The Pars

It goes without saying that for any successful team there needs to be a core of stand-out quality players. These players are naturally celebrated and cherished by supporters and a privileged few become club legends. Any successful team also needs to have squad players who can play wherever required and can always be relied upon to put in a decent performance. There are no prizes for guessing which of those two categories Ronnie belongs to, but in my view his contribution to our success in the last two seasons deserves its own recognition. I am sorry that he has left and I hope he finds what he is looking for at his next club.

I just want to congratulate all those involved who made the David Smith loan happen. A surprising but amazing signing. Looking forward to the new season even more now!

Last year the league fixtures came out 6pm 14 July so if that is repeated it will be Wednesday 13 July. I believe that the Conference South fixtures for 2022/3 will come out on 6 July and their season starts a week earlier than ours. So it would make sense ours comes will come out a week later.

I was at the Enfield game today. As well as Brightlingsea played in the second half, Enfield were dreadful. Hornchurch to win 4.0 attendance 279.

The 2.1 score line was not a fair reflection of the game, with better luck and finishing this game should have been a thrashing. But it is great to watch us make so many chances. Considering that 7 regular starters were missing from the line up it shows that with our recent signings we building up strength in depth. Well done to Tom Wraight who has scored in both games he has played for us. Our new strategy of winning football matches is something that I am really getting behind 😀 Long may it continue.

Considering that there have only been 7 women’s cup finals played at Wembley which have been won by only 3 teams, Arsenal, Chelsea and Manchester City, there is a very limited pool to draw from. As best as I can find this is the first time ever that a brother and sister have won a cup final at Wembley, not only in one year but ever. But more than happy if shown to be wrong in this.

Jack Charlton winning the league cup with Leeds United and Bobby Charlton winning the European Cup with Manchester United in 1968 both held at Wembley is one which first comes to mind.

Yes. Gary and Phil Neville won the FA Cup for Manchester United in 1996. Brian and Mark Stein won the league cup for Luton Town in 1988. Jimmy and Brian Greenhoff won the FA Cup for Manchester United in 1977. Bobby and Jack Charlton won the World Cup for England in 1966. George and Ted Robledo won the FA Cup for Newcastle United in 1952.

Despite the severe wind chill a very warming performance and for want of more clinical finishing we should have won by more. I was fortunate to be right in line with Lewiss when he took the shot for goal and what made it even more special was immediately after the game a Bognor fan was complaining that they only lost because of a fluke goal who then told me to f off when I said it was deliberate 😀 With the run of fixtures we have ahead hopefully this is the start of a winning run to get us a in a position to be challenging for the playoffs. COYU

Or google search says that Nottingham Forest, Middlesbrough and Bournemouth are interested. It does look like he will be leaving us in January and if so the best of luck to him.

Totally agree with KLF. In the Chairman’s notes for the first home league of the season he stated “The squad we have now is strong, Mark is very loyal to the squads he assembles and evidence of that is that virtually all of the squad who gave us our day at Wembley have started the season. Mark hasn’t brought new players in at this stage, he knows that he can but only wants to bring players in who will not only improve the squad, but also fit into the squad dynamic” I will leave you to come to your own conclusions as to whether a squad with no specialist defensive and central midfield cover could ever be considered as strong. From previous posts the consensus seems to be that Jill has been the only non-loan signing who has improved the squad. The best time to build your squad and team is when you are at the top, and I fear that complacency rather than ambition coupled with more injuries as usual has inevitably brought us to where we now are. A mid-table team. Winning the FA Trophy was a once in a lifetime: event that we have sadly wasted. The only thing that I can hope for is that lessons have been learnt and we can turn this into a positive for next season.

As we unfortunately had a free Saturday yesterday I decided to watch a FA Trophy game anyway so I went to see the Brentwood v Staines game. (4.1 to Brentwood btw). I have to say that Brentwood’s No 9, Tom Richardson, looks like a player who could do a really good job for us. Apart from penalty taking, as the one he missed was woeful. But he is a good finisher otherwise, with good positional awareness but most of all he is very fast. The best player on the pitch though was Noah Amissah but as he plays for Staines, I don’t see that signing being feasible. As a bonus I also got to see Sir Trevor Brooking who was also at the game!

I have read on our website that he has moved on after literally only playing for 5 minutes for us. But what a 5 minutes. in those 5 minutes through no fault of his own we ended from being 3.2 ahead away to East Thurrock to losing 4.3. I hope he has better fortune at his next club.

The game has been re-arranged for Tuesday 23rd November.

The team we put out yesterday was good enough to win and I totally agree with Mickey Parcell’s tweet after the game. By my count we made 8 good goal scoring opportunities in the first half and none in the second which tells its own story. I am also at a loss as to why we only had 4 subs and frankly it has become embarrassing. Jordan Johnson and Ellis Brown both started last week yet there was no information from the club why they were not available yesterday. Also having no information provided on the availability of Ronnie Winn, Sam Higgins and Wilberforce Ocran just adds to the frustration.