at Corley, I just happened to meet fellow ground hopper Steve Alison and his two boys Luke and Teddy, we met in a Facebook group online and bonded over our love for the Essex Senior League. Today they were heading off to watch their beloved Millwall away at Shrewsbury.

Braintree and Millwall unite at Corley!!

We kept heading up to Chester and eating the food that we had stocked up on, it usually involved all 4 of us eating about 3 packs of Dairlylea dunkers, we couldn't get enough of the stuff!!

We finally made it to the ground 30 minutes before kick off, unlike our supporters coach which was still making its way up the M6, we took the smarter decision of taking the A roads to avoid traffic. The did make it just in time for kick off though.

We had to walk round the ground to get to the away end, This was interesting because it meant crossing the Boarder between England and Wales. You could tell which part of the ground was in Wales because as soon as we walked around, you could smell some sort of Animal Faeces coming from the fields behind the stand.......

Grounds in the National League fit into 2 categories, Grounds which can easily be football league grounds and ones which cannot. Chester City was a football league club until their club died and reformed in 2010 under the name "Chester FC". The 4 stands are all relatively the same height as each other. 3 of the stands are all seater including the one we were in except for the other stand Being a nice terrace behind the goal. Where the Cesterian Ultras were chanting, singing and making a nice atmosphere.

The game started with everyone enthusiastic, but immediately after about 3 minutes Chester got one in from curled shot from outside the box on the left hand side which our defence should have easily closed down....

We did have a few breaks after that though, the problem was however Danny Cowley decided to leave Simeon Akinola up front on his own, now don't get me wrong Akinola is one of our best players, but leaving 5ft 10 Simeon on his against 6ft 4 defenders is not the right idea.

HT Chester 1-0 Braintree.

At second half I felt a little hungry and decided to pay £3 for the "Chester Pie" which chicken and ham, it was ok I have had better, also Chicken and ham isn't my favourite The Chicken Balti is where it's at!!!

Chester selfie with Dan and Maurice

We basically dominated the second half with more possession and more runs on the wing, Sean Marks came on as well, but we still counldn't find the equalising goal..... Mainly because we had some good crosses into the box from the wing but no one could get their heads on it. Furthermore we had about 3 penalty claims, none of which were given. That's how the match finished though 1-0 to Chester.

After the game I went to meet Connor and Corin and managed to get a few pics and have a chat. Really nice bunch of lads who gave a me a few Chester stickers as well.