FIVE goals without reply.
Matlock Town's first league win since October was a pleasure to watch - after a nervy start.
One or two concerns remain, however.
By the time Matlock play Worksop in the cup on Wednesday evening, they could be back down to second bottom in the UniBond Premier Division, with their 'hosts' propping up the table.
That's if Leigh are sufficiently inspired by their new Sports Village stadium to overcome FC United on Tuesday and, more likely, Prescot get a result at home to Whitby.
While I don't want to pour cold water on what was a thoroughly professional thrashing at Causeway Lane, you have to temper that with the fact that Leigh, plucky opponents it has to be said, have been through a rough old time this season and certainly looked on Saturday to be the ones who will finish 22nd come April.
But playing in a new stadium, which Matlock must still travel to for what could be a fight for survival on April 18, might just get them fired up for a relegation battle.
Another concern is the number of chances Matlock spurned at the weekend.
OK, we should be happy with five goals and you have to say that Leigh keeper Danny Morton pulled off some excellent saves, but I don't think it would be outrageous either to say a double-figure scoreline would not have flattered Matlock.
If the finishing was not as sharp as it could be, there is also a distinct lack of attacking pace without the injured Ross Hannah.
OK, Simon Barraclough is nippy, but his chances are increasingly limited these days.
Dene Cropper, however, is not blessed with Bolt-like acceleration and neither is Nathan Benger.
Time and again in the second half, Benger, whose positional sense and touch can't be faulted even if he did waste a simple headed opportunity for his hat-trick, was out-paced by the Leigh backline.
If Matlock are going to opt for dinked passes along the ground into the channels, they need to know that the striker stands a fighting chance of sprinting ahead of his marker to either fashion a shooting opportunity or execute a cut-back for his supporting team mates.
Not every defender will have the pace of the leggy Leigh rearguard, but it might be something for Mark Atkins to consider on his scouting missions.
But the positives are these:
A first clean sheet since the home meeting with Kendal on October 25. 
That was also the last time Matlock failed to score in a game (they have only recorded four blanks in 32 league and cup games this season).
A substantial subtraction from the goal difference column.
I've made this point before but it's worth updating in light of Saturday's goal-fest.
With the exception of tenth-placed FC United, Matlock have scored more goals than any other team outside the play-off places (45).
That gives them a goal difference of -12, bringing them on a par with most other teams around them, and that margin can only improve with a few more defensive shut-outs between now and the end of the season.
The three-week break without a league game for Matlock will see others around them dropping points and taking them off each other.
If you look at the teams still in the relegation mix there is only a six-point gap between Matlock, in the highest of the relegation places, and Ossett Town in 12th place, so it's still all to play for.
By the time Matlock play their next league game at home to Ilkeston on February 14, their games played surplus over their rivals will also be significantly reduced and the league table could look at whole lot rosier.
Key fixtures during Matlock's sabbatical will include (positions correct as of Monday January 26):
Tuesday January 27:
Leigh (22nd) v FC United (10th), Prescot (21st) v Whitby (18th)
Saturday January 31:
Boston Utd (16th) v Buxton (15th), Eastwood (1st) v Witton (17th), Leigh v Worksop (20th), Whitby v Cammell Laird (14th), Nantwich (6th) v Frickley (13th), North Ferriby United (3rd) v Prescot Cables. 
Saturday February 7:
Bradford PA (9th) v Buxton, Cammell Laird v Eastwood, Leigh v Nantwich.
Tuesday February 10th:
Frickley v Leigh, Ossett (12th) v Worksop.
And on the day Matlock resume:
Ashton (8th) v Whitby, Bradford PA v Boston, Cammell Laird v Nantwich, FC United v Leigh, Witton v Buxton, Worksop v Frickley.
With a useful friendly win, a morale-boosting progression into the League Cup quarter-final and victory over the Robins to add to the potion, Matlock fans could truly love the game again on Valentine's Day.

  

With a dearth of Matlock Town action to discuss, permit me, if you will, to bask in the glory of Derby County's fine Carling Cup semi-final first leg victory over the mighty Manchester United.

Living in a non-Sky household, and with post-Christmas budget plans putting the mockers on trips to the pub, I could scarcely believe my ears as an unrecognisable Rams not only beat but toyed with the domestic, European and world club champions.

If only I could believe that Derby could produce the same level of performance and a similarly positive result in the second leg.

Somehow, I expect Wembley to be a bridge too far, but it's unusually pleasant to be in with a shout at this stage.

Next, an apology to Matlock Town. In my last blog I said they were 22nd in the UniBond Premier Division. That would have course meant they were rock bottom, which they are not.

They are currently 20th in a division of 22 teams.

It's a big weekend for Dales sports folk.

Both the Gladiators and Matlock Rugby Club NEED wins - and you can't stress that strongly enough - against Witton Albion and Dunstablians respectively, but I won't go on about it.

And in Bradford cyclo-cross team Zepnat, formed in 2007 by Darley Hillside's Julian Gould, will be bidding for podium finishes in the National Championships.

Julian believes his men's veterans team is in with a shout, with John Shaw bidding for a top three placing, while British Cycling, the sport's governing body no less, has tipped Great Longstone's Annie Last, also riding for Zepnat, to finish second in the ladies championship.

She's still only 18 and is studying for her A-Levels at Bakewell's Lady Manners School (biology, chemistry and maths - so all the easy ones, then), but already she has been snapped up by British Cycling's mountain bike academy.

Were she not still at school, she'd be a full-time cyclist aiming - ultimately - for glory at the London 2012 Olympic Games.

20-year-old brother Tom, meanwhile, is precisely that - a full-time cyclist, having just signed for pro road-racing team Sigma Sport.

Cycling is a big deal in the Dales and beyond.

In fact, Sport England revealed last week that cycling is the second fastest growing sport in England behind athletics, if you include running and jogging. (The most popular sport? Swimming.)

During the last time-trial season, I enjoyed following the progress of young Patrick Smart, the 12-year-old Matlock Cycling Club rider who braved all weathers to make the start line, determined to better his previous time on each occasion.

Even being knocked off his bike by a motorist in Bakewell couldn't quell his enthusiasm.

It's that kind of attitude to sport, wanting to test and better yourself, even in adversity, that creates winners.

Wanting to be the best badly enough is something I don't think we Brits do often enough, at least I didn't until the Beijing Olympics.

But I still think it's the reason we produce too many average footballers.

All too often, we seem to talk about keeping their feet on the ground rather than urging them to reach new heights.

Anyway, I started with a mention of one of my favourite teams and I'll finish with another, wishing Sale Sharks victory over Guinness Premiership leaders London Irish at Edgeley Park tonight.

That'd set the championship race up nicely as the Premiership takes a break for the Heineken Cup.



  






 

IF you're a Matlock Town fan, there must have been an unerring sense of inevitability as Jon Douglas' faintest of forehead brushes with the Boxing day matchball edged past Paul Pettinger in the 93rd minute.

It was the second and equalising goal for the hosts, Ilkeston Town, and the eighth time in the last 19 league matches that Matlock had let in that number of goals in a game.

In fact, since beating Worksop Town 1-0 on September 10, Matlock have conceded two or more goals in 17 of those 19 games.

Only twice have they kept a clean sheet - the 2-0 win at Cammell Laird and the 0-0 home draw with Kendal Town - and the only games in which they have conceded just the once were the cup games against Warrington Town and Glapwell.

As I pointed out in my last post, the Gladiators are already close to conceding the same number of goals they let in during the whole of the 2007/08 season (at the current rate of concessions, 2.2 goals per game, they would just about reach that figure - 68 - by Valentine's Day, at home to Ilkeston).

However, you would have to climb another nine places in the table from Matlock's currently uneviable 22nd position to find a team that had scored more goals than the Gladiators.

In fact, only six other teams in the division have scored more than the 38 Matlock have registered at the right end.

Contrast that to a team like Frickley Athletic (currently second in the 'other UniBond Prem' behind FC United before a six-point gap to Bradford PA) who've scored just 25 goals. The difference is, they have conceded almost exactly half (27) the number Matlock have.

It's sobering to realise as well that a fifth of Frickley's goals have been scored against the Gladiators.

The 'neutral' - is there such a person? - will point out that spectators at league matches involving Matlock Town have seen a total of 93 goals this season - more than any other club in the division -  whereas those who have followed Leigh Genesis home and away have witnessed just 43, albeit in just 17 games compared to Matlock's 25.

So if it's entertainment you're after, Matlock are the team to be watching.

But Gladiators fans want points right now, and what better way to start the new year than with three at home to Buxton.










 

RIGHT.

After a much longer than intended absence (of, oh, only 16 months) and some gentle chivvying from one of my regular correspondents, the Sports Ed blog is to be resurrected.

Last time I ventured into the blogosphere, it was the start of the 2007/08 football season and I was pondering Matlock Town's promotion prospects.

As it turned out, those prospects petered out some time after September.

This season there were no such expectations, despite some very promising acquisitions in the shape of Ross Hannah, Liam King, Ashley Foyle, Lee Featherstone and the permanent signing of Jamie Jackson.

After a little turmoil, to say the least, and what seemed like an age without a win until the Jackson-inspired victory over Glapwell in the Derbyshire Senior Cup, there may now be some fresh, young shoots of hope.

For a man who has won the biggest prize in English football - and a club competition title perhaps second only in the world to the Champions League - Mark Atkins appears to have no problem with the rather less salubrious surroundings of the UniBond League.

After all, he's spent the best part of a decade getting to know the lower reaches of the game well as his playing career came to an end and his management career began.

He's also acutely aware of what needs to be done to turn this season around.

Step one: Stop conceding goals.

His first acquisition was a central defender (on loan), Aden Flint, and his likely second new recruit is a goalkeeper, Paul Pettinger.

His other current - unnamed - transfer targets are also defenders.

When James Lukic left for Gainsborough Trinity in the summer it often sounded as if the size of the 'hole' he would leave in the Gladiators' rearguard had been blown out of all proportion.

Not so.

By the end of the 2007/08 campaign, Matlock had conceded 68 league goals in a season in which they - on paper, although it was actually a bit more complicated than that - beat the drop by a single point.

It's not even Christmas yet and they have already let in 53 goals - and there are still 22 games to go.

When it became clear that height was an issue at the back, most obviously exposed by Eastwood Town to snatch an 89th minute equaliser in September when a long ball bounced over Ryan Laight and Ashley Foyle for the giant Marc Smith to nod home, Phil Brown and Gareth Williams soon brought in the lanky Rob Pacey from Ossett.

He rewarded them with a debut goal against North Ferriby United in Matlock's last league win back on October 14, but his positioning and confidence on the ball remain questionable, and he was given a torrid time by Glapwell's 44-year-old striker Neil Grayson in the second half of the Derbyshire Cup tie.

What the Glappy game demonstrated - and bear in mind Glapwell are pushing for a play-off place in the UniBond First Division South, so the sides are not so very far apart - is that when Matlock attack with confidence they are a joy to watch.

Central to that is Hannah, a player who can not only score goals but can pass the ball well with either foot and has great awareness of his team mates in and around the box.

Dene Cropper has, when fit, consistently shown he knows where the goal is and reminds me of Derby's mercurial Belgian/Croatian striker of a few years back, Branko Strupar, whose appearances were severely restricted by injury but who had an happy knack of scoring goals whenever Rams fans got a rare glimpse of him.

Simon Barraclough has had an interesting season. Made captain by Brown and Williams, only to hand the armband over to Steve Warne once they had been relieved of their duties, but still, crucially, weighing in with seven goals.

Nathan Benger is developing as a UniBond level striker, while Jamie Jackson now finally seems to be taking his drop from League football in his stride and realising that, at this level, he can really have some fun down the right flank if he's in the mood.

Lukic's legacy as a leader is also echoing around the Lane. Matlock are not a particularly vocal side at present, perhaps because they are so young, Warne is only 24, Barraclough a year or two older and Liam King, who has also taken on the role this season, is just out of his teens.

Atkins realises he needs older, more assertive players to take his team by the scruff of the neck when things get tough. That's not to say Brown and Williams did not realise it - they were continually frustrated by knock-backs from transfer targets who could find more money elsewhere, but still managed to draft in some very promising "ones for the future".

Atkins appears to be completing the balancing act of blending youth with experience.

2008 has been horrible for the Gladiators.

2009 is another year - if not a new season - and they've got a timely win, albeit in a county cup game.

But it's a flicker of light at least.


IT'S not been pretty for Matlock Rugby Club either.

Just two wins this season and a disastrous defeat at rock-bottom, previously pointless Wellingborough.

Thank goodness that Derby - new coach of not - can still be relied upon for two points.

Of course, it's not as simple as that and even though the city boys currently languish in the Midlands Two East relegation zone one place below Matlock, if they were to play tomorrow that run of eight consecutive wins over Derby could feasibly come to an end.

Matlock coach Chris Loeber insists he has a greater pool of players capable of playing at first team level, but puts the disappointing results down to having too inexperienced a team. 

It's a coach's dilemma; how else do new players gain that experience?

But there have been some big absences this season - the aggression of second row James Atkinson and the presence and influence of number eight Mike Brookes are not there because of long-term shoulder and neck injuries respectively. Neither currently is the guile and skill of fly-half Dave Hartley, nursing a broken arm, or the direction and distribution of scrum-half Ben Wragg.

But there have been some encouraging 'breakthroughs': winger Ben Neville, second rows James Cooper and Adam Twyford, Tom Hooton's re-invention as scrum-half, the return of centre Dan Hooton and Alex Powell's assimilation as a full-back.

There is a whisper that the prodigious kicking talents of Chris Young could be winging their way back from Australia in the New Year.

Could his return - if it happens - be the difference between staying up and Midlands Three East (North) derbies against Bakewell Mannerians in 2009/10?

FINALLY, cricket, and not only has summertime Matlock resident Iain O'Brien been giving Australian captain Ricky Ponting a few headaches this winter, but he's also earned himself a cult following on the internet.

Fast bowler O'Brien's daily test match blogs are published on the Cricinfo.com website and The Guardian's sports desk, no less, proclaimed it one of their favourite web items of the week.

You can read his latest offerings about New Zealand's current series against the West Indies by going to www.matlockmercury.co.uk, sport and clicking on the latest article about Iain.

RIGHT.

After a much longer than intended absence (of, oh, only 16 months) and some gentle chivvying from one of my regular correspondents, the Sports Ed blog is to be resurrected.

Last time I ventured into the blogosphere, it was the start of the 2007/08 football season and I was pondering Matlock Town's promotion prospects.

As it turned out, those prospects petered out some time after September.

This season there were no such expectations, despite some very promising acquisitions in the shape of Ross Hannah, Liam King, Ashley Foyle, Lee Featherstone and the permanent signing of Jamie Jackson.

After a little turmoil, to say the least, and what seemed like an age without a win until the Jackson-inspired victory over Glapwell in the Derbyshire Senior Cup, there may now be some fresh, young shoots of hope.

For a man who has won the biggest prize in English football - and a club competition title perhaps second only in the world to the Champions League - Mark Atkins appears to have no problem with the rather less salubrious surroundings of the UniBond League.

After all, he's spent the best part of a decade getting to know the lower reaches of the game well as his playing career came to an end and his management career began.

He's also acutely aware of what needs to be done to turn this season around.

Step one: Stop conceding goals.

His first acquisition was a central defender (on loan), Aden Flint, and his likely second new recruit is a goalkeeper, Paul Pettinger.

His other current - unnamed - transfer targets are also defenders.

When James Lukic left for Gainsborough Trinity in the summer it often sounded as if the size of the 'hole' he would leave in the Gladiators' rearguard had been blown out of all proportion.

Not so.

By the end of the 2007/08 campaign, Matlock had conceded 68 league goals in a season in which they - on paper, although it was actually a bit more complicated than that - beat the drop by a single point.

It's not even Christmas yet and they have already let in 53 goals - and there are still 22 games to go.

When it became clear that height was an issue at the back, most obviously exposed by Eastwood Town to snatch an 89th minute equaliser in September when a long ball bounced over Ryan Laight and Ashley Foyle for the giant Marc Smith to nod home, Phil Brown and Gareth Williams soon brought in the lanky Rob Pacey from Ossett.

He rewarded them with a debut goal against North Ferriby United in Matlock's last league win back on October 14, but his positioning and confidence on the ball remain questionable, and he was given a torrid time by Glapwell's 44-year-old striker Neil Grayson in the second half of the Derbyshire Cup tie.

What the Glappy game demonstrated - and bear in mind Glapwell are pushing for a play-off place in the UniBond First Division South, so the sides are not so very far apart - is that when Matlock attack with confidence they are a joy to watch.

Central to that is Hannah, a player who can not only score goals but can pass the ball well with either foot and has great awareness of his team mates in and around the box.

Dene Cropper has, when fit, consistently shown he knows where the goal is and reminds me of Derby's mercurial Belgian/Croatian striker of a few years back, Branko Strupar, whose appearances were severely restricted by injury but who had an happy knack of scoring goals whenever Rams fans got a rare glimpse of him.

Simon Barraclough has had an interesting season. Made captain by Brown and Williams, only to hand the armband over to Steve Warne once they had been relieved of their duties, but still, crucially, weighing in with seven goals.

Nathan Benger is developing as a UniBond level striker, while Jamie Jackson now finally seems to be taking his drop from League football in his stride and realising that, at this level, he can really have some fun down the right flank if he's in the mood.

Lukic's legacy as a leader is also echoing around the Lane. Matlock are not a particularly vocal side at present, perhaps because they are so young, Warne is only 24, Barraclough a year or two older and Liam King, who has also taken on the role this season, is just out of his teens.

Atkins realises he needs older, more assertive players to take his team by the scruff of the neck when things get tough. That's not to say Brown and Williams did not realise it - they were continually frustrated by knock-backs from transfer targets who could find more money elsewhere, but still managed to draft in some very promising "ones for the future".

Atkins appears to be completing the balancing act of blending youth with experience.

2008 has been horrible for the Gladiators.

2009 is another year - if not a new season - and they've got a timely win, albeit in a county cup game.

But it's a flicker of light at least.


IT'S not been pretty for Matlock Rugby Club either.

Just two wins this season and a disastrous defeat at rock-bottom, previously pointless Wellingborough.

Thank goodness that Derby - new coach of not - can still be relied upon for two points.

Of course, it's not as simple as that and even though the city boys currently languish in the Midlands Two East relegation zone one place below Matlock, if they were to play tomorrow that run of eight consecutive wins over Derby could feasibly come to an end.

Matlock coach Chris Loeber insists he has a greater pool of players capable of playing at first team level, but puts the disappointing results down to having too inexperienced a team. 

It's a coach's dilemma; how else do new players gain that experience?

But there have been some big absences this season - the aggression of second row James Atkinson and the presence and influence of number eight Mike Brookes are not there because of long-term shoulder and neck injuries respectively. Neither currently is the guile and skill of fly-half Dave Hartley, nursing a broken arm, or the direction and distribution of scrum-half Ben Wragg.

But there have been some encouraging 'breakthroughs': winger Ben Neville, second rows James Cooper and Adam Twyford, Tom Hooton's re-invention as scrum-half, the return of centre Dan Hooton and Alex Powell's assimilation as a full-back.

There is a whisper that the prodigious kicking talents of Chris Young could be winging their way back from Australia in the New Year.

Could his return - if it happens - be the difference between staying up and Midlands Three East (North) derbies against Bakewell Mannerians in 2009/10?

FINALLY, cricket, and not only has summertime Matlock resident Iain O'Brien been giving Australian captain Ricky Ponting a few headaches this winter, but he's also earned himself a cult following on the internet.

Fast bowler O'Brien's daily test match blogs are published on the Cricinfo.com website and The Guardian's sports desk, no less, proclaimed it one of their favourite web items of the week.

You can read his latest offerings about New Zealand's current series against the West Indies by going to www.matlockmercury.co.uk, sport and clicking on the latest article about Iain.

IT'S only November, but already people are talking about title contenders and promotion hopefuls.
It's all a bit previous, if you ask me.
Sad to say, nobody has asked me, but I'm going to add my fourpenneth anyway.
UniBondly speaking, if there was a moral victory championship, I think Matlock Town probably have a 20-point lead right now.
That's three points for every star player lost to a richer club - Ian Holmes, Tom Cahill, Steve Warne, Kris Bowler - and two for each of those that left for domestic or personal reasons - Wayne Diuk and Liam Howley - plus another four for losing your leading scorer - Simon Barraclough - for what could be six weeks to an injudicious challenge. 
But then I'm biased.
There are probably a dozen other UniBond clubs citing similar hardships right now, but the Gladiators' squad has taken a bit of a battering in my opinion.
And yet they are, at the time of writing, still very much in the play-off mix.
Given that the time of writing is some six months before the end of the season, it all sounds faintly ridiculous to even be uttering the phrase 'play-offs', but I think they deserve credit for hanging in there.
True, watching them struggle to get back on terms with a not-overly-impressive Gateshead on Saturday had some friends and I agreeing that we had been spoiled by last season's tremendous offering.
There isn't the same degree of quality in the squad, but there is still something and it helped them stick three past niggly Stamford on Tuesday.
Joint-manager Phil Brown talks a lot about the spirit of the squad and that may be it.
Whether there is enough spirit in the tank to put them in the top five at the end of April remains to be seen, however.
He, along with Messrs Williams and Bowling, is scouring the grounds of neighbouring counties to unearth some more unlikely gems, such as those who were fresh from their studies in Sheffield last year.
Those kinds of finds are rare indeed, and it'll need diligence, discretion and not a little luck to hit the jackpot again.
However, if the Gladiators don't run away with the title, then surely the time has come for Witton Albion to take the next step up.
Witton form half of Northwich's inexplicable footballing rivalry and one can only imagine where the Cheshire town's footballing fortunes could lie were it not riven by this division of loyalties.
It's not our problem, I guess, but over the past three seasons in which I have been sports editor at the Mercury, they have been arguably the best footballing side in the UniBond Premier Division other than the Gladiators' 2006/07 squad.
But nice guys don't always win, as big and ugly Telford and gnarly Fleetwood proved last season, and I know some at the Geoquip who would mourn the passing of at least one visit to Witton each season; nice ground, good facilities, decent pitch, football as it should be played.
Back in Matlock, we have two great assets: the contemplative, modest Brown and the maverick Williams.
I wasn't joking when I said at the presentation dinner that they were my players-of-the-year for last season.
They played a blinder in putting a side together that punched well above its weight.
It might not look like it at times this season, but they still are playing that blinder given the hits and knockbacks they've taken since the end of the last campaign.
But when you hear how much money one now ex-Gladiator is allegedly being paid at another non-league club, how long will it be before Brown and Williams look to take charge of a bigger club with a bigger budget?
It'll be a sad, sad day on Causeway Lane when they do.

If the BBC weather symbol for Sunday is a white fluffy cloud with golden rays emanating from just behind it that tells me that the cricket carnival at Matlock Cricket Club is going to be a fantastic day.

Hats off to Steve Haslam, of Matlock Cricket Club, for beavering away behind the scenes, and Maazi owner Irfan Shabir for backing the day with a £250 cash prize for the winning club.

There'll be boundaries breached and bails scattered and probably a few lost balls in the Denefields undergrowth, but the long, tall and short of it is that we will have ourselves a rip-roaring six-a-side cricket tournament of fast moving, big hitting games at Causeway Lane.

The action starts at 10.30am on Sunday (that's July 22 for people who do dates rather than days) and goes on until the final at around 7pm.

We've got Matlock, Marehay, Darley Dale, Belper Meadows, Duffield, Alvaston and Boulton and a team from Winster taking part and we're pretty sure it's going to be a belter, and, who knows, perhaps the start of an annual six-a-side competition.

There's a bar and barbecue, and it's free admission.

All you have to do is turn up and enjoy youselves.

THERE's a rain guage in my garden which seems to be overflowing by about midday every Saturday recently, which means only two things:
1. It's raining, so there's no cricket.
2. It's been raining and the pitches are saturated, so there's no cricket.
I appreciate the frustration must be double, if not triple if you're a player rather than a rotund sports editor whose only form of exercise is planning next week's pages in his head.
Hopefully, you'll all want to get it out of your system by taking part in the Matlock Cricket Carnival on Sunday July 22. Email me on sport@matlockmercury.co.uk for more details.
On the upside I suppose we can look forward to slew of verdant playing surfaces when the football season starts.
Sadly the soft, gateauxy, sponge-like earth will no doubt cut up like a farmer's field at sowing time, and we'll have more blank Saturdays and Sundays.
Negative thoughts done with now.
Congratulations to young Hannah Styles, one of our trio of talented trials riders, on winning the British Ladies B Class Championship and to Sam Mak for once again showing what a superb martial artist he is and picking up European golds in Poland.
As I've always said, talent abounds here. May it follow them into adulthood.
I was sorry to see Kris Bowler leave the Gladiators. As the song goes (to the tune of 'Amore') : "When the ball hits the goal, it's not Shearer or Cole, it's Kris Bowler." And indeed, he was good for many a goal. 
He also became an easy target for opponents looking for a creative genius to wind up, and he often gave them exactly what they were after, earning something of a reputation for petulance and indiscipline which referees occasionally over-reacted to.
Good luck to him at Alfreton, though. 
Liam Howley has decided that life's rich pageant would be more colourful with a few months of travel and has called time on his Matlock career to earn the cash to enable him to do just that.
It's a shame, but you only live once and it's better to hit the road before you get into the career rut.
Talking of travellers, Ian Holmes returns from his antipodean adventures for pre-season training this weekend. Let's hope his itchy feet are well and truly cured now.
I, for one, am looking forward to Gripper and Brownie going with a Holmes-Cropper-Barraclough front three next season - a glimpse of blue sky beyond a decidedly grey summer.