First Team update

Our mens first team only completed 12 league games last season and had not played a competitive game since Dec 15th 2020 prior to our opening league game last Tuesday at Blackfield and Langley a period of nearly 8 months.

During this time they had 3 months of lockdown to endure and did return to training in early April for a month prior to breaking up and returning to proper pre-season training in early June ready for the new season.

The club had the opportunity to apply for promotion to Step 4 via the FA in May and submitted a detailed application as the 3rd best team based on points per game over the last two seasons in the Wessex Premier league despite not having actually ever completed a full season in the Premier Division. The top placed team, Christchurch, declined the invitation and that left ourselves and Lymington Town who did eventually take the one promotion space available. Although disappointed not to get the opportunity of promotion the process and experience certainly whetted the appetite to progress and has enabled us to plan and think accordingly whilst recognising that real progress can only be made in incremental steps and must be sustainable for the whole club.

During the 8 month period without a game we have seen the retirement of both Club Captain Chris Manning and Merl Anteney-Wright. Both Chris and Merl have been very instrumental in our clubs progress over the last few years and have played a huge part in our journey both on and off the pitch. They will be sadly missed but will always be “honorary purps” and we do hope to see them at games on a regular basis whilst hoping that one day their newly born children will wear purple !

Due in no small way to the covid pandemic we have also waved goodbye to our spanish contigent of Sergio Caballero and Edu Jiminez who have returned to their homeland. Sergio has scored too many fantastic goals to mention for our club and has often been our talisman during his 5 years with the club. Likewise Edu was a matchwinner on his day and a fantastic player. Both players were hugely popular with everyone at the club and always had smiles on their faces. They will also be sadly missed however we do hope they will return to see their english friends very soon and some of our players have already made visits to see them in Spain.

For the new season we were delighted to welcome back Cal Laycock from Portchester, Nathan Clements from Gosport Borough and club stalwart Ronan Galloway from Fareham Town. We have also added Jim Orvis from Blackfield, Tommy Barnes from Brockenhurst, Jamie Webber from Bashley and both Jamie Bulpit and Tom Bickley from Sholing along with three or four more new faces who will be promoted from within

We retained the services of all of our squad from last season with the exception of Arty Kerton who moved to Lymingtom, Marcel Laptas to Downton and Sam Woodward to Hamble Club.

The boys enjoyed a good pre-season with a notable win over Marlow from Step 4 and other victories over Ringwood, Stockbridge and Bemerton after losing to a very strong AFC Totton side.

Our season started on Tuesday with a credible 1-1 draw at Blackfield and Langley with a 96th minute equaliser from captain Alex Welch whilst our FA Cup journey this season started with a tremendous 3-1 away victory at fellow Wessex League Premier division Moneyfields who have been playing in the league above for the last few seasons. Our reward is a tough away trip to Shaftesbury on August 14th who also play in our league.

Very early days however , like many others, we are looking forward to a great season and the enjoyment of being able to play again after the pandemic .