There\u2019s a fine drizzle (mizzle, we call it, in this part of Dorset) as I make my way across the car park in the dark, towards the all-weather sports pitch at Beaminster School in Tunnel Road.<\/p>\n
The air smells of cow dung and a gaggle of geese is in hysterics outside the nearby farm shop. If I didn\u2019t know better I\u2019d think they were laughing at the antics on the pitch.<\/p>\n
Floodlights are in full glow and, while others are snuggled up at home, a handful of hardy souls is moving around in front of me. At first glance these men look like they\u2019re running, albeit slowly. But they\u2019re not. They\u2019re taking part in walking football for the over-50s. And the language is as ripe as the manure cloud currently sitting over this part of town.<\/p>\n
From the touchline, B-Fit Leisure Centre committee member Mike Runyard is keeping a keen eye on the ball and the players.<\/p>\n
\u201cWatch out,\u201d he shouts at them but looks at me. \u201cThe press is here.\u201d<\/p>\n
Instantly, the language on the pitch is modified for my benefit, the goalkeeper saying \u2018jolly good show, chaps\u2019 when the ball hits the back of the net at the other end of the pitch.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe started it in January last year and it\u2019s grown in popularity. We\u2019ve had a few injuries,\u201d Mike Runyard says, pointing to his leg, \u201cso not everyone is here. We have about 20 people taking part usually, including a couple of women. My wife\u2019s one of them.\u201d<\/p>\n
My husband, Andrew, is too and he\u2019s managed to rope in about five other men from our village every Monday night. He\u2019s 64 and a retired company director.<\/p>\n
\u201cI love competitive team sports but at my age nothing seemed available until walking football started, so now I can get my competitive buzz as well as good exercise and camaraderie,\u201d he says.<\/p>\n
He\u2019s not alone. Ever since a Barclays advert honed in on walking football in 2014, the sport has really taken off among older people wanting to keep fit and maintain that competitive edge.<\/p>\n
Referee Ryan Sweetman says: \u201cIt\u2019s massive. It originated in Bury and is really popular for people who used to play football or rugby.\u201d<\/p>\n
Ryan is an assistant at the leisure centre, a facility used by both the school and the wider community. At the tender age of 19, his word goes when it comes to the people on the pitch, some of whom are old enough to be his grandfather. I don\u2019t envy him one bit. The rules of the game are that participants can only walk, there can be no offside play, no throw-ins and a player can only touch the ball a maximum of three times before passing to someone else.<\/p>\n
There\u2019s quite a lot of backchat going on and the goalkeeper is telling another player that he\u2019s quite happy to be in goal because he had too much to drink at the weekend and can\u2019t walk fast because he\u2019d be sloshing about too much.<\/p>\n
There is an incredibly fine line between walking fast and running. And the ref needs to have visited a famous optician to spot the difference. Every now and then Ryan blows his whistle at an offending player, dealing good naturedly with the whingeing on the pitch. But despite the banter, they respect him and his decisions.<\/p>\n
I can see someone scuttling across the pitch like Max Wall, walking very quickly without actually breaking out into a run. I squint my eyes and realise it\u2019s my local butcher who, despite wearing knees supports, is pretty nifty with the ball.<\/p>\n
\u201cHey, Ref!\u201d shouts a petulant opponent, a used car salesman, hands on hips. \u201cHe\u2019s running!\u201d<\/p>\n
A plumber runs by and then gets shirty when the other team members yell at him and tell him to walk instead. There\u2019s an outburst of swearing from my husband and then a retired engineer zooms past, closely followed by a former policeman on his first outing into the world of walking football.<\/p>\n
He tackles and dribbles the ball towards the goal. He shoots, he scores. He\u2019s ecstatic.<\/p>\n
\u201cMy children won\u2019t believe it, I haven\u2019t played football since I was 14,\u201d he says to me. \u201cCan you email me a picture?\u201d<\/p>\n
Landscape gardener Nick David, 55, last played in the early 1990s, although he\u2019s been very active on the local cricket scene for many years.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt\u2019s a great laugh and really good exercise,\u201d he says after the game. \u201cI love playing football but I haven\u2019t played for 22 years. Forty years ago I had a trial with Plymouth as a goalkeeper but now I\u2019m a box-to-box midfielder.\u201d<\/p>\n
From what I can see, Mike Saunders, who works for Framptons the butcher in Beaminster, is one of the fastest and most competitive players on the pitch, quietly walking on and getting on with the job in hand while his opponents protest rather too much.<\/p>\n
\u201cI never wanted to give up playing football but age caught up with me,\u201d he says. \u201cBut the big kid is still there and I love playing. It\u2019s a lovely group of blokes, great exercise and a fun evening.\u201d<\/p>\n
For more information on the classes available at the B-Fit Leisure Centre, visit www.bfitleisure.com<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
There\u2019s a fine drizzle (mizzle, we call it, in this part of Dorset) as I make my way across the car park in the dark, towards the all-weather sports pitch at Beaminster School in Tunnel Road. The air smells of cow dung and a gaggle of geese is in hysterics outside the nearby farm shop. […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"cybocfi_hide_featured_image":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[16,23],"tags":[36],"class_list":["post-2600","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","category-articles","category-history-community","tag-margery-hookings"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.marshwoodlife.com\/test\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2600","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.marshwoodlife.com\/test\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.marshwoodlife.com\/test\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.marshwoodlife.com\/test\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.marshwoodlife.com\/test\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2600"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"http:\/\/www.marshwoodlife.com\/test\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2600\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.marshwoodlife.com\/test\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2600"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.marshwoodlife.com\/test\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2600"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.marshwoodlife.com\/test\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2600"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}