Wealdstone F.C.

Wealdstone
Full name Wealdstone Football Club
Nickname(s) The Stones, The Royals
Founded 1899
Ground The Vale Stadium, Ruislip
Capacity 2,640 (329 covered seating & 837 covered standing)
Chairman Howard Krais
Manager Gordon Bartlett
League Conference South
2014–15 Conference South, 12th

Wealdstone Football Club is an English semi-professional football club formed in and representing Wealdstone in the London Borough of Harrow, although it is currently based a few miles away in Ruislip in the London Borough of Hillingdon The club is affiliated to the Middlesex County Football Association.[1] Having been promoted through the play-offs to the Ryman Premier League in 2003/04, the club finally finished the 2013/14 season as champions of the league and so as of the 2014/15 season they are members of the Conference South.

They play in royal blue shirts, white shorts and royal blue and white socks, and are nicknamed "The Stones" or "The Royals".

The club holds the notable achievement of being the first ever to achieve the non-league 'double' of winning both the FA Trophy and the Football Conference in the same season, 1984/85.

History

Two separate Wealdstone Football Clubs were in existence as far back as the 19th century, but the present club was formed at the start of the 1899–1900 season. It started with a friendly match on 7 October 1899, winning 6–1 at Northwood. Seven years later the club was forced to close down.

The club was reformed in time for the 1908–09 season, enjoying a successful period before another closedown during World War I, which claimed the lives of a great many of its members. From the 1920s onwards, though now drawing very sizeable crowds for amateur football, the club had little success on the pitch until the 1950s, but beat RAF Uxbridge in their third successive Middlesex Sports Red Cross Cup final win, in the first-ever amateur match at Wembley Stadium.[2]

Wealdstone took part in the first televised broadcast of a football match in 1946 when it played at Barnet in an Athenian League game. It also participated in the first live showing of an FA Cup tie in 1949 v Colchester United at Lower Mead.

Finally, in 1952 it won its first major trophy becoming champions of the Athenian League. The club then began a period of sustained growth, winning three Middlesex Senior Cup titles, in 1959, 1963 and 1964. Major national success was achieved in 1966 when the club won the FA Amateur Cup at Wembley Stadium, beating local rivals Hendon.

Wealdstone are the only club in history to have been crowned champions of The Athenian League (1952), Southern League (1982), Football Conference (1985) and Isthmian League (2014), and to have won both the FA Amateur Cup (1966) and the FA Trophy (1985).

Great success followed by disaster

The club decided to turn semi-professional in 1971, and in 1974 the Southern League Division One title was won. The remainder of the 1970s saw mid table finishes, but the early 1980s proved to be by far the club's most successful period to date, to the extent that it became the nation's top non-league side.

Wealdstone comfortably won the both the Southern League Championship and Southern League Cup in 1982 and won promotion, with a team featuring future England defender Stuart Pearce. Then, in 1985 it became the first ever club to achieve the non-league "double"; captained by Paul Bowgett the team won the Conference National and also the FA Trophy, beating Boston United at Wembley Stadium. The club has played at Wembley in three finals, and won all of them.

With an experienced and talented squad, which contained future Wimbledon and Wales midfielder Vinnie Jones, the club started the process of application for election into the Football League (the voting system for entry into the Football League was then in its penultimate season, prior to automatic promotion as now happens). However, as the Lower Mead ground was not up to the requirements at the time, Bath City was subsequently selected as Runners Up and Wealdstone lost out narrowly in the vote.

With a change of management in 1987 and an aging team, the club was relegated from the Conference in 1988 back into the Southern League.

At this point, a severe and long-term downturn in the financial fortunes of the club began. Together with relegation, the club was forced to move out from its Lower Mead stadium in central Harrow when the then chairman, Alan Clifton, controversially sold the land to the Tesco supermarket company with the club itself receiving very little money from the sale of its property. The board of the club then decided to enter into a prestigious, but extremely costly, two-year ground share agreement at Watford's Vicarage Road stadium, a move which may well have destroyed the club entirely had it not been for the fund-raising efforts of its fans. Ultimately, the move from Lower Mead proved to be financially disastrous for the club and left it homeless for the next fifteen years. A much cheaper ground share at Yeading followed from 1993 to 1995, and then a ten-year period sharing with Edgware Town. In 2005, the club moved yet again, this time to share with Northwood for three seasons.

Wilderness years

Throughout this long period of homelessness, the club was run on a very tight budget because of its minimal income sources, as the massive financial loss caused by the sale of their old ground was slowly recovered.

On the pitch, although the team initially slipped rapidly downwards as a result of the severe lack of funds, the decline was slowly reversed. The club requested that the Football Association move it from the Southern League into the equal standard but less geographically widespread Isthmian League, in order to save on travelling expenses. The FA agreed to this but insisted that the club join the Isthmian League at its lowest level, which effectively meant the club voluntarily taking two steps down in playing standard.

The Isthmian League Division 3 title was won in 1997, and then promotion from Division 2 was gained the following season. In 1999, the club finished third in Division One and thereby earned promotion to the Premier Division. However, this was frustratingly denied to them when Edgware Town's ground, at which Wealdstone were then tenants, failed a ground grading inspection. In 2004, the club finally returned to the Premier Division of the Isthmian League, having won the First Division Play-Off Final against Dulwich Hamlet on penalties.

With very little money to spend on wages to attract players, the club found itself relying on a large number of inexperienced youngsters, but narrowly avoided relegation in both 2005 and 2006.

In the summer of 2006, following non league re-organization, the club was very reluctantly reassigned back to Southern League for the 2006–7 season, before re-joining The Isthmian League again the following season.

Search for a new home

Since being forced to leave Lower Mead, the club and its supporters have sought to be in a position to afford the building of a new home stadium within the London Borough of Harrow. This plan finally found substance when a suitable site was found at the Prince Edward Playing Fields in Canons Park, a facility which had fallen into disuse and disrepair. Planning permission for a new stadium with substantial community amenities was gained and partial funding obtained from the national lottery.

Construction began in 2003, but the project was hindered by various financial problems and the building work halted completely in 2004, when the private company paying the builders went into liquidation. Very slow progress was made in sourcing alternative funding, but there were still hopes that the stadium would be completed and opened in 2007.

This did not happen and the partially built site remained unoccupied for many years until it was eventually acquired by Barnet FC, who completed the stadium, renaming it "The Hive" and moving in from the 2013–14 season.

The Vale

In early 2008, the club issued a press release stating that the chairman and vice-chairman of Wealdstone FC had acquired a majority shareholding in Ruislip Manor Sports and Social Club (RMSSC), which owned the lease to the Grosvenor Vale stadium, then used by Ruislip Manor and also by Wealdstone's Youth Team.

With the ground share agreement at Northwood coming to an end and still no specific completion date in sight for the club's Prince Edward Playing Field project, Wealdstone instead decided to invest in the Grosvenor Vale stadium to upgrade the playing facilities as a priority, in order to meet the necessary ground grading requirements to play Isthmian League Premier Division football in the 2008–09 season. The Vale continues to be improved with the introduction of new terracing, safety barriers and in 2009 a new covered stand ('Brian Collins' Corner). In the Summer of 2012 a new club shop was added, along with a new Tea Bar located behind the dug-outs on the half-way line as well as additional raised terracing. In the Summer of 2013, the Supporters paid for and built a new mobile stand ('Bulla Stand') which has been positioned behind the goal at the old 'Tea Bar' end and more cover has been added at the Gun Turret end ('Roy Couch' stand) providing further covered accommodation for the fans.

The Stones have several allegiances with other clubs across the country, including Premiership/League clubs who have used The Vale as their "base" whilst visiting Wembley Stadium, including Manchester City, Swansea City and Aston Villa, some of whom have unofficially adopted Wealdstone as their "second club".


Since moving to Grosvenor Vale, Wealdstone have seen steadily increasing home attendances year on year, and currently has the highest average home attendance for any non-league club in all of North London. During the 2013/14 season, Wealdstone had the second highest average home attendance in the Isthmian League (after Maidstone United) and the highest average away attendance (closely followed by Maidstone United and Dulwich Hamlet). This was the season they were promoted as champions, beating Margate 1-0[3] with three games to spare. They ended the season on 96 points, 11 higher than 2nd place Kingstonian. They would play in the Conference South next season

Conference South

Wealdstone struggled early on in their first Conference South campaign, picking up four points in their first nine games, and only winning their first game in their 10th, against Whitehawk.[4] However, their form soon picked up, they beat Chelmsford 2-0 to spark an 11 game unbeaten run. Despite their late season form, they couldn't push for the playoffs due to their bad start. They finished in a very respectable 12th place after beating Maidenhead 4-1.[5]

Club names

Most consider Wealdstone to be founded in 1899, but in truth it was founded in 1887. The club's names were the following:

  1. The Oaks FC (1887) – Friendly matches only
  2. The Oaks (Wealdstone FC (1888)
  3. Wealdstone FC (1889–1893)
  4. Wealdstone Juniors FC (1893–1895)
  5. Harrow Athletic (1894)
  6. Wealdstone Athletic FC (1895)
  7. Wealdstone Rovers FC (1886–1898)
  8. Wealdstone Wanderers FC (1897–1899)
  9. Wealdstone Juniors FC (1897–1998) No connection to the previous club on the same name or the Wealdstone Wanderers FC
  10. Wealdstone Albion FC (1898–1899)
  11. Wealdstone FC (1899–1905)
  12. Wealdstone Church Athletic FC (1905–1908)
  13. Wealdstone FC (1908–Present)

Rivals

Wealdstone's main traditional local rivals for many years were Barnet, Enfield and Hendon, who were all leading teams in the Athenian and Isthmian Leagues from the 1950s into the 1980s. However, these rivalries have lapsed over time with Barnet's rise into the Football League, Enfield's plunge down the football ladder and Hendon being regularly less successful than in its glory days.

Most Wealdstone fans would now consider Harrow Borough to be their biggest rivals, owing purely to the clubs' geographical proximity. For a great many years the two clubs only ever met if they were drawn together in cup competitions as they operated in different leagues, but when they were both members of the Isthmian League Premier Division, they played each other regularly. In 2012–13 the rivalry with Enfield was resumed with the latter's promotion to the Isthmian League Premier Division.

Players

Current squad

As of 16th January 2015

Note: Flags indicate national team as defined under FIFA eligibility rules. Players may hold more than one non-FIFA nationality.

No. Position Player
Wales GK Jonathan North
Wales DF Sean Cronin
England DF Tom Hamblin
England DF James Hammond
England DF Carl Martin
England DF Wes Parker
England DF Ryan Watts
Canada MF Elliott Godfrey
Northern Ireland MF Matt Ball
No. Position Player
England MF Dan Brown
Northern Ireland MF Michael Corcoran
Republic of Ireland MF Scott Davies
England MF Shaun Lucien
England MF Tom Hickey
England MF Luke O'Nien (on loan from Watford)
England FW Richard Jolly
England FW Jefferson Louis
England FW Scott McGleish
England FW Jonny Wright

Out on loan

Note: Flags indicate national team as defined under FIFA eligibility rules. Players may hold more than one non-FIFA nationality.

No. Position Player
England GK Warren Carter (dual-registration with Hampton & Richmond Borough)
England FW Reece Grant (dual-registration with AFC Hayes)
England MF Toby Little (at Chesham United)
England GK Gareth Malone (dual-registration with Beaconsfield SYCOB)
No. Position Player
England FW Lewis Putman (dual-registration with Aylesbury United)
Nigeria FW Enoch Showunmi (dual-registration with Canvey Island)
England MF Joey Turner (dual-registration with Met police)

Notable former players

For all Wealdstone F.C. players with a Wikipedia article, see Category:Wealdstone F.C. players

The club's all-time goalscorer is George Duck. George Duck scored 251 goals for Wealdstone in 370 appearances during 1972–79, and additionally set unmatched scoring records for penalties and hat-tricks. In all the seasons he played for the club Duck was top scorer in league and cup competitions.

Stuart Pearce, Vinnie Jones, and Jermaine Beckford are notable Wealdstone players who have gone on to play in the top tier of English football.

Management staff

Position Name
Manager England Gordon Bartlett

Honours

Middlesex Senior Cup Runners Up – 8 times. Middlesex Charity Cup Runners Up – 6 times.

Former players

1. Players that have played/managed in the Football League or any foreign equivalent to this level (i.e. fully professional league).
2. Players with full international caps.
3. Players that hold a club record or have captained the club.

See also

References

External links

Coordinates: 51°34′09.85″N 0°24′59.90″W / 51.5694028°N 0.4166389°W