17th March, famously the day named for St Patrick, Ireland’s patron saint, has been the quietest in terms of football for the Greens with just 13 matches played. That’s comfortably the fewest since 12th February, leap days notwithstanding.

Things began in rather riotous fashion in 1923 as Cheshunt came to The Avenue Ground for an Athenian League match and returned back to the Herts / Middlesex border with a 9-1 defeat ringing in their ears. Travers Day, Cecil Wise and George Howell each netted twice whilst Lewis Smith, L Evershed and Freddie Young completed the rout with a goal apiece.

Five years later in 1928 Kingstonian arrived at Claremont Road for another Athenian League match and were comfortable 3-0 winners before a 1934 Middlesex Charity Cup semi-final saw the Greens take on Enfield and thanks to goals from Freddie Evans (2), Herbert Knott and Ronnie Rowe, come away with a 4-2 win to set-up a final against Hayes.

In 1945, as Allied shipping bombarded North-Sumatra, Uxbridge were beaten in a Middlesex Senior Cup semi-final, 4-1. Harry Robshaw scored twice and was joined on the scoresheet by C Fair and Mac Cochrane who grabbed one each.

1951 saw another semi-final appearance, this one against Pegasus in the club’s first appearance in the FA Amateur Cup semi-final held at Arsenal’s Highbury Ground. Roy Stroud grabbed the Hendon goal on the day of Brian Statham’s test match debut in New Zealand in a 1-1 draw to set-up a replay the following week.

The ever prolific Miles Spector was on target in 1956 as Southall were beaten 2-1 in the Athenian League, Jim Ward grabbing the other goal and half a dozen years on in 1962 Grays Athletic beat the Greens 4-2 in the same competition, Maurice Williams and Charlie Sells were on target for Hendon.

The 1973 title march continued unabated as the still unbeaten (in the league, at any rate) Greens beat Dulwich Hamlet 2-0 at Claremont Road thanks to strikes from Tony Bass and Rod Haider, this on the day that the Queen opened the new London Bridge. This gave way to a 17-year break between St Patrick’s Day matches and it wasn’t until 1990 and a 1-1 draw with Dagenham in which Uche Egbe scored the Hendon goal.

Two years later, another Hendon / Enfield derby went the way of the Greens as Alan Campbell scored his 31st – and final – Hendon goal in the 1-0 win before another lengthy gap ended in 2012 as a visit to Concord Rangers led by the newly installed Portsmouth manager, Danny Cowley, grabbed a comfortable 2-0 win. Elsewhere in football, Fabrice Muamba, then at Bolton Wanderers, collapsed on the pitch during a game with Spurs suffering a cardiac arrest from which, thankfully, he made a full recovery.

In 2014 a local derby with eventual champions Wealdstone at Earlsmead attracted 575 people to watch an absorbing 0-0 draw and finally, three years ago in 2021 goals from Ashley Nathaniel-George and Zak Joseph were enough to beat Tooting & Mitcham United at Imperial Fields, securing a 2-0 win.

Of the 13 matches to have taken place on 17th March there have been seven wins, three draws and three defeats. 28 goals have been scored and 16 conceded.