Westbury United
Tallinn, Budapest, Hamburg, Prague and Bratislava to
name but a few.
A fabulous experience and team bonding exercise
the Chairman takes particular delight in. Mud baths in
Hungary and Slovakia, our club pennant being hung
alongside those of international teams in the national
stadium in Prague, a famous 3-1 win in Hamburg, a
chance to climb a ski jump in Bavaria, a chance to have
a kick about in the Camp Nou car park and many
many more.
Off the pitch funding is always a
challenge (as it is for every club)
and sponsorship is important,
an average home game costs
around £85 which is reasonable
compared to what some clubs
have to pay.
End
of
season
presentation dinners help
immensely, with different
guest speakers each year
from the football world, most
famously World cup winner
Nobby Stiles who helped us
to celebrate our centenary.
For this celebration we were
delighted to be joined by several
members of Aulendorf football club,
a town in southern Germany where we
had enjoyed several end of season tours.
On the field this season we had a very solid
start and were just a couple of points off the top going
into the Christmas break but unfortunately the turn of the
year saw our title ambitions end after losing key players to
work committments and injury.
One of our most important achievements and
challenges of late, have been the ability to keep two teams
running. A reserve team is vital, not only to future success
on the field, backing up the 1st team but also to the long-
term future of the club.
In recent years we have sadly witnessed many local
sides, derby games from neighbouring villages, firstly
drop their reserves then eventually fold. These were
marvellous match’s we used to relish and now miss, we
hope they manage to reform in the near future. I think
this is an indictment of the distractions so many young
kids have today which serves to make us even more
determined to attract the local youngsters to
team sport and the pride of belonging
this brings.
There is renewed optimism
though as we have recently
attracted quite a few young
players we hope will help in
the next few years towards
our aim of winning the North
Glos title and taking the next
step up the league pyramid
system.
In recent seasons the
1st team achieved a league
and cup double and were
promoted up the pyramid
system for a short period. The
reserves have had some cup
success reaching several cup finals,
the final of 2009 was particularly special
as they won against all the odds after extra
time and a penalty shootout.
The superb facilities and set up are already in place to
meet the requirements for the next level and hopefully the
emerging squad of players can come together to fulfil the
club’s ambitions.
Article provided by Derek Palmer
www.footballfocusmag.com
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