FIXTURES

  • Saturday 14 September away to Banbury league kick-off 3.00pm. Coach leaves 11.45am.
  • Monday 16 September home to AFC Rushden & Diamonds league kick-off 7.45pm.

PLAYER NEWS

  • Harry Draper will not be fit for the Banbury game.
  • James Verney will not be fit for the Banbury game.
  • Jay Dowie has recovered from his injury and is in the squad for the Banbury game.
  • Jack Green has recovered from injury and is in the squad for the Banbury game.
  • Leo Donnellan has been transferred to Hayes and Yeading.

BRETT’S BLOG
Brett Donnelly has resumed his popular blog this week. Please click here to enjoy Brett’s unique take on events at Hitchin Town FC.

HITCHIN TOWN UNDER 19’S
The SCL League team are at home to Sturridge FC on Wednesday 18 September kick-off 1.00pm at the Arena.

EJA NEWS WITH NICK CARR
Our four EJA teams had a very successful opening weekend of the new season.

Our U14s came back from Godmanchester Town with a credible 2-2 draw despite taking the bare 11 to the match and having to finish the game with 10 men after an injury to one of our boys. Our best wishes go out to Omari for a speedy recovery. Scorers were Louis Brady and Zion Kelly.

Our U15s ran riot at home against Kempston Rovers Colts, winning the game 8-0 with Cathal Fee bagging four, Lavel Davis-Thomas scoring a hat trick and Devaughn Sibanda also finding the net.

Our U17s were also in action against Kempston Rovers Colts and came away with a 2-1 win with Ajay Lidder and Ashley Hay the scorers.

Finally, our U18s opened their season at Top Field on Sunday with a fine 5-0 demolition of Newport Pagnell Town with Jack Holmes, Shaun Dowler, Josh Adams, Harry Hunter and James Thompson all finding the net.

This Sunday, three of our four teams are involved in EJA League Challenge Cup action whilst our U15s play in a friendly fixture, as follows:

U14s home v Saffron Walden Community Youth FC, 2:30 pm kick-off at The Arena, Baldock.

U15s away v Ware FC Academy, 12:30 pm kick-off at Ware FC.

U17s away v Barkingside Youth, 11:15 am kick-off at the EJA League Development Centre.

U18s away v Woodford Town FC, 10 am kick-off at Woodford Town FC.

HITCHIN TOWN LADIES WITH CALLUM ELLIS
We are back! The 2019/2020 season has finally arrived! We are pleased to say we have created a Hitchin Town Ladies FC Reserves team, who will be competing in the Beds & Herts Women’s League Division Three. After two months of solid preseason training, it was time to get the season underway!

First game of the day was Harvesters v Hitchin Town Ladies Reserves FC.

Hitchin Town Ladies Reserves started life with a tough test against a young Harvesters side who were playing their first match at this level. Despite dominating possession and some slick passing moves from the back, the game was turned on its head with two sin bins issued to the visitors in the early stages of the second half. This resulted in 3 quick fire goals from the hosts which was too much of a deficit to turn around once Hitchin were back up to the full allocation of 11 players.’

The second game of the day was Royston Town Development v Hitchin Town Ladies FC

‘Hitchin Town Ladies returned to Division One for the second time. We were looking to put our past experience well in the past and strive to finish staying within Division One. In the 2016/2017 season we opened up the season losing 3-1 to Sharnbrook. Today our opponents were newly promoted Royston Town Development Ladies. The game got away and within 6 minutes Gash put Hitchin in front. Royston got back into the game minutes later equalising. Hitchin responded well and within a minute of the equaliser took ther lead through Gash who completed her hat-trick in the 30th minute.

The second half got underway and within the first 10 minutes Coughlan on her league debut grabbed her first goal. Coughlan scored again in the 71st and 80th minutes. The matched ended 6-1 to Hitchin Town Ladies and they recorded their biggest ever win in Division 1.

It was a great first opening game for Hitchin Town Ladies FC and there were so many positives to take from the game. We finished the 2016-2017 season on 6 points so we are already half way to beating that total.

MANAGER’S NOTES WITH MARK BURKE

WISBECH

It is not unknown for the FA Cup to sometimes throw up adverse conditions and we certainly suffered on Saturday. We were without our club captain Dan Webb who was unavailable and our top scorer Harry Draper who was injured. We only found out that Harry could not play on Friday afternoon which meant I had to change the tactical plan that had been decided at training on Thursday evening.

As I had seen Wisbech in their replay at Ely I knew they were a very hard working team and I knew we would have to match their work rate. I also felt we needed an experienced spine in the team so I chose Josh Bickerstaff to play centrally at the back, Jay Dowie to play in central midfield and Brett Donnelly as our target man. I also felt these three would help to motivate the other players.

We started on the front foot and our midfield worked tirelessly to prevent Wisbech getting in to any kind of rhythm. We created some chances and deserved to be ahead at half time. However we then conceded very early in the second half and showed great character to regain the lead. We worked hard to the end to see the game out and earn a local derby trip to our old friends Barton Rovers in the next round.

WELWYN GARDEN CITY

I chose to experiment with the team at Welwyn on Tuesday night and unfortunately it went horribly wrong. Not to take anything away from a very good Welwyn side we were poor in every area of the pitch. I made changes at half time to try and rescue the situation but the damage was done and we conceded two further goals.

James Verney came off injured and we were down to ten men having used all our substitutes and this seemed to galvanise us as whilst not being very good we did improve on the rest of the performance.

BANBURY AND AFC RUSHDEN & DIAMONDS

On Saturday and Monday we face two more difficult games. Banbury are currently top of the table while Rushden are fourth. However there are no easy games in this division and we have to be really on our game if we want to turn things round. The performance at Welwyn was not acceptable and we need to replicate the work rate and desire we showed at Wisbech.

BY ROY IZZARD