Hello all and welcome once again to your monthly members newsletter. If the pedants amongst you can hold your tongues on the fact you’ve already had one this month, that would be super.

I think I’ve just about thawed out after Tow Law, I should take a leaf out of Reg’s book and go to Tenerife where it’s much warmer. Now I’ve got the feeling back in my hands though, let’s crack on with the newsletter.

Football Update

Well we’ve been a little bit luckier with the weather recently, so we’ve had plenty of games.

Two home games were up first against West Allotment and Crook Town. I think I talk for most when I say we deserved to win both with the amount of chances we created but both ended in 1-1 draws.

Next a large Stan Army contingent made the way over to Shildon were in a deep sense of shock I had to buy a pair of emergency sunglasses only for it to start peeing down within 20 mins of kick off. Some wag said I should have bought some gloves instead. Despite taking the lead through a cool and composed Leighton Hopper finish, Shildon are second for a reason and have 3 of the leagues top scorers and it ended 4-1.

To add insult to injury the snack bar didn’t have the food ready when we got there and when they did the chips were the worst I’ve had in the league. Egon Ronnay would have binned them.

On the Wednesday night after this we welcomed play off spot challengers Guisborough Town to Grounsell Park and a masterful first half saw us go in leading 3-1. A textbook second half game management saw things finish thus and us up into 4th.

Two days, yes that’s right two days later Sunderland RCA were the visitors. Leighton Hopper opened the scoring followed by a brace from Sean Reid and an Andy Burn special saw us reclaiming 4th.

Our most recent game was away at a traditionally cold and also misty Ironworks Road, Tow Law on Tuesday night. Once a tough hunting ground for us, we made it two wins from our last two visits with a double from Jordan Lashley, another Andy Burn special and what on the face of it looked like Craig Scott falling over and knocking the ball in, which raised more than a few chuckles on the terrace. But as you can see from the Veo highlights, it was a very well taken left foot tap in…before he fell over.

Birtley won last night and leap frogged us again and West Auckland into 3rd. We sit 5th with a game in hand on Birtley, 3 on West Auckland and two on Guisborough.

The A team continue their push at the top of their table. In their last game before their Amateur Cup final they travelled to promotion rivals Wallsend Boys Club, were a rare defeat saw them lose 2-1.

Next up a very healthy Stan Army support went to North Shields to watch the lads in the Amateur Cup final against Hazlerigg Victory. It was a cracking game of very competitive football, Hazlerigg thought they had it in the bag till Andrew Tallen’s free kick cleared everyone and went in.

The lads put them under the cosh with Hazlerigg putting everyone in the way but they couldn’t stop Harry Poole putting in an 89th minute equalizer.

With the scent of victory in the nostrils the A Team weren’t done yet and were unlucky not to get a winner.

It went to penalties though with Hazlerigg winning 4-3. We’ll be hoping that the lads can exact some form of revenge by beating them to the league title.

Bar Refurbishment

As a result of funding awarded via the FA, we are delighted to have finalised plans to refurbish the bar in the Clubhouse. This stage of the project will see the following things delivered:

• Existing bar will be removed
• We will knock through into what was the old disabled toilet, so that the bar can be extended
• New ServaClean bar system installed (see image below)
• A new modern bar front and bar back built around the ServaClean system
• New and additional beer pumps on the bar
• New fridges and appliances
• New till system which two serving points

The end result will be a high quality, larger and more functional bar environment allowing us to operate more efficiently (on match days especially) and give our bar volunteers a better environment to operate within.

This project will set the stage for further Clubhouse improvements that will follow at a later time, such as improved seating.

We are fully committed to making the Clubhouse a functional, welcoming and comfortable environment for members, supporters and volunteers.

To enable this work to go ahead, the bar will be closed for most of May 2024. The last evening it will be open is Saturday 4th May 2024, where all beer on taps will need to be consumed! We intend to re-open before the end of the month (exact date TBC in due course).

We do however have plans to operate a temporary bar from the lounge during this time – we will share more details about this separately soon!

Thank you for your patience and understanding during this period of disruption – once
completed we think you’ll all agree it was worth it!

Not the best image I agree, but hopefully gives you an idea of how it will look.

Inclusive Club Award

As you may have seen if you follow our social media channels earlier this month we became a Kick It Our Equality Chartered Club. This is a big step in our work to make Heaton Stannington an where discrimination is challenged, diversity is celebrated and everyone feels welcomed, included, valued and respected. We’re incredibly proud to have achieved this.

Juniors Welfare Inspection

In the continuing success of our Junior sections first season, Northumberland FA completed a random Safeguarding review at one of the Under 14’s coaching sessions recently.

We subsequently received glowing feedback not only on Ray Hogg’s structure of the session and how much the team were enjoying it, they also commented on how evident the players welfare and development was at the forefront of the coaches and the clubs minds.

This is testament to all the hard work being put in by Ray and all the other coaches, plus Neil, Jamie and Jordan.

Well done all.

Wildcats

In more juniors news, we have been successful in our application to become a Weetabix Wildcats provider.

This is a programme aimed at giving gives aged 5-11 a fun way the try out football for the first time.

Neil tells is that for a club to obtain this in their first season is unprecedented and some well established clubs haven’t received it. So it shows how much hard work is going into the juniors section.

Free Logs

As you will have noticed if you have been to the club in the last few days we have finally been able to have the trees behind the goal at the church end removed. As previously mentioned they had become diseased and have been dropping branches for some time now so it’s a relief to have the work done.

We will be replacing them elsewhere in the ground with some new fruit trees in conjunction with a local charity who specialize in teaching schoolchildren and other local community groups about grafting and growing trees.

That’s not grafting as in stealing them from Dobbies by the way.

And just like that another newsletter is over. We’ve a big promotion push on the way and if we’re going to do the play offs lets get that 3rd place and get the home game, so please come along and support the lads whenever you can plus the A Team if you can’t make the first team’s game.

Ta ra for now.