Mid Sussex League
Championship Division
Saturday 12th December 2020
Kick Off 14.00. On Time !
Southwick 1882 2 West Hoathly 0, attendance 68
14’ 1-0
22’ 2-0
@ Southwick Recreation Ground
Old Barn Way
Southwick
BN42 4NT
No Admission
Programme, 28 pages, for donation.
Southwick were founder members of the Sussex County League (now Southern Combination League) in 1920. They joined the Combined Counties League in 1984, before joining the Isthmian League the following season, where they remained for seven seasons, before a return to County League football in 1992.
In March 2020 it was announced that the club’s owner had handed back the lease of their Old Barn Way ground to the council. The club was also believed to be heavily in debt. With no ground to play at, and unable to use the Southwick F.C. name without taking on the old debts, the club disappeared, but the Southwick name would live on. Southwick 1882 were formed in July 2020, starting life in the second tier of the Mid Sussex League, a drop of two levels from the previous club. They are currently playing on Southwick Recreation Ground, which shares the same car park as the stadium, with the two pitches being less than 100 yards apart.
I had visited the old ground on 26th December 2003, when Southwick had beaten local rivals Shoreham 1-0 in a Sussex County League Division 1 match. The ground is lying vacant now and looks in a sorry state, but not too far gone that it couldn’t become home to the new club in the future and all efforts are being made for this to come to fruition. I managed to take a few photographs from the outside of the ground this afternoon…….
Southwick 1882 have certainly made a good start to life in the Mid Sussex League. They came into this game sitting in third place in the league table, having won all six league matches so far. West Hoathly were one place lower, having lost just one of their nine matches to date, a 1-2 loss at home to Southwick 1882. Today’s match was very scrappy. Both goals came from crosses from the left. The first stabbed home from six yards and the second tapped in from little more than a yard out, as the visitors defence stood static, hoping to be saved by an offside flag that rightly never came. The hosts dragged a couple of efforts wide during the second half, but neither side ever looked like adding anything to the 2-0 halftime score.
The win now sees Southwick 1882 go level on points with new league leaders Crawley Devils, but with two games in hand. It is hard to see anyone stopping them from gaining promotion at the first attempt……apart from another aborted season due to COVID-19, especially if we head into more lockdowns after Christmas.
