Wormley Rovers FC vs. London Lions

Spartan South Midlands Football League, Premier Division

Date: 13 August 2024

Kickoff: 7:45pm

View from the chair

Welcome everyone to The Lane for our second home league game of season 24-25 as we try to navigate our way around step 5 football for the first time.

A particular warm welcome to the players officials and supporters of London Lions who we play for the first time in our history today in the league and we should start with a small apology in that the clubhouse is in the middle of a refurbishment at the moment so if you can see past that what you will see is a welcoming club and a community club that makes a difference locally. I am confident we will have a shiny new clubhouse for all our teams and visiting teams to enjoy for years to come.

It’s been a challenging first few weeks for the first team group of players but two draws and a narrow defeat may reflect we got what we deserve but in parts of games we have been very very good but not so good at other times. A brilliant 0-0 draw at title favourites Harpenden Town saw a resolute second half defensive display and we fully deserved a hard earned point this a week after beating them in the Herts Charity Shield.

A little better finishing at home to Crawley Green could have given us the win but a last minute save from Carlos saw us happy to get another point on the board.

We flirted with the FA Cup too briefly but fell to a 2-1 defeat to Heybridge Swifts who just about deserved to beat us on the day but a 90th minute winner is not easy to take especially with the prospect of a replay looming.

Sucker punch breakaway saw Winslow United beat us 2-1 Saturday but again nothing between the two teams apart from two different styles of football being played.

I have sympathy for Ryan and his management team as he hasn’t been able to put anywhere near the same side out in consecutive games due to injuries, holidays and wedding commitments!

I’m sure all clubs face similar challenges and as someone once said, it all evens out across a season.

So, it’s been a tough few weeks for us going into a new league, stepping up a level but we relish the challenge and look forward to picking up out first league win sooner rather than later.

Hope you enjoy the game and thanks for your support. COYW

Welcome to our opponents

Welcome to our opponents, London Lions.

In the summer of 1995, the players and officials of Maccabi Association London (MAL) decided that they had reached the limits of Sunday football and that a new challenge was required. The Hertfordshire Senior County League was a popular choice, and the club made its debut in the 95/96 season under a new name of MALEX.

Four years later the club had made many friends but had narrowly missed out on promotion from Division 1 in each season. During the summer of 1999, the club revised its management structure, and decided to change its name to LONDON MACCABI LIONS, whilst retaining its all-Jewish status.

Under the management team of Bobby Fisher and Adam Solomons the 1st team lost only three league games that season as they won the Division 1 and reached the semi-finals of the Aubrey Cup. The club grew into one of the strongest teams in the Premier League but had to wait to land its first major honour in 2007 when Lions beat Metropolitan Police to lift the Herts Centenary Trophy. This was supplemented by the Reserves who were also promoted as champions, in 2002, and made it to three Herts Reserve Cup finals, winning one in 09/10.

After a decade in the Herts Premier, in 2009/10 now under the stewardship of Tony Gold and Steve Grenfell, Lions won the Herts Senior County League for the first time in the club’s history, winning promotion to the Spartan South Midlands League in the process. The following season – the club’s first in the South Midlands Division One – they added a second Herts Centenary Trophy beating Letchworth Garden City Eagles 3-2 in the final. Lions were able to go on better in 2012/13, winning the South Midlands Division One title and promotion to the heights of the South Midlands Premier Division. The club also made their debut in the FA Cup, winning 4-0 against Clapton.

Now just one league away from semi-professional football, it was a tall order for a team missing a number of players who had departed following promotion, and so 2013/14 saw Lions suffer their first ever relegation at the end of a difficult season. Having steadied the ship, the club decided to return to the Herts Senior County League for 2015/16 in order to rebuild.

Seeking to promote a new generation under manager Andy Landesberg, there was immediate reward by winning the Anagram Records Trophy at the end of their first season, with most of the starting XI having come through the club’s massive youth set up. We then achieved an unprecedented treble in winning the league, Centenary Trophy and, for the first time, the Aubrey Cup.

The club was welcomed back to Spartan South Midlands League where we have won further honours in the shape of the Division One Cup (2018), Herts Centenary Trophy (2019) and Spring Cup (2021) while threatening to get promotion to the Premier Division before Covid struck.

The club was reassigned to the Combined Counties League Division One in the summer of 2021 and we are again targeting promotion to the next step, as well as representing our community with pride.

Match Day Squads

Wormley Rovers FC

Keeper: All Green

Red Shirts | Black Shorts | Black Socks

Joshua Asiedu
Reece Barrett
George Beattie
Lee Brennan
Cormac Clark
Zion Dos Santos Sinclair
Bradley Empson
Danny Haigh
Archie Hammond
Adam Hart
Charles Hill
Dillon Lee
Prince Will Madu
Luke Marshall
Kaidyn Michael
Reece Mosanya
Tom Mulqueen
Mason Oakley
Louis Offer
Connor Scully
Ruben Silva
Carlos Simeon
Ryan Stevenson
Craig Tolley
Ryan Wade
Reiss Webber