In the Beginning
I’ve been watching Non-League football on a regular basis since I was 10 years old. What I like most is that the players, club officials and supporters are there for the love of the game. The true spirit of football exists at Non-League level.

I grew up in North-West London and I was taken by my family to see my local club QPR as a child in the 1970’s. I’ve always supported the R’s, but when they were playing away from home I started going to see my local Non-League clubs – Hendon primarily, but also Finchley, Barnet and Edgware Town.

Albanian Experience
‘I was covering the Republic of Ireland against Albania for Capital Radio,’ he said. ‘It was like going back in time 400 years. I checked into my hotel room and there was a 12-inch black furry rat running around.

‘The hotel wouldn’t do anything about it so I called the police who got rid of it. They turned up in full gear and were rehearsing karate kicks in the corridor. They chased the rat into a huge hole in the skirting board and then smashed the wardrobe to get some wood to plug the gap. It was all quite dramatic.

‘Anyway, for some reason the three policemen took a shine to me and one asked if he could spend the night with me so I could say thank you to him. The other two wanted to watch. I told them to get out.’

Groundhoppers
From there, I decided to visit every Non-League club in London as my groundhopping bug began. By the time I was 17, I had visited all 92 Football League grounds and I visited all the Scottish League grounds whilst still a teenager. Since then, I’ve continued travelling all around the country to visit Non-League clubs. Last season, I chalked up my 2,000th ground at FC United of Manchester.

Whilst I talk about myself, I am not alone there are ground-hoppers all around the world and everyone has different rules. There are some German ground-hoppers who watch 45 minutes and go to the next game. That is a different hobby from my hobby — you have to watch the whole game or what is the point?

‘You go on an organised ground-hop trip and it can be anything from 200 to 400 people. It’s a nice community and full of quirks.

‘There is one guy who has to walk around the four sides inside the ground and outside as well and there is another who would insist on touching the match ball. There were a few times when he would get desperate and run on the pitch at half time or full time and hassle the referee to touch the ball. There was a game in Cornwall when the ball got kicked out of the ground on to a main road and he jumped into the road, between all these lorries and cars, to get to the ball.’

World Record
One of the best groundhops was being part of a world record in March 2004. It was based around the Central Midlands League and I and about 250 other ground-hoppers started at 11am at Greenwood Meadows FC. From there, there was a game at 1pm at Pelican FC, 3pm at Dunkirk FC, 5.30pm at Sandiacre Town FC and 8pm at Graham Street Prims FC

This is listed in the Guinness Book of Records and we received certificates confirming the world record at the end of the fifth game.

Inside Prison!
In December 2011, I set about watching a match inside Feltham Prison in Middlesex.

This featured a team called Phoenix FC, who had to play all their fixtures at home (for obvious reasons!) as inmates of the Young Offender Institution at Feltham. I received special permission by email to attend a fixture, but I was told not to bring a phone or a camera with me.

I was instructed to arrive in the main car park along with the match referee and the visiting players from Hanworth Villa Vets. We were met by members of the prison staff who escorted us all in together…via an airport-style metal detector, a body search, numerous locked gates and along a path to the changing rooms. This process took 45 minutes. After the players and ref got changed, we were then accompanied through more locked gates out to the playing area.

A high mesh fence with barbed wire on top surrounded the football pitch. There were dug-outs along one touchline and I watched the match from there as the only spectator.

The Future
I have now been to 2,109 football grounds and have completed visits to the all the grounds in the top 16 divisions of English football down to Non-League step 4. Then at step 5 I need 24 grounds and another 71 at step 6.

There are endless possibilities at step 7 and below. Also, I’ve been to 35 European countries plus the USA for football – so it would be nice to visit more countries

By Tony Incenzo