Merthyr Town AFC

Another Welsh association football team playing in the English pyramid and doing well, they're in the shadow of the four others, that's because they've drifted out of the spotlight into the nether regions. They have crucial gêms coming up against their promotion rivals, hoping to go up a division for a third successive year. I've followed them since I can remember because my gran used to live opposite, below Penydarren House in Trevethick St., we'd play where there were once bluebells in the grounds of the old Homfray mansion, and where F.A. Cup Final referee Leo Callaghan & others built their bungalows after the council knocked the house down; before we lost our childrens' football pitches where our coats served as goalposts, on a saturday afternoon we'd hear a murmur, walk through the skeletal house to see what was happening, and sneak in through a hole in the fence to see a real football match. Back in the fifties when clubs were voted into the Football League they were the best team in the land for years outside of it & the top Scottish clubs, but no matter how many times they applied they couldn't get the votes. In the end they couldn't get back to where they once were in the 1920s when they played against Aberdare in the 3rd Division South, so after years of frustration from banging their heads against a wall they slipped to their current position. After a lot of trouble & financial strife they seem to have got themselves back into the groove and are moving in the right direction, ask Owen Money. Up, up, up The Martyrs.