| Full name | Westfield Football Club | |
|---|---|---|
| Nickname(s) | The Field, The Yellas (Yellows) | |
| Founded | 1953 | |
| Ground | Woking Park (Capacity: 1,000) |
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| Chairman | Steven Perkins | |
| Manager | John Comer | |
| League | Combined Counties League Division One |
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| 2010–11 | 13th | |
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Westfield (Surrey) Football Club is a semi-professional football club based in the Westfield area of Woking, England. Established in 1953, the club was a founder member of the Home Counties League (now the Combined Counties Football League) in 1978. In the 2000–01 season, they reached the Fourth Round of the FA Vase.
They are currently members of the Combined Counties Football League Division One. They were demoted from the Premier Division at the end of the 2005–06 season due to failing the ground grading criteria, and were unsuccessful in their appeal to stay up. The club was intending to groundshare with Woking at their Kingfield Stadium for the next two years, while Westfield's own ground was upgraded. In July 2010, plans were announced for a redevelopment of the club's ground.
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The Club was formed in 1953 as Westfield Boys Club playing in the Woking and District League and also running a youth team. From the start the Club had success in the com—petitions entered. Among the trophy’s won in the early years were the Surrey Youth Invitation Cup in 1953–54, the Surrey Junior Charity Cup in 1954–55 and 1955–56, the Surrey Junior Cup at the first attempt in 1955–56 and the Surrey Youth Cup in 1956–57. Following several seasons in local league football the Club made the break into Surrey Intermediate football using the present ground at Woking Park, Kingfield. Successes soon came and, after becoming League Champions and
Westfield FC Club House by local artist Brenda Davis Cup winners on several occasions in the subsequent seasons, the Club decided to apply for senior status.
The application was accepted in 1964 and after one season in the Parthenon League, Westfield met the necessary ground grading requirements and joined the Surrey Senior League.
Westfield’s future success in senior football sprang from their ability to attract the best local youngsters and they were successful in winning the Surrey Youth Cup again in 1966–67 and 1969–70 and the Surrey Youth Shield in 1969–70 and 1970–71. This talent matured and there followed three tremendous seasons for the senior side when they won the Surrey Senior League Cup in 1971–72, followed by the League and Cup double in 1972–73 and the League Championship again in 1973–74.
The Surrey Senior League was disbanded and reformed as the Combined Counties Football League in 1978 and Westfield became founder members and retained membership to date. Success, however, has been more difficult to achieve and in recent times the closest the senior team has come to honours was in 1989–90 when they lost the final of the Combined Counties League Cup to Hartley Wintney in extra time.
In recent seasons with former Woking player, John Cassidy as manager, the senior side have improved their league position, finishing sixth for the last two seasons, but only mid-table in last season's campaign. Season 2000–01 saw the Club enter the Carlsberg FA Vase for the first time, performing beyond expectations before losing in the Fourth Round to Ryman League Arlesey Town, on the way beating Wantage Town, Lewes and Bowers United. Season 2002–03 saw Westfield enter the FA Cup for the first time, losing at home to Dorking in the preliminary round.
Westfield continued to compete at youth level and they won the Combined Counties Youth League Cup in 1991–92 as well as being runners-up in the League.
Following the installation of floodlights in 1998 the U18 team joined the Southern Youth Floodlight League as members of the Western Division. The Club also run an U16 team playing in the West Surrey Boys League. This is currently the Club’s most successful side, last season competing at U15 level the team won the League Championship, the League Cup and the Surrey County Cup.
Following the end of the 2003–04 season, Westfield lost both first and second team managers. John Cassidy moved to Frimley Green, and thereafter back to Farnham Town, and Graham Pope moved to Godalming & Guildford to manage their reserve team in the Suburban league.
Westfield recruited Paul Donaghy from Guildford-based Merrow as first-team manager, and Dave Robson - long-time Westfield player - took over the reserves.
At the end of 2005–06 Westfield were relegated to the 1st Division due to new ground-grading regulations after a very acrimonious conflict with the league. Numerous commitments from league officials were reneged upon and after months of appeals and meetings, Westfield had to accept their unwelcome fate.
After a mid-table Division 1 season and partly because of the league-enforced relegation, Manager Paul Donaghy decided to resign as first team manager to join Godalming and reserve team manager Dave Robson also quit.
The team of ex-player Martin Powell, ex-Spurs stalwart David Howells and coach John Comer took over the running of the senior teams for the start of the 2007–08 season.
In the close season of 2007–08 following a highly credible 4th place finish, Martin resigned as manager due to personal circumstances, his departure signalled the exits of both David Howells and John Comer.
In July 2008 the position of 1st Team Manager was filled by Steve Plunkett, the ex-Godalming Town Reserves boss though was replaced within 4 months by the returning Dave Robson as the club attempted to rebuild following a mass exodus of players. Dave Robson did a fine job stabilising the club but after an indifferent 2009–10 was replaced by Craig Moore and John Comer who were joint managers. Off the pitch there was good news as building of the new facilities commenced 2010–11 promised to be a good season as the management duo assembled the best squad since the 2008 season, however despite some wonderful results the team struggled to find consistency and finished a disappointing 13th in the table. There was better new for the reserves who finished 4th in the reserve league and reached the final of the league cup where they went down to double winning side Mole Valley SCR. During the summer of 2011 Craig Moore decided to step down to concentrate on playing leaving John Comer as sole manager. He promoted Kevin Bailey from the reserves to be his assistant and following Dave Kelly’s resignation as reserve team manager appointed former Cobham duo Alex Palinski and Ben Knight to run the 2nd string. In May 2011 the old pitch was dug up and raised a metre before being re-seeded and in June the old clubhouse demolished. The club expect to move into the new facilities at the start of August 2011
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