NATIONWIDE NATIONAL LEAGUE NORTH. MONDAY, 31st AUGUST 2026.

Morecambe Give Chester The Blues.

On the final Bank Holiday of 2026, Morecambe travelled the fairly short distance to the County Town of Cheshire to take-on Chester FC.

So what do we know about Chester apart from the fact that it is 87 miles away from the Halo Stadium to the south? This ancient walled city is on a par with places like York; Durham and Cambridge as one of the most historic settlements to be found anywhere in England.

Chester also firmly sets itself in a historical context with its references to particularly its Roman past.

The football club, for example, plays at a ground named after the Roman Goddess of the adjacent River Dee – `Deva’ – and has a mascot – `Lupus’ – which means `Wolf’ in Latin.

`Chester’ – like `Caster’ – signifies the presence of a fortified Roman settlement in English place-names: Manchester; Winchester; Lancaster etc- and the original Roman Deva Vitrix (as Chester was called by the Latin-speaking invaders) was a fortified town.

Even centuries after the Romans had gone, Chester continued to be a bastion of English power in the border country close to the Welsh border. The unhappy and frequently violent relations which have existed between `Cestrians’ (natives of Chester) and their Welsh neighbours is still reflected in the mutually antagonistic relationship between fans of Wrexham FC and those of the Seals. In Morecambe’s first-ever away game in the EFL, the taunts by those among us aiming to wind-up the home crowd that Wrexham supporters were peasants; lived in a dump – or sought intimate relations with even quite ugly sheep – all fell on deaf ears. But when our contingent suggested that Wrexham was `Just a bus stop in Chester’; the Welsh segment of the stadium went absolutely berserk….

The Cambrian connection has also caused practical – and really serious – problems for the club which are probably unique in football – and social – history. Most of the Deva Stadium (including the pitch) can be found on Welsh soil and the club found itself on the receiving end of the ire of both the government in Cardiff and Flintshire Police during January 2022 for failing to respect Covid regulations which were different to those that would apply to the part of stadium which was built on English soil.

The long-term tensions between the city and its closest neighbours is also apparent in a statute still in force which dictates then any Welshman to be found within Chester’s City Walls after sun-down should be killed. So we need to remind Ben Williams to get on the team bus promptly after we play them on their own patch…

Chester is a beautiful city with many visitor attractions such as its Cathedral, the intact city walls; Market; the Eastgate Clock; boat trips on the river and the nearby Zoo. There are a lot of High-End shops, reflecting its status as the County Town of affluent Cheshire. A lot of money has been spent on re-development around the Cathedral in recent years and I think it’s fair to say that Chester has bucked the trend of increasing desolation and empty shops which characterises so many towns the length and breadth of Britain.

Morecambe and Chester FC share the unwanted distinction of falling from on high into relative obscurity in the English Football Pyramid during recent years. Part of the price they have both paid for this slip down the leagues is having to qualify to play in the First Round of the FA Cup.

Last season, for the first time in almost twenty years, Morecambe had to compete in an FA Cup Third Qualifying Round match. Ashvir Singh Johal’s hopeless team entertained Chester FC, ran rings around them for much of the game but drew one goal each when the visitors scored with literally the last kick of the match. In the replay, Morecambe were out-played; out-muscled and basically shamed by a part-time team much fitter and more determined than our collection of badly-performing full-time shirkers and misfits. We finally lost by two goals to nil and our display was utterly shambolic – it should have been totally unacceptable to the ownership as well. But this turned-out to be just one of countless humiliations the Shrimps would experience under the alleged `leadership’ of the utterly clueless pet of the owners in what still seems to be a Panjab Warriors’ experiment with our club. 

Chester, though, have become accustomed to even worse humiliations than ours.

The original Chester FC was founded in 1885 and played in the Combination at several locations until moving to Sealand Road in 1906. They won their league in 1910 and were promoted to the Lancashire Combination Second Division as a result. They became Champions of this, too, at the first time of asking and transferred to the Cheshire League during 1919. They were Champions of this three times before being accepted into the Football League’s Third Division North in 1931. When the Football League abandoned its regional divisions during 1958, Chester were placed in the Fourth Division. In 1975, they were promoted to the national Third Division. They were relegated back again in 1982 and renamed themselves Chester City a year later.

After slipping out of League Two during 2000 into the non-league wilderness that cronyism had at times protected them from during their unremarkable decades as a Football League club since 1931 (seven applications for re-election in 1954, 1955, 1961, 1962, 1963, 1968 and 1984 as clubs like ours were deliberately kept out of this Closed Shop by the EFL), City fought its way back again in the 2004-5 season.

But who can forget the time when – at Christie Park – a shameful bit of play-acting by one of our own led to a Chester forward being sent-off for a head-butt which never happened and City lost a tie in which they had been on top? This happened on 7^th December 2002 when Morecambe was an authentic non-league club and the Shrimps came through in the F.A. Cup by three goals to two.

I also have a particular memory of the performance for them by a certain crazy-looking very muscular player with a shaved head and a Rottweiler mentality at Christie Park when he was almost able to turn a losing position into a draw for the Cheshire club single-handedly with a simply phenomenal goal and a dominant performance in mid-field. This was none other than a man who would go on to be a Shrimps‘ legend: Kevin Ellison. The game was a League Two fixture which happened on Saturday 14^th February 2009 and Morecambe finally won 3:1 in a season which would end in relegation out of the EFL for the second time for the Seals (a nickname, I probably should have already mentioned that came about as a result of their former stadium on Sealand Road and has absolutely nothing to do with the nearby Zoo.)

This loss of Football League status sparked a financial crisis for Chester which had already been exacerbated by a typically unsympathetic EFL with a transfer embargo. Facing a ten-point deduction for going into administration, City found themselves seven million pounds in debt. As the HMRC used the Courts to enforce a CVA (Company Voluntary Agreement); City’s 10 point deduction became 25 and when they tried to re-start life as a new company altogether, the FA intervened to prevent them playing their first game as a member of the Football Conference in 2009 at Grays Athletic.

Unable to fulfil their first few fixtures as a new non-league club, things got even worse during January 2010 when their players went on strike having not been paid and the Conference reacted by suspending the club altogether. Following a vote by other members of the league, Chester was expelled on 26^th February 2010, with its assets valued at just one pound sterling and a points total of minus three right at the bottom of the Conference.

Their application to join the Welsh League was immediately rejected and the rump of a once proud club found itself without any league to play in at all by Summer 2010 until they were finally accepted by the Northern Premier League Division One. Since then, they have managed to battle their way back to the National League only to be relegated again in 2018, when they found themselves in serious financial trouble once more.

But they rallied again – helped by former Manager and Liverpool legend Ian Rush plus Michael Owen among others – and the season before last, they were denied membership of the National League proper once more only by a 2-1 defeat by Scunthorpe United in the NL North Play-Off Final at Glanford Park.

They were frustrated anew last season when they finished the campaign in seventh place in the table but lost 2-1 in the quarter finals at relatively nearby Macclesfield – where they played their home games for two years in the hiatus between leaving Sealand Road and playing at the Deva Stadium between 2000 and 2002.

So when we think we’ve had a hard time as Shrimps’ fans, we have not been alone and the generosity of Chester fans just over a year ago as they paid for travel to away warm-up matches for our club as we teetered on the brink of extinction ourselves will never be forgotten by Morecambe supporters. Bury and Chester will always hold a very special place in our hearts.

Altogether – according to 11v11.com – the two clubs had met seven times in various competitions in the past prior to the two FA Cup games last season. This sequence began with a 0-1 win for Morecambe at Sealand Road as a non-league club against Fourth Division City in November 1961. This match was watched by 7,965 fans and marked the Shrimps’ first ever victory over a Football League club. Since then,11v11.com assures us, Morecambe have apparently won all of them. Can this be right?…

No – as we have seen, Chester simply swept aside Ashvir Singh Johal’s unfit and demoralised side in Cheshire by two goals to nil last year in the FA Cup and thus pulled off a Giant Killing to equal the one they suffered against the Shrimps in 1961.

The clubs will meet again on Bank Holiday Monday, 31^st August, 2026 at 15:00hrs at the Deva Stadium. The reverse fixture will be played at the Halo on Saturday 20^th March 2027; kick-off 15:00hrs. 

Apart from Our Kev, several other players have performed for both clubs, chief among whom are the sensational Stewart Drummond, goalkeeper Tony Thompson and Wales Youth International Marcus Dackers (on loan to both clubs from Salford City).

—

Ex-Altrincham Manager Phil Parkinson (the lesser-known one) is the man in the Chester hot seat this season. Under his stewardship, the Blues were unbeaten and started in second position in the National League North this afternoon. They have won four of their five games so far and drawn the other one.

Morecambe, by contrast, arrived at the other end of the table in nineteenth place, out of the Bottom Four’s Legion of the Damned on goal-difference alone.

The Shrimps have lost as many games as their hosts have won and today’s clash would be a real Acid Test for the visitors against one of their fellow favourites to win this Division. Just how good would Adam Lakeland’s unpredictable side prove to be in all truth?

Morecambe kicked-off on a cloudy but occasionally sunny day interrupted by really heavy downpours in front of a decent crowd.

The play was disappointingly scrappy from both sides for the first ten minutes or so with neither goalkeeper tested. Referee Darren Rogers let a lot of bad tackles by both teams go unpunished but Joe Garner went in the book after just over a quarter of an hour following what seems to be a characteristic bout of bad temper resulted in him committing a needless foul on Declan Weeks.

Following a quick clearance by home goalkeeper Luke Hewitson, ex-Morecambe man Ma’kel Campbell forced Myles Boney into the first save of the game to concede the initial corner kick of the contest with 28 minutes played.

With Jefferson Abreu looking dangerous for the hosts as stand-in full-back Will Smith struggled to deal with him, his prompting caused Connor Murphy to flash a low cross right across the Shrimps’ penalty area after half an hour which none of his team-mates could get on the end of.

Morecambe finished the period with a free-kick in injury time following a foul of Garner. Jake Cain took the free kick, which found its way eventually to Teddy Collis, whose shot went wide.

And that was basically as good as it got in the first half: few chances and a game basically bogged-down in midfield.

Morecambe started the second half on the front foot and won a corner after a couple of minutes which came to nothing. Collis was then fouled on the edge of the home penalty area by Murphy with 52 minutes on the clock. Cain took it and Paul Lewis was in the right place at the right time to beat Hewitson with a neat header and put the Shrimps one-nil up.

As the away fans made all the noise until the end of the game, the Seals had most of the ball for the next ten minutes or so but created little with it.

As Phil Parkinson made two attacking changes, Morecambe hit on the break again in the sixty-fifth minute: Newby played over a cross which Garner headed into the danger area to see the home defence struggle to clear.

With ten minutes left, home substitute Billy Waters put the ball over the bar with perhaps Chester’s best game of the bar so far. Lewis Leigh was then roundly booed by the Seals’ faithful as a former Blues player when he was introduced with a few minutes left. Will Smith then made a miraculous block on the edge of his penalty area with less than five minutes left to play after hesitation by Ben Williams allowed Campbell to latch onto a ball which the Shrimps’ defender should have cleared.

But the day ended with a perfect Bank Holiday for Morecambe. Chester were beaten for the first time in the league this season as the Shrimps picked-up the maximum six points on offer over the last four days and earned a Clean Sheet into the bargain.

Their reward – as the Seals fell to fourth place in the National League North table – was to move up to lucky thirteenth position.

Time’s moving on and I can’t share with you yet what would clearly be a delighted Adam Lakeland said after the game. An interview like this would have been available on all sorts of feeds not too long ago. Dave Salmon at Beyond Radio does a fantastic job but there are only so many hours in the day for him to drive to away venues; set up his equipment; commentate; do his media stuff like write a match report and interview the Manager. And then dis-assemble everything and finally drive home again. Any one of these tasks would surely be enough on its own…

Radio Lankyshite – which, I am told, is part of our BBC – aren’t interested in us anymore. But they never really were, were they?

We are too far away geographically from Blackburn and Preston where they have always had their main focus.

Sadly, other media outlets have clearly taken their lead.

So once I know what Adam told us, I will share it with you.

Chester FC: 1 Luke Hewitson; 3 Nathan Woodthorpe; 4 Declan Weeks; 5 Jake Griffin; 7 Tom Peers (11 Billy Waters 63’); 9 Jacob Hazel; 14 Connor Murphy (Y) (12 Dan Ward 63’); 16 Sam Foley; 19 Jefferson Abreu (31 Kofi Moore 75’); 20 Ma’kel Campbell (Y); 33 Sam Reed (15 Isaac Burgess 75’).

Subs Not Used: 1 Callum Mackin; 6 Jack Kenny; 28 Alfie Jones-Mellor.

Morecambe:  13 Myles Boney; 3 Ben Williams; 4 Liam Hogan; 5 Will Smith (C); 6 Lewis Baines; 7 Teddy Collis (Y) (8 Lewis Leigh 84’); 20 Jake Cain; 9 Joe Garner (Y) (14 Isaac Buckley-Ricketts 78’); 10 Matty Daly; 11 Elliot Newby (27 Adam Fairclough 90’); 17 Paul Lewis.

Subs Not Used: 1 Joe Young; 26 Lennon Dobson; 29 Oscar Wright; 30 Corey Goodyear.

Ref: Darren Rogers.

Att: 3,634 (378 from Morecambe.)