CORBY TOWN (Steel Park)

CONFERENCE NORTH, CORBY TOWN 1-2 CHESTER FC, ATTENDANCE: 768

Today was a trip to "little Scotland" for the completion of a little milestone in my groundhopping journey.

A visit to Corby Town's Steel Park today meant I have now visited all the grounds of the Conference Premier, North and South.

Corby is known as "little Scotland" due to the influx of Scots coming South to find work in the Steelworks. Stewarts and Lloyd's set up the steelworks in the 1930's and it was the main source of employment until the early 1980's when steel making in Corby was phased out.

The references to the steel industry though run deep throughout Corby Town Football Club. The steelworks had their own football team, Stewarts and Lloyd's (who are still playing today in the United Counties Premier) which effectively represented Corby but in 1948 it was decided the town could sustain another team, hence Corby Town were born. They adopted the nickname The Steelmen in honour of their roots.

Years were spent in the various divisions of the Southern League before reaching the Conference South in 2009.

After playing at Occupation Road, they moved to the Rockingham Triangle sports ground in 1985 before moving to Steel Park in 2011. Steel Park is actually adjacent to their old ground and the main stand of Rockingham Triangle backs onto Steel Park to enclose the ground. The changing rooms underneath the old stand are still used and it is from here the players emerge.



View of Main Stand at Corby's old Rockingham Triangle
Ground.This stand now forms part of the new ground.



View of stand, behind which the new ground is located. The players still emerge from this stand.



The is a covered terrace behind one goal and a 500+ seated main stand on one side of pitch. The main bonus though, in comparison to the old ground, is there is no bloody athletics track! For a new build, I was quite impressed.

One thing that hasn't changed is the Wetherspoons across the road from the ground, where a pre-match Grainstore 'Rutland Beast' and a Hopping Mad 'Cor Blimey' went down a treat. Time was also spent in 'Wethers' talking to a local Corby chap, who indeed had a strong Scottish accent.

The game was a comfortable win for Chester as they continued their relentless march towards the Conference North title.

Dave Hankin headed home after 13 minutes to give Chester the lead before Nathan Jarman doubled the lead after 17 minutes. Chester were always in control but Corby kept plugging away, but to no avail.

On the hour mark a Josh Moreman effort was deflected onto the underside of the crossbar by Chester Skipper George Horan, if that had gone in then maybe the remaining minutes could have been interesting. Corby did eventually get themselves a goal when Paul Malone headed home in stoppage time, but it was too little too late

As the Chester fans filtered out, news came through that Vauxhall Motors had beaten Guiseley 2-0, which meant the Blues were now 16 points clear at the top of the league. Surely this is now an unassailable lead....