County 1- Chichester player found ineligible after 22 games played

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THE County League Division 1 title race has been thrown wide open this week following the news that Chichester have been playing an ineligible player this season

No 43 RFC WEEKLY NEWSLETTER

Note, If you have not received this via e-mail it is because Bob has had a systems failure and can not send them out at the moment.

Our penultimate game was disappointing to say the least with our first defeat for some time. There’s not too much point in dwelling on it. The reality was we didn’t play our usual way and we had too many players who didn’t give 100%, and I think that a pretty fair assessment. To be fair to the players though, they’ve played eight games this month and turned in some impressive performances - six wins from eight.

During the week we entertained Steve Johnson’s and Paul Tomsett’s East Grinstead and ran out winners in a pretty good performance. They’d probably think to score three goals away should win you a game but I did feel that we looked pretty good going forward.

On Monday night the reserves play away at St Francis in what will be their penultimate game. By everyone’s admission, its not been our greatest year with our up an coming reserves. We were unable to hold on to our Reserve Premier status but lets just look at the two major occurrences that has influenced their destiny. First, some of the reserve players from last year were moved upwards into the first team - Jo Tubon, Jayson Sowter, Simon Greatwich, Will Broomfield, Aaron Last and Sam Sowter for example were all with the reserves last term. Take them out of any side then get promotion too and you’ve got to find players of similar ability to hold your own.

To be fair to Geoff, and Neil before him to be honest, they had little or no preparation as they were just given what they had to work with. If that sounds a bit unfair to players then I’d have to say that the league position doesn’t lie. (Unless you’ve had 10 points deducted of course). The second major issue was me stopping the Under 18s. That effectively stopped access to younger players to support the senior campaign. Just on that point - I stopped the under 18s because I was actually struggling with a side. What I did learn from that is that the first year U18s will support you and come through. Second year 18s will not be so reliable as they get jobs, birds and go out on a Saturday night. When I’ve had second year 18s playing, its because they want to play and you know they’ll be there. Kev Allen, I’m sure, will get our youth programme right.
So we move on to the final game for the first eleven and we travel to Arundel for the game that got postponed. Arundel drew at the weekend so this game will just be about final positions. After the game - which don’t forget is 2pm ko - we go back to the club for the early evening presentations. The reserves are away too so we’ll all be meeting back at the club, 6-8pm. Ringmer FC Ltd (in Administration still) will be putting money behind the bar and supplying food.

I haven’t really had a chance to speak to all of the players in the first team squad about next year but the ones I have spoken to tell me that they’ll be with us next term. I have spoken to three players we intend to sign but I think it likely we will possibly lose a couple of players who go to American colleges or to Lewes but I’d like to think that the majority will stay at Ringmer FC and help us in our campaign to become Sussex champions and no less.

Have a safe and enjoyable week.

No 42 RFC WEEKLY NEWSLETTER

First, I want to say hello to Josh Lawrence who gets this Newsletter and is currently unavailable to play football. Josh, - keep your head up mate and we all wish you the best and hope to see you out and about real soon. Keep yourself fit son.

The changes within our football club are slow and predictive and both Steve and I have to take a view on next season. Lets be frank – its unlikely that RFC Ltd will be out of Administration in the time-scales we have referred to previously when we said that we’d stay on if asked. But Steve and I really like not only the club but the people of Ringmer too and have really enjoyed our nearly complete season here. We wouldn’t leave without good reason and we recognise that certain people have worked really hard to get the club right and it would be a slap in the face to those people should we just cut and run to one of the clubs offering football. So if asked officially by whoever it is running this club now we would stay provided there was one – and only one as far as we are concerned – one change. Everyone knows what it is.

Our reserves found it tough to challenge the conditions and the Hassocks reserve side at the Caburn on Friday evening – us losing the game 0-1. Geoff will re-structure and re-build for next term with new faces and new goals being set by all in the proposed football management team and it was quite noticeable that body language and attitudes were not as Geoff will have wanted through the game. Looking to next term irrespective of youth football application that’s been discussed, we will be running our U18s next term with Kev Allen at the youth football helm. He’ll be working closely with Geoff feeding players through and utilising players from each squad in each side. We have new goals and ambitions for next term and more detailed standards. The standards in this football club need to be improved. This is not a cost factor – this is a standards issue.

Ringmer scored their 100th goal in all competitions on Saturday in our dramatic late equaliser courtesy of Dave Altendorf. We have tired players at the moment and it’ll be good to welcome back to the squad Dan Craghill, Matt Percival and Mark Price for the Tuesday encounter with East Grinstead. We beat East Grinstead 0-1 at their place and since then they have had a major upheaval with players coming and going and more importantly to the club perhaps, Steve Johnson and Tommo going there as the management team. They are in a dog-fight for survival and they need to come to the Caburn and get something from the game here on Tuesday night. We have a different agenda despite being robbed of 10 points and will look to get all 3 on Tuesday night.

We have taken 10 points from a possible 12 having beaten Lingfield, Whitehawk and the Championship contenders Arundel and we now have East Grinstead on Tuesday night, Three Bridges on Saturday then Arundel away for the last game of the season on Saturday week. The game v Arundel should be interesting as they may need to win it perhaps to win the title.

Have a safe and enjoyable week.

No 41 RFC WEEKLY NEWSLETTER

The three points gained on Saturday against Lingfield ensured safety and Sussex County division one football next term and from here on I’ll be referring to our position with the 10 points as if they weren’t taken. Mainly because they should never have been taken in the first place. Administration clearly did not change ownership of the ground - thank goodness- and it would seem that that was the intention of those that signed the paperwork which consigned us to a season of concern over our future here at the Caburn.

So our position is now seventh, one point behind Redhill and a game in hand. Our maximum points level is 70 and thats our target figure. Technically, we could have still won the league but with our mid-term blip - which had nothing to do with directors, Administrators’ or ten points being deducted - we would have fallen short.

Tomorrow (Tuesday night) our reserves play against Crawley Down reserves at the Caburn. We welcome back Sam O’Reagan who signed for us pre-season but the had to go to work in Ireland in this game and hope he stays with us for the remainder of the season. Together with a few other players lending a hand we feel confident of getting three points tomorrow. Geoff found himself particularly short of personnel on Saturday when they encountered Eastbourne Town. Town, let us not forget play their first team football in the Ryman League so quite naturally their reserves will be pretty good. And on the day they were better than us with Geoff taking part in the competition.

On Thursday night we have a re-scheduled game against Arundel who could well win the top spot in the County. They have a couple of games in hand over the top sides and will come to us fully expecting to get three points. I don’t believe in needle games and if they’ve still got the hump over our postponed game earlier in the season I couldn’t give a toss to be honest. They are like any other side - coming to us to win a game and we are looking for three points too. It should be interesting. Almost as interesting as the last game of the season - Arundel away on Friday May 1st. They may need to win that perhaps to clinch the title…

Today, Monday, we met Whitehawk to whom we lost to earlier in the season - and we lost Aaron Last in too. We scored three times and won the game 2-1 - a free-kick winning the tie after, (once more) we went behind, only to drag ourselves on and win the game.
On Saturday the first team play Redhill at home and the reserves are at home to Hassocks on the Friday night - so lets all get there and get behind Geoff’s side and then with us all together on Saturday.

So a win against Arundel on Thursday night followed by a win against Redhill will give us a further 6 points and quite possibly - by my reckoning - could take us to third place.
I think we’d all agree that in different circumstances and with clever people, this could have been a fantastic season.

Have a safe and enjoyable week.

No 40 RFC WEEKLY NEWSLETTER

It was noticeable that Worthing United were picking up points and this seemed unusual for a side seemingly destined to play division two football next term. So as some (although it should have been all) trained with Steve at Falmer on Tuesday night, I went down covertly to watch them take on the Arundel side and was immediately impressed with their performance. I know we had a bit of a run in with Arundel on this “no game” crap a few weeks ago and when they’ve all calmed down - and for the record - my view is that Arundel can play a bit of football and in this game it was no different - and that’s what bothered me when it turned out to be a draw 2-2 on the night - Arundel quite fortunate to drag it back to level scores after being 2 down. So we had to get a bit clever to overcome this very effective side when they visited the Caburn on Saturday.

Losing Aaron in the warm up didn’t help our preparations but a quick change of paperwork and we worked hard to graft out a win. And to be fair it pretty much all went to plan, Ringmer winning the game by a solitary goal, 1-0. It was a tough encounter and we move on to 39 points and I guess relative safety in the top flight of the County League. Of course, it should be 49 points but lets not go there until the end of the season huh..?

We move our attention to games that now come thick and fast - but not before we turn our attention to our reserves who travelled the length and breadth of the county to go to Pagham who are situated close to Lands End in Cornwall - well it seems like it when you drag your arse all the way down there - particularly if you lose as our young blues did on Saturday. Bad luck Geoff and the fellas - re-group and with players coming back in and a couple of mid week games coming up, lets see if we can put a few points together over the last part of the season. The one thing I’m sure of is that not having an U18s side this term has certainly hindered the selection availability for the reserve manager and next term - should they ever decide to get us out of Administration - we would certainly be re-booting our youth development project - should they ever decide to get us out of Administration.

On Tuesday night we come up against the much-fancied Eastbourne United. I’ll be quick to point out that we have already taken 3 points from them with a win earlier on in the season. Since then there’s been a bit of water under the bridge and they’ve had their eye on promotion to the Ryman League and …… we haven’t. Still we meet them on level terms and on a flat pitch and although I have to be honest and say we have quite a few squad players missing on this one, we still have plenty of quality to contest their challenge. 7.30 kick off.

So no training as Falmer has now finished for training, and incidentally the club needs to get the next booking in over the next few weeks to ensure we have a facility next term. Perhaps the powers that be should take a look at that.

On Saturday the front side take on Lingfield at home followed by Whitehawk on Easter Monday followed by Arundel away on the Wednesday night followed by Redhill at home on Saturday followed by the visit of Steve Johnson and Tommo with the East Grinstead side on the Tuesday. Busy huh?

The ressies have a less busy time visiting Eastbourne Town next Saturday. Hope to see as many of you as possible on the start of events at home on Tuesday evening. Have a good week.

Munnery in administration warning to Blues

RINGMER manager Bob Munnery says he is delighted with how his debut season in first team management has gone despite all the club's off-field problems, but warned he would consider his future if the club was still in administration next term.
Ringmer were the surprise package in county league division one at the beginning of the season, winning seven of their first eight games, including a 14-1 demolition of Worthing, to lead the pack going into November.

But a row over the ownership oADVERTISEMENTf their Caburn ground between the trustees and directors led them into administration and saw 10-points docked from the club.
Despite the setback, Munnery and assistant Steve Oliver, who stepped up from reserve team management at the beginning of the season, have guided a young side to virtual safety.
Munnery is happy to have comfortably met the season's 'brief' of survival, but not so impressed with continuing off the field problems."I have to say I was disgusted with the conduct within the club to allow the situation to unravel which has affected the players, coaches and managers," Munnery said.
"Having said that, we have survived the 10 points, we are 15th in the league and one more win will probably make us safe.
"I see it as a successful season considering we have had no budget and brought an awful lot of young players through, and at the beginning of the season I was given the brief to survive."
Young players such as Will Broomfield, Aaron Hasan, Matt Percival and Kieran Patel have stepped up to the plate and more than held their own to give Munnery reason for optimism for next season, should the club get things right off the field.
"We (he and Oliver) have really enjoyed the season and are looking forward to next season," he said.
"Hopefully Ringmer Football Club will get themselves out of administration.
"If they do not come out of administration we will have to weigh up where we are next term."
Munnery is targeting three points against a rejuvenated Worthing United at home on Saturday, and the club then have a difficult home match with Eastbourne on Tuesday before hosting Lingfield on Easter Saturday.