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Great Expectations by Guardy

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I’m probably being a bit harsh with the title, as at the beginning of the 2022/23 I would have taken a mid table spot. Unfortunately, due to this new manager in charge, a certain Mr Paul Michael, he has definitely changed supporters expectations, and not making the play offs seemed strangely disappointing. Something I don’t think any of us were thinking about in August 2022. I’ll let you into a little secret, after the year when the club mothballed due to the pandemic, I was thinking of jacking it in. The message came from nowhere, and as an owner, at the time I was really narked that no one had given me the chance to have a say, what is the point of being an owner? Looking back, it was obviously the right decision, at the time being stuck in, no pubs open and Pingus zoom quizzes had an adverse impact on my mental health, and looking forward to watching a bit of football was a light at the end of the tunnel. So, no football for a few months, well albeit there are some international gam
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Hooked by The Wandering Martyr

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The recent resurgence of the club has attracted over two hundred Under 16’s who attend on a regular basis and have become part of the massively important match-day atmosphere generated by the CTM stand.   An important part of our community engagement programme is to engage with grass-roots clubs and local schools, who benefit from complimentary match-day tickets. The look on the faces of the young children as they cautiously push their way through the turnstiles, many for the very first time, walk down the Lyn Jones Grandstand spectator tunnel and see the vastness of the stadium that brings joy and a wide smile to their face is just worth the time and effort to try to engage with our potential fans of tomorrow.   Most will have persuaded their parents to take them after proudly bringing the laminated complimentary ‘golden’ ticket home with them. They may have noticed the mention of the team we are playing and if they have nothing planned for the family that Saturday perhaps a p
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Waka Waka by retired Sec

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Wales first World Cup since 1958 was not to be missed, well not for 4 of us intrepid travellers.  Sods law that the competition we did qualify for was probably the most controversial World Cup ever.  The Human rights situation in Qatar is well documented, and the hosts mount an immediate defence of their country and culture whenever it is raised. In my own mind I did think about it, but I took the easy way out.  My attitude was it was not my fault that corrupt FIFA officials chose Qatar.  And that’s not me being slanderous or provocative.   A number of FIFA officials who voted at the time have since been suspended, and 2 officials on the morning of the vote had to pull out due to concerns around their integrity.     So off we went with Wonky Dai.  4 of us had an apartment with a shared pool, which worked out a treat for us.  We were warned beforehand that Qatarians have a very laid-back attitude and are never rushed, and we saw that immediately on arrival when we were bussed fr
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The Disturbed Podcast

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This week we got involved in The Disturbed District's first Merthyr Town based podcast. If you want to hear the episode, hit the link below. https://open.spotify.com/episode/55d3Q7CYCkbIZxGB0PI3mG?si=6eDp0arLRSCDCJXTRf4z3g&fbclid=PAAaanSNNZuN2t2ORLlh0gtzdelhMdUTkLFo4A-rL7H_pg2SiI9RjYzzkXuGM&nd=1&utm_medium=organic&product=open&%24full_url=https%3A%2F%2Fopen.spotify.com%2Fepisode%2F55d3Q7CYCkbIZxGB0PI3mG%3Fsi%3D6eDp0arLRSCDCJXTRf4z3g%26fbclid%3DPAAaanSNNZuN2t2ORLlh0gtzdelhMdUTkLFo4A-rL7H_pg2SiI9RjYzzkXuGM&feature=organic&_branch_match_id=1217201714678451964&_branch_referrer=H4sIAAAAAAAAA9VO22qDMAD9mvRt6hLbsoEUp%2Bgc1nXaQtuXEk3ULKkJMYHNr58O9hGD83A4N05vjBqfXXdU0rD228FKOYIN3N0pLYltTCAVHVYA%2Bq0V4ma1CPqlAlAIYDJjsZ2%2FdiPvs0QVGyWhM1uvCfrYRpeI19n1K33xDhm6pwAlIwMo3tBYeVjnZRXF0dv5WLb%2BhDoAN23dCEbmxCEMMR6qorjaAhr4Xuai9zozESr6PTkdeZ5IP3zQ%2Bfb1pjpYseyp%2FLxMEz%2FbdP97GgtR44b%2Fq%2BPz0LCMPK5aio3VNJC6wwNrfgDw%2FQOzrQEAAA%3D%3D
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Showing your support by Wolvesy

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“Badges, we don’t need no stinking badges!” is one of the best lines in the classic Mel Brooks movie Blazing Saddles but we all need badges, don’t we? Something personal that shows both who or what we support and what our values are to the outside world. I wore this Merthyr Tydfil AFC badge on the lapel of my Vaynor & Penderyn school blazer every day I was in that fine establishment of learning. I probably wore it firstly because the chance of getting any MTFC merchandise in that era was virtually nil. The club shop operated out of the tea hut at the end of the grandstand and it was never open in the seventies and when those wooden boards were ever open then every kid in the ground would flock there to buy anything available but it was always the same stuff – key-rings, rosettes and badges. So even a badge was a rarity and such a rare item could never be allowed to rest somewhere in a drawer to be lost in some clear out years later. It had to be shown off, it was a family heirloom
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It’s in the cards by Marc ap Dafydd

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There are not many tangible links with our decade of membership in the Football League available to us at Merthyr Town. The holy grail of a home match  programme  continues to elude the museum project, there are always a few Merthyr Town issues  up for  auction  but their rarity means that their reserve prices are always way outside our budget. We’ve got a few away game  programmes  in the collection in preparation for future  exhibitions  but a copy produced and sold at  Penydarren  Park escapes us.  However around 100 years ago our squad of players preparing for a season in the Football League alongside teams such as Watford, Watford and Millwall were photographed  for inclusion in one of the great  promotions of the age; the cigarette card. The cards were originally included in the packaging as “stiffeners” to prevent the cigarettes from bending or breaking but very soon became collectors ’  items  in their own right and  another way to advertise the brands in a very crowded tobacco
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A Safer Space by Marc ap Dafydd

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  The recent  Sgorio   piece on our game v Weston Super Mare gave the club an opportunity to express everyone’s frustration with the Covid-19  restrictions imposed by our very own government. That game ,  in particular , seem s  the most ridiculous of the two games played behind closed doors. The “Boxing Day” game would have seen a crowd possibly close to 1,000 fans which is sadly unusual for us in recent seasons, a day of reunions as exiled fans return home to celebrate Christmas with loved  ones, a slice of Valleys life concentrated into a football ground. There would  of course  have been  cwtshes  all around the terraces  on that day  so maybe a note of caution over the festive period was warranted  but the next home game with no fans seemed absurd to everyone at  Penydarren  Park when the S4C cameras came to film our empty terraces.  Our average home crowd is about 400 fans these days and let’s be honest we can probably provide any authority in the land with a map of where each of
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Why do we live this way by Konrad Bartelski

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  Have you ever thought about the way we live? The reliance on the ability of a dozen or so semi-professional or maybe that should be semi-amateur players to complete our week’s endeavors with a competent game of football and if we’re lucky three points . It all  seems a bit ridiculous .  I’ve thought about this for a long time, it’s getting on for 43 years now, and I’ve come to the realization that it’s not absurd for us to believe in a football team to make us happy. Why shouldn’t we? We live in the Valleys, the most hedonistic part of the UK.  The most ludicrous fans hav e got  to be those from the big cities where there  must  be more to life than football, haven’t they got more there after all? They do, we don’t ,  but we  certainly  live life to the full. That’s the  big  difference  in  how we live our lives. Belgrade is a great city. There are more than a few Merthyr fans who have been there to watch Wales over the years and every one of them will tell you that it’s a great cit
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