End of season Ramble Round up

This week's action brought the 2023-24 season of the Everards Leicestershire Senior League to an end on the pitch. Off the pitch, there were some matters for the League Management Committee which have resulted in some table adjustments to Everards Brewery Division One. The Committee awarded a walkover to champions Anstey Town for the final game of the season, at home to Sutton Bonington, after SB were unable to raise a side on 27 April. That confirms that Town have gone the whole of the League campaign unbeaten, finishing eight points clear of runners-up Leicester Atletico. 


But that was not the only matter involving Sutton Bonington. With regards to their game on April 30, where they suffered a shock defeat at home to Barrow Town Reserves, the League have found Barrow Reserves guilty of having breached player eligibility rules in relation to the fixture. The result has therefore been quashed, and Sutton awarded a walkover victory. That result moves Sutton two places up the table into fifth place out of ten finishers in the final reckoning, just breaking into the top half in their first season in Div1, with Holwell Sports Reserves and Kirby Muxloe Reserves each dropping a place in the final table to sixth place and seventh place respectively. 


For Barrow, that puts the tin lid on a frankly awful season, finishing with just a solitary point to their name, Although Khalsa suffered a similar fate in the 2020-21 season, that campaign was heavily truncated due to the Covid pandemic, so the last time that it happened in a full completed season in the LSL was Castle Donington Town in Division One during the 2012-13 season, who lost all 29 matches played and suffered a points deduction to finish on minus three. Barrow Reserves finish 17 points adrift of safety, relegated to Everards Brewery Division Two next season.


So as the shutters come down on the season just gone, a summary of the three divisions. Champions Allexton & New Parks won the Everards Premier Division with plenty to spare, finishing nine points clear of runners-up Hathern. Allexton will be playing next season at Step 6 in the Midland Football League Division One. Desford & Caterpillar round off the podium places, claiming third ahead of Aylestone Park Reserves, who will be left to rue an administrative error at the end of October where they fielded an ineligible player against Thurnby Rangers, resulting in their 8-1 win being quashed and the points awarded to Thurnby- ultimately, that cost Park third spot. They do have, however, the consolation of having won the Everards Tiger League Cup, having beaten Allexton & New Parks 1-0 on Tuesday night, thereby denying ANP the chance to become the first side since Rothley in 2012 to do the League-Cup double, and becoming the first reserve side to lift the League Cup since Kettering Town Reserves in 1976. At the bottom, Barrow Town followed voluntary demotion with automatic relegation, ten points adrift of safety. Only one team is relegated after pitch issues forced Ashby Ivanhoe Knights to resign in mid-season. The Golden Boot was won, by a long chalk indeed, by Aaron Preston of Aylestone Park Reserves, who scored 38 goals at a ratio of more than a goal per game, seven goals clear of ANP's Ryan Charles, with Hathern's Liam Walton coming third.


Div1 has been summed up above with regards to the top two and the bottom side. Only one team goes down from Div1, after Sporting Markfield resigned in March from the League. In the event that a vacancy should arise in the Premier, then third-placed Hinckley LR Reserves are first cab off the rank so to speak, having finished two points behind Atletico, though Road also have a cup consolation, having a County Cup triumph in the Saturday Intermediate Cup. For the Div1 scorers charts, Hinckley LR's Brogan Greenwood won with 21 goals, two clear of Holwell Sports Reserves' Tallen Burt, Anstey Town's Jordan Small in third. 


Everards Brewery Division Two is simple- Loughborough Students Development cleared almost the lot. Unbeaten not just in the League, but in everything, they won the League by four points from runners-up St Patricks, and also a County Cup in the shape of the Saturday Trophy, plus the City Goldsmiths President's Trophy and the Chairman's Trophy, defeating Hinckley LR Reserves in the finals of each of the latter two. The only reason why the word 'almost' is used is because they didn't take the top scorer competition. St Patricks' Jamie Bottomley won that competition with 21 goals, four clear of his team-mate Jack Hickey, Owen James of the Students in third. St Patricks will also be playing in Div1 next season, whilst Mountsorrel Amateurs round off the podium spots. Owing to resignations earlier in the season, there is no relegation from Div2, but Loughborough FC finish bottom.


The League finished on time for two of the three divisions, with Div1 only going into injury time because of a knock-on from the Chairman's Trophy being disrupted by bad weather in the group stages. All this despite the weather posing huge problems to a number of clubs- indeed, a sobering Sport England report on that topic in the last week concludes that our changing weather could pose the biggest challenges to grassroots sports and community organisations in the years to come, with few easy answers on the horizon. A big thank you should go therefore to Fixture Officer Charlie Tissington, who has had to deal with a large number of postponed fixtures spread across the season, this 2023-24 season arguably being the season of sogginess. 


As we sign off, some more thanks. Firstly, to Dave Lumley, who has edited these rambles and sat in when I have been away, and to Andy Grout, who has also sat in and provided reports. I've had info from lots of other sources around the County at games through the season, to whom I must give thanks for helping to make these rambles more detailed and more interesting- I hope that suffices given the space constraints. Above all, I'd like to thank all those who give their time, whether playing, managing, doing the admin, or whatever, to make the grassroots game what it is every Saturday. Your work deserves a salute.


So that's a wrap for 2023-24, nine months after it started in August. It was raining then, and it hasn't stopped much since... The constitution for the three divisions for 2024-25 will be finalised at the League's AGM on June 24. Subject to confirmation by the FA and the AGM, the Everards Leicestershire Senior League will return on Saturday 10th August at 3pm. Enjoy your summer, and see you then.