EV2 Sheffield & Hallamshire County Senior League Premier Division
Memories of his Stocksbridge Park Steels Reserves days with Jamie Vardy will flood back for Jon Wragg when he takes Ecclesfield Red Rose 1915 to Bracken Moor tomorrow.
Wragg returns to Stocksbridge for the first time as a manager, along with his brother and assistant Matt and first team coach Ryan McDonald – both ex-Steels reserves players as well.
The Wragg’s were part of the Stocksbridge reserves side – one Vardy was a vital part of – which was very successful in the mid-2000s and the Red Rose chief is proud of his time at Bracken Moor.
“(If we were reminiscing we’d be talking about) a few battles with Athersley Rec which we had on there during the season where we finished second and we won the League Cup and Association Cup,” Wragg told Non League Yorkshire.
“We beat Athersley 3-2 at home and it was a cracking game and they pipped us to the title that year.
“We won the League Cup against Wombwell on that pitch.
“We played with so many players who went onto play NCEL and higher like Vardy, Rob Pacey, Matt Griffin, Tom Jones, Paul Lavender, Mark Wilkinson, Andy Ring.
“They were great times and one of my best times in football.
“I didn’t know Griff before Stocksbridge and I’ve really good mates with him now and there’s three-or-four who I am still in touch with and on different WhatApps groups with.
“I made a lot of friends and I was best man at a wedding for one of the lads I met at Stocksbridge so we had a really good dressing room.
“It makes it even more special that the friendship groups I’m part of at the moment developed while I was at Stocksbridge.
“It was five years ago last Friday since I did my ACL at Stocksbridge against Frechville and I’ve not been back up in a playing or managing capacity since.
“It will be good to go up.
“When we got into the Prem (with Ecclesfield three years ago) one of the fixtures we looked for was Stocksbridge away.
“But in the two seasons which didn’t finish we didn’t manage to play them away.”
The match will Ecclesfield’s 16th league game of a very disjointed campaign.
Along with Sheffield Town and Hepworth United they have played far more than most while Oughtibridge have only played ten and we’re almost in February.
One reason why sides are lagging behind with their games is because of the controversial wildcard rule which continuers to divide opinion and is probably the league’s version of Brexit.
We didn’t get onto Brexit but Wragg remains opposed to the wildcard rule.
“Most teams will have used it now and I was thinking (about the wildcard) the other day and we had to use it earlier in the season,” he said.
“We voted against it and I’d like to think next season it won’t be in.
“It has to be a one-off and basically (the league need to say) ‘look if you’re in the Premier Division you have to be fulfilling your fixtures’.
“There is the 28-day option where if you know there is a wedding or a stag do and multiple players are unavailable you can request a free week.
“Any clubs who are struggling have the 30-day grace period as well to get themselves together which a few clubs have used this season.
“There’s enough there to help clubs out.
“If you look at games where the wildcard has been used, most have involved Swinton and Wakefield and it is disproportionate.
“Have teams had a genuine reason to not fulfil the fixture (against Swinton or Wakefield by using the wildcard)?
“Is it because they haven’t had a team or is it because they haven’t had their best players so we’re not going to Swinton or Wakefield?
“You have to look at it like that and I was looking at it the other day and I saw that (the wildcard) was hitting Swinton and Wakefield more than other sides.
“I don’t see anybody using (the wildcard) against teams at the bottom.”
The West Yorkshire League Premier Division is flying through their games and all teams have played a similar amount of matches.
Although there is a clearly a lot of games to be played, Wragg is hopeful the County Senior League will not face a huge backlog at the end of the season.
“Most teams have used (the wildcard) so games have got to be played,” he said.
“If they don’t get played now, it will go back to teams losing points which they probably should do.
“There’s no reason why we can’t finish the season and why we shouldn’t be playing tons of games in April and May.
“We haven’t even had a League Cup competition and I’m not sure we’ll get one.
“It is disappointing when you look at how many games have been played and we’re not even played the League Cup.”
Ecclesfield go into the Stocksbridge in fourth following the 4-1 win at North Gawber and Wragg says it was a good victory considering preparations.
“It was a really good win and they were in a similar boat to us as we only had 12 men,” he said.
“Our goalkeeper got injured in the warm-up so we had to make change and put our centre-half Tyler Bates in goal.
“So it wasn’t the best start to the day but we played really well.
“We went 2-0 up by half-time.
“They got one back at the start of the second and it was a bit of an onslaught for 15 minutes but we weathered the storm and Carlton Carty scored a couple of goals late-on to seal the win.
“It was great performance, especially considering at quarter to two I probably wasn’t expecting that result to be honest.”