ECDSA event 'Game of Two Halves' evening with Mike Mullarkey 27-01-15

Nik Saunders · Jan 4, 2015

Please find below a poster about the first ever social event by ECDSA taking place up in the Apple Taxi Suite at Exeter City F.C on Tuesday 27th January, 7pm.

The event is called 'Game of Two Halves' which is an evening with our Ambassador, Mike Mullarkey (Premier league & Fifa Assistant Referee) and a media presentation by the Supporters Trust 'The day we played Brazil'.

It's FREE entry with the upstairs bar being open also.

If people are able to circulate our poster please PM me and I'll email back the poster.

We hope to see you there.

Tuesday 27th January, ecdsa event at ecfc.jpg

Nik Saunders · Jan 17, 2015

Just bringing this back to the top and to let everyone know that this event is not just for ECDSA members but open to everyone.

Pete Martin (CTID) · Jan 23, 2015

Looking forward to this. Should be a good night!

Nik Saunders · Feb 1, 2015

Game of Two Halves - Match report

The evening was skilfully chaired by Andrew Barge whose first task was to delay the kick off by 15 minutes. Sadly there had been two very serious road traffic accidents during the day and the roads in and around Exeter had been brought to a standstill. The short delay ensured that late comers did not miss any of the highly entertaining and informative evening that followed.

So as a near capacity crowd of 80+ gathered in the Apple Taxi Suite at St James’ Park, Martin Weiler from The Supporters Trust, got the evening going with a multi media presentation all about the history of ECFC and the club’s famous trip to South America in 1914 when ECFC became the first team to play Brazil. Martin’s presentation was full of fascinating facts about the club with pictures and information from that famous trip – for example you may have thought that ECFC was founded in 1904. Indeed the club celebrated its centenary with a game against the Brazil Masters in 2004 here at the Park but following research into the club’s history by The Trust it is now known that St Sidwells Football Club, which was founded in 1901, changed its name to Exeter City in 1904. No new club was formed in 1904 and therefore there may be a move to change the club’s date of formation from 1904 to 1901 – watch out for more news on this from The Supporters Trust.

Following the half time interval Andrew then introduced our guest speaker for the night – FIFA World Cup Final 2010 Assistant Referee and ECDSA Ambassador Mike Mullarkey.

And what a highly entertaining second half we had with Mike charting his rise from Under 13 ECFC hopeful to League 4 footballer (that’s Exeter & District Sunday League) to non-league linesman, Football League Assistant Referee and all the way through to Premier League and FIFA Assistant Referee. Along the way Mike told the captive audience many amusing stories and anecdotes about his time running the line leading up to the 2010 World Cup Final and beyond. Mike talked about how lady luck always plays her part in any success story. Remember the game in the 2010 World Cup – England trailing Germany 1-2 when Frank Lampard shot from outside of the box. The ball hit the crossbar, bounced down behind the line but bounced back out and into play. No goal was given although the ball was clearly over line and England went on to lose the match 1-4. With England out of the World Cup an opening for the England officiating trio of Howard Webb, Darren Cann and Exeter’s Mike Mullarkey appeared and the rest is history so they say. Had the goal been given and England, who were in the ascendancy at the time, went on to win the game then our England trio may not have been given another match to officiate.

Mike finished off by inviting questions from the audience and diplomatically answered questions on time wasting, yellow & red cards, the ‘sin bin’ and many more. Surprising though no one asked Mike to explain the off-side rule – a good job because we all had homes to go to!

Mike had brought with him a number of items of memorabilia from his time as an Assistant Referee and these were on show for all to see including his medal for officiating in the 2010 World Cup Final which was the same medal given to the World Cup winners.

Mike had also given to ECDSA a number of high quality items to raffle off from the football world. The raffle together with a retiring bucket collection raised an impressive £275.33 for ECDSA funds all of which will be used to help improve the match day experience for disabled supporters here at St James’ Park.

ECDSA would like to thank Mike, Martin and Andrew for helping us put together a wonderful evening of entertainment and all those fans who attended for making the evening such a success.

Silver fox · Feb 1, 2015

Good to hear the evening went well, Mike is a top bloke.

ECDSA event 'Game of Two Halves' evening with Mike Mullarkey 27-01-15

Nik Saunders

Member

Nik Saunders

Member

Pete Martin (CTID)

Very well known Exeweb poster

Nik Saunders

Member

Silver fox

Very well known Exeweb poster