I invested in the Timex global trainer with heart rate monitor. Received it this week and tried it out yesterday in a U17 7's tournament.
The GPS takes a few minutes to hook up that lead to a bit of stress as I like to have everything sorted out way before the kick-off.
Prior to the purchase, I checked up with timex for specific features, especially having an independant count down. Unfortunately, Timex confirmed that this watch didn't have this feature. I went ahead all the same and I've started sifting through the many features, but I haven't found the count down menu yet.
for the match yesterday, I customised the screen to have a stop watch (with stop-start feature), a stop watch that keeps going and the time of the day. You have to keep a close eye on the time not to go beyond full time.
once back at home, I loaded the stats into the Training Peaks web site and I got all the stats : distance, heart rate, speed....... There is also a Google Earth window where you can follow your mouvements around the pitch. You can also play back the match and observe the stats. It's great fun!!!
For my 3 matchs :
Time : 39 min
Distance: 3.5 km
Average speed : 5.2 km/h
top speed : 29.3 km/h