It's
full of beer, beer and more beer... |
Stedders' Football and
Real Ale Guide that is - we review the 2006-7 edition |
Stedders’ “Football and Real Ale Guides” first appeared a year ago and they’re back, bigger, brighter and with even more beer. Stedders’ mission at the outset was to find pubs that real ale fans could go to and enjoy a decent pint or two before or after the game and two years after he began his country-wide trek he should be pleased with his success. As far as gasheads.com were concerned, most away games involved meeting up with fellow fans at one or other (or several) of “Stedders’ pubs”. Most of the time too, we weren’t disappointed: The Mitre at Barnet was a great starting point for the season’s travels while The Cemetery at Rochdale was the perfect end and, to be honest, both were so good it was a struggle leaving either to go to the game. In between we particularly enjoyed first trips to The Golden Eagle in Lincoln and The Brewery Tap in Peterborough, while old favourite The Kemble in Cheltenham was superb as usual and will be missed after the team’s promotion. The only disappointment we had was in Darlington, which has been much hyped for its pubs but the Quakerhouse proved to be a barren venue for cider lovers while Number Twenty-2 almost made us miss the game with an hour and a quarter wait for our food order and some criminally flat cider. We assured by Stedders and others that the latter was a blip (with the landlord away for the weekend) and to be honest it seemed like a nice place with a good range of ales so we’d like to think that it was nothing more than a bad day. And let's face it, without this guide we'd definitely have found far more than two pubs that didn't quite meet the required standard during the course of a season! The 2006-7 Guides have more pubs in each town and ratings for those that are recommended for food as well as beer. Rovers’ section includes new entries for CAMRA pub of the year, The Inn on the Green, and the revamped Robin Hood’s Retreat, which is a far cry from its spit and sawdust past. You also get to see high quality comments on the Wellington from a number of gasheads.com types… There’s also more space for each pub in 2006-7, better maps and a “Cultural Guide” for each town by Glyn Watkins of Bradford City fanzine “The City Gent”, which means that you can find out about Bury Market’s black puddings and Swindon’s Magic Roundabout which is, let’s face it, about as cultural as it gets in that town. Other improvements that we liked were a list of taxi numbers (we always seem to need one when we go away) and the fact that the teams are in alphabetical order this season (last season they were in the order of the Guide’s League table). Next season Stedders is looking for more fan input for the Guides and we imagine their popularity will mean he’ll get plenty of offers. We’re clearly in the minority but we’d like to see what ciders are on offer in a pub (nothing worse than getting to a boozer only to find it is Strongbow or nothing – something that is sadly common in London) so if Stedders can get anyone to review them it would be a bonus. If you’re interested you can email him via his website but if writing’s not your thing then just get out there and buy the new Guides which, at £3.50 per division, are excellent value and will make every awayday a trip worth making. There’s an online shop linked from Stedders’ website and the Guides will also be on sale at this week’s Great British Beer Festival where the great man himself will be signing copies on Friday afternoon.
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