#COYD - Come on You Dockers

There’s a thin line between success and failure. A line so thin, that it’s nigh-on impossible for me to decide what category Newhaven’s 2022/23 season falls into. Firstly, let’s be clear from the outset. I thought we’d win the league last season. As did many people involved at the club. And probably a fair few from outside it, too. There’s no hiding the fact that this was the aim. The target. Ultimately, it was a target we didn’t hit. We failed to achieve our goal. However, does finishing third really constitute a failure? Let’s have this right, it’s not like Newhaven are among the SCFL’s big spenders. Far from it. This is no Wrexham-type situation whereby a failure to win the league clearly would have been a disappointment. A failure. Newhaven’s 2022/23 squad was one that had been gradually put together over a number of seasons. The players were – and still are – here through a mixture of loyalty and a belief that it’s a club that’s going places. Not to enhance their bank ...

Newhaven Under 18s 2 Alfold Under 18s 2, Newhaven win 5-4 on penalties, Under 18s League Cup After the Newhaven Ladies success in the Eastbourne FA Cup last month, and the men’s success in the Peter Bentley Cup on Monday afternoon , it was up to the Under 18s to try and make it a hat-trick of cup successes for the club in less than a month. As it had been just 24-hours earlier, Hassocks’ Beacon Ground was the venue for Newhaven’s latest assault on a cup competition. However, while the men and ladies’ teams arguably went into their respective finals as slight favourites, this wasn’t the case for the Under 18s. In Alfold, they were undoubtedly up against one of the best teams in their age groups in the county (we’ll conveniently ignore the fact that Alfold is actually in Surrey). Champions elect of the SCFL Under 18s North Division, having amassed a hugely impressive 66 goals in just 15 games, Alfold will have been confident of making it a league and cup double. However, Clive...

Newhaven Ladies 3 Eastbourne United Women 2, London & South East Women’s Football League Division 1 South, Match #22 On Sunday, Newhaven Ladies hosted Eastbourne United Women in the final game in what has been an overall encouraging league season for the female Dockers. Particularly the latter stages of it. Since the turn of the year, Newhaven had lost just three of the nine league games that they'd played going into their final match, winning four of them. With a commendable seventh-place finish already guaranteed, the Dockers look to have firmly established themselves at this level in just their second full season at it. And with a Sussex derby to finish the season, against a side with aspirations of a top four finish – United still have games to play – the Dockers were determined to end the season on a high. On a warm and sunny Sunday afternoon, in front of a healthy crowd of just over 60, Newhaven started the game in the ascendancy, and it was no real surprise when ...

Newhaven 2 Crowborough Athletic 1, Peter Bentley Cup Final The league season may not have panned out quite the way we wanted it to, but the Peter Bentley Cup offered the Dockers a chance to add some much-deserved silverware to the Fort Road trophy cabinet. Newhaven are no strangers to Peter Bentley Cup finals. Since the competition’s formation in 2014/15, this would be the fourth final they’ve appeared in, and the second in succession. However, of the previous three, they’d won just one – the inaugural final. The time was rife to rediscover that winning feeling. Standing in their way of making this happen were Crowborough Athletic. Having been members of SCEFL league in recent seasons, this was their first season in the league cup competition and, like Newhaven, they were desperate to end a decent season (they finished a commendable sixth) on a high. Following two close league games which ended in a draw at Crowborough and a narrow Newhaven victory at Fort Road , this was al...

Newhaven 4 Loxwood 2, SCFL Premier Division match #38 And so another league season reaches its conclusion. Unfortunately, the campaign didn’t have the fairytale ending that us Newhaven fans were hoping for. There were to be no slip-ups from Broadbridge Heath or Crawley Down Gatwick in the final week of the season, with the former being proclaimed league champions and the latter taking the runners-up spot, thereby earning a promotion play-off match. Meaning we had to contend with a second successive third-place finish. Our congratulations go out to both of those two teams at the end of what has been a long, gruelling season. Also, best of luck to Crawley Down in the play-off! In truth, a lot of the drama was taken out of yesterday afternoon’s fixture even before the game against Loxwood had kicked off. With Crawley Down’s match against Roffey being, slightly bafflingly, allowed to kick-off an hour before everyone elses, the knowledge that they were 3-1 up at half-time in a g...

  Eastbourne Town 0 Newhaven FC 3, SCFL Premier Division match #37 What a difference a few days makes. Having looked like their league season was effectively over following Easter Monday’s disappointing performance and result at local rivals Peacehaven , the Dockers will now definitely go into the final Saturday of the season next weekend still in with a chance of claiming a runners-up spot.  Maybe even with an outside chance (admittedly a very outside chance) of winning the title. More on that later. Neither scenario had looked particularly likely at just after 13:00 five days ago. To keep their season alive the equation was simple.  Newhaven had to go to Eastbourne Town and win; then hope results elsewhere went their way. Not being able to affect what happens elsewhere, all the Dockers could do was make sure they returned from the Saffrons with three-points; whilst keeping their collective fingers tightly crossed. It was a task that would be far easier said ...

Peacehaven and Telscombe 4 Newhaven 0, SCFL Premier Division match #36 Sometimes a scoreline tells you everything you need to know about a game.  This, unfortunately, is one of those times. On an unseasonably miserably wet Easter Monday morning, Newhaven’s chances of finishing second – and thereby snatching a promotion play-off spot – took a literal battering. Despite arriving at Piddinghoe Avenue on the back of a ten-match unbeaten run, three draws in their last four matches had threatened to derail Newhaven’s promotion aspirations. Still, belief remained that three wins from their remaining three league games could still be enough for Newhaven to potentially end the season on a high. Local rivals Peacehaven, though, were never going to lay down and let the Dockers merely take three points without a fight. In fact, since their chances of winning silverware were effectively ended with defeat to Crowborough in the semi-finals of the Peter Bentley Cup last month – thus endi...