County Ground looking good

The photograph of the new marquee on the club website is a further sign that Derbyshire are moving in the right direction, on and off the field. It is sure to prove a popular venue for weddings and functions, as much for the curiosity value in the first instance. The location is excellent and it almost makes me think of asking Mrs Peakfan to renew our vows so we can have a bit of a "do" there…

I thought the new stand also looked very good on TV the other night and look forward to seeing it in due course. With all the recent developments, the ground is a long way from the vast, open, downright chilly space that it was when I first attended the County Ground in 1970.

I'd been to a few games before then, but they were at the outgrounds. I'd seen half a dozen matches at Chesterfield, a couple at Ilkeston and another at Buxton before I saw the headquarters. I was unimpressed to be honest, as it was so much bigger than the others and we seemed a long way from the action. When I subsequently went to a match at Trent Bridge, I felt we were watching a match through binoculars, held the wrong way round!

I had mixed experiences of the County Ground at that time. At the Surrey match in the John Player League in 1970 it was a baking hot day and my memories of the game include eating ice cream and layering on sun cream in equal measure. On the pitch we won the game easily, thanks to some fine batting by Chris Wilkins and some good bowling by Alan Ward. Our car was parked on the mound, which was then square of the wicket, and at the end of the game the car was like an oven. The folly of wearing shorts was quickly highlighted when my thighs made contact with the plastic on the seats, the temperature of which was something akin to molten metal…

At the opposite end of the scale, there were a few games where we watched from the car, as it was so cold, and a few when we ventured out onto deck chairs, dressed as if ready for a Polar expedition. Any good work was applauded, if only to ensure that we kept warm. A brisk walk around the boundary edge served little purpose, as there was nothing much to see. The club shop of the time had little in it, unless you wanted to buy the year book, pens, pencils or rubbers. The only other thing of note was a fairly expensive plate produced to commemorate the club's centenary. It was nice enough (I've seen a few on ebay in recent years) but didn't look the sort of thing to use for Mum's stew, shin beef or pies, so we didn't bother.

To a young boy, as I was at the time, it didn't matter of course. This place was the theatre of dreams, long before Manchester United adopted the idea. It really didn't matter that the toilets were spartan, barely functional and smelly, or that the gatemen were presumably hired for their surliness. It didn't matter that we didn't seem to win too many games, as there were always positives to find in defeat.

It might have been a handful of clubbing blows from Ashley Harvey-Walker, or a great catch by Bob Taylor. Maybe someone excelled in the field, or maybe, as often happened, we got lucky and Chris Wilkins stayed in for an hour. Sometimes we did win and the journey home was filled with excited chatter about this one and that one and how well we were doing. Other times, the only things that kept us going was Mum's picnic that she'd packed us up, the one bright spot of another hammering…

Through it all I stayed a fan. As Dad did and as anyone reading this presumably did. Forty years on we've got a ground that looks like one and a team that's coming together, even if it's more slowly than some people might want. The road may indeed be long, as The Hollies once said, with many a winding turn, but at least we've got a marquee now...