WEEKLY BULLETIN – 18TH OCTOBER

FIXTURES

• Saturday 19th October League Home to Stourbridge kick-off 3.00pm.
• Tuesday 22nd October League Home to Lowestoft kick-off 7.45pm.

PREVIEW
Another Saturday home game as we look to build on our unbeaten league run. This time it’s the turn of Stourbridge to visit Top Field.

Who can forget Stourbridge’s last visit to Top Field, our final game of last season where a huge crowd of 1141 came to will the team on to fight relegation. A 0-0 draw in that game seemed to have sealed our fate until the events at Coalville in the closed season intervened.

We look forward to welcoming Stourbridge back to Top Field. The information below should help you make the best out of your visit to Top Field.

On Tuesday we welcome Lowestoft to Top Field who have won two and lost four of their last six league games. They gained promotion last season to return to the Central Premier Division. We won our previous league meeting on 2nd April 2022 3-2 the goals coming from Steve Cawley, Alex Brown (penalty) and Rio Dasilva. The attendance was 559.

Tickets
For lowest prices and quickest entry into the ground please purchase your tickets online here:
https://hitchintownfc.ktckts.com/brand/match-tickets

The online box office remains open until 30 minutes after kick off.

If you do still wish to buy your tickets in person, the matchday ticket office is open from 13.30-15.15 on Saturday and can be accessed from the rear car park (behind the Canary Club). Once you have purchased a ticket at the Matchday Ticket Office you will then need to present your ticket for entry at the Turnstiles on Fishponds Road. More details here:
https://hitchintownfc.club/admission-prices/
Turnstiles open at 14.00.

Remember our flexi tickets are also available. This allows you to buy a pack of 5 adult or concession tickets at a discounted rate. You can then login to your Kaizen account and decide which league games you want to use these tickets for. You can use as many as you like per game. Buy yours here:
https://hitchintownfc.ktckts.com/merchandise/hit2425flexi/flexi-ticket-202425-5-matches

Parking
Unfortunately supporter parking is not available in the club car park (unless you are a registered blue badge holder and have made prior arrangements).

Food and Drink
The Canary Club bar is open from 11.00 with some of the lowest prices in Hitchin! Drinks can be taken into the ground in a reusable plastic cup. (£1 deposit required). You can exit to the bar during the match and will be re-admitted via the side gate by showing your hand-stamp.

Mad Squirrel Brewery will also be on hand from 14.00 within the stadium located next to the main stand serving a great selection of craft lager, ales and stout.

Canary Kitchen will be open from when the turnstiles open serving a great range of food and soft drinks including our signature HTFC Pies.

Club Shop
Get your matchday programme, teamsheet, chocolate bars, sweets and HTFC merchandise from the club shop.

For full details on the facilities at Top Field see our Matchday Info page here:
https://hitchintownfc.club/matchday-info/

We look forward to welcoming another big crowd and hope everyone has a great afternoon at Top Field.

MANAGER’S NOTES BY BRETT DONNELLY
We have done it. We managed to win a home game! And probably should have won 2!! It was a great feeling to get that monkey off our back in front of a big crowd. The support was fantastic and definitely helped in the last 10 minutes when we beginning to tire. Now that ghost has been laid to rest and we have some points we can look forward to progressing up the table.

The Spalding game was a tough physical battle. The match itself wasn’t much to write home about it, but the result was all important. I thought we started poorly and probably didn’t deserve to go in front. But this team now has a bit of grit to it. Dan Stokoe is finding his feet and on Saturday he was the difference with a superb goal and winning the penalty. The team as a whole were brilliant. Not technically or with the free flowing football people want. But with determination, a will to win at all costs and desire to run through brick walls for team mates. That’s what won us the game. It’s fantastic for me to see as these are the ingredients needed in this league. The biggest compliment paid to me after Saturday by the opposition was that we didn’t stop running. Hard work beats talent when talent doesn’t work hard. It wasn’t pretty but it worked. If we win all games that way until the end of the season we can’t complain!

Tuesday saw a very different side come to Top Field. Leiston wanted to keep the ball, move us around the pitch and make us work hard to get it back. We were superb in sticking to our task. We knew if we sat in we could nick the ball and use our pace to break on the counter. And that’s exactly what we did. How we came in 0-0 at half time I don’t know. Then we continued to miss chances including a penalty until Coree finally got the goal we deserved. We could have added to it, sadly we didn’t and we got a bite on the bum with the last kick of the game. As soon as the keeper went up I had this horrible feeling something would happen. It did but more because Forbsey was unable to pick his man up properly due to an injury. Sods law. Few people said I must have been gutted with that punch in the stomach at the death. Of course I was, but the performance gave me so much encouragement. 4 points from the week, 4 unbeaten in the league now. Hopefully the tide has turned. Still loads to do but we are competitive at least.

This week sees another 2 tough home league games. Stourbridge will be looking for playoffs minimum this season. They are up there for a reason and have a manager in Liam MacDonald that knows how to get out of this league. We need to be at our best to get anything. Lowestoft will be a different sort of game. 2 sides down the bottom. Neither wanting to lose. Hopefully we can get some more points and keep climbing the league.

Annoyingly we picked some injuries this week. Not minor ones either. Forbsey looks to have picked up a knee tendon injury and will be out for a couple months. Saturday George Morrall went off just before halftime with a knee injury. He has struggled with it all season but it comes and goes. The fact it happened in consecutive games meant after Saturday he went to have an X-ray. That came back clear of any fracture but an MRI this week has shown he has a meniscus tear. He will be out for the foreseeable. Surgery is going to be needed unfortunately so it’s anyone’s guess when he’s back. Two big losses for us long term. Another one picking up an injury was Brooksy who can’t catch a break at the minute. He pulled his hamstring early Tuesday night. We need to get him looked at as the injuries all seem connected. We don’t know when he’ll be back either. Brad Dixon-Smith had bad cramp Saturday and should be back for selection tomorrow. Searsy was ill Tuesday and had to go off early. He trained last night and should be good for tomorrow. There is a bug going through the squad so hoping that clears up by game day. I did have one supporter asking why we are getting so many injuries… what’s going on?!! I did laugh, I don’t know Bob… but I wish they’d stop getting injured! Glad it’s not just me that gets frustrated by the picking up of injuries! Just on that, it’s been great being back at home and speaking with the supporters. Always nice to hear what they’ve seen that day and what they hope for going forward. I hope we’ve brought a bit of pride back to you all in the side. They are trying their hardest to not let you all down. The numbers through the door have been unbelievable. I see clubs raving that they got 500+ for an FA cup tie last weekend. We had 700+ for a league game when we’re bottom and haven’t won at home for a year. Hopefully we can see another home win this week.

Thanks for the support and sticking with us.

Donners

ATTENDANCES
Many thanks to our incredible supporters who have stood by the club during our difficult run of results. To have an attendance of 719 against Spalding last Saturday when we had gone 17 home league games without a win over 350 days was quite remarkable and everyone at the club dedicates the win to the supporters. The loyalty of our supporters makes us even more determined to continue to improve the match day experience for everyone and to strive even harder to produce a winning team.

In the attendance table for the Central Division Hitchin are in ninth position with an average of 522.

Merchandise Update by Paul Sprague
Our run of home games has seen the Top Field Club shop doing a brisk trade, so thanks for the continued support. See below for the latest availability for Replica Home and Away shirts. We do still have regular deliveries scheduled so it shouldn’t be long until any missing sizes are restocked again.

Hertfordshire County Council Fostering
At the Stourbridge game come over and chat with the team for Herts County Council fostering as they will have a stall set up between the Main Stand and Fishponds Road end.

HITCHIN WELLBEING HUB
One of our chosen charity partners, Garden House Hospice, launch their new Hitchin Wellbeing Hub on Monday 21st at Hitchin Town FC. Sessions will run every Monday from 1.30-3.30pm. For full details see here:
https://hitchintownfc.club/hitchin-wellbeing-hub-launches/

ACADEMY UPDATE BY MICHAEL JONES
On Wednesday 16th October we hosted F2 Academy at Top Field.

We were looking to build on the positive start to this season which has seen us play well in every game and score plenty of goals.

We gave first starts of the season to 3 of our academy players who had trained well this week and earned a start.

We knew the team was going to be slightly disjointed because of the changes but when we started the game we could tell this was going to be even more difficult than we ever imagined.

20 seconds into the game and F2 had taken the lead after a ball over the top allowed the wide man to go one on one to score. It was not long before it was two with a carbon copy of the first goal. The young Canaries were all over the place defensively but were now starting to get on the ball and move it well, creating quite a few chances and probably should have scored two goals but the defensive vulnerabilities were shown again and another ball over the top resulted in F2 winning a penalty and converting it and things got even worse when another ball in behind allowed F2 to extend their lead to 4-0 with 20 minutes played.

This was looking like a complete capitulation but the young canaries kept creating chances but just lacked quality in and around the box. Not long before half time and the score was 5-0. Hitchin made a few changes at half time.

The second half saw Hitchin come out with something to prove and should have scored almost straight away but a break out move from this chance resulted in another F2 penalty which they converted again.

After this the young Canaries controlled the game, scoring one goal from Josh Beedell and creating plenty of chances but unfortunately the quality was lacking and the game finished with an extremely disappointing 6-1 defeat.

Head Coach Stephen Gleeson had this to say “A really disappointing day at the office, this group has been really good so far this season and it was so disappointing that we failed to turn up today. We rewarded 3 players with their first starts due to excellent training but I think today showed the levels in training to a game and unfortunately these players were miles off of the level. The other lads rather than bringing these players up to their level dropped down and it took us 45 minutes to raise our levels. If this was senior football we would have dragged a few in the first 15 minutes but as its development football we left these players on until half time as it’s a better learning experience and hopefully they will be better for it in the long term. We will now watch the Veo back at training and help the players correct the areas of improvement”

Junior Canaries by Michael Jones
We are still getting plenty of youngsters to sign up to become Junior Canaries which is pleasing to see.

If you want to receive issue 2 then you need to make sure you sign up by Friday 25th October.

If you wish to sign up as a Junior Canary, please email juniorcanaries@hitchintownfc.club with the following details:
Name, Date of birth, Address, School, Club Team (if applicable), Team you support, Parent/Guardian Name, Email, Contact Number.

We look forward to welcoming you all to the Junior Canaries.

STEVE MAXTED
Steve Maxted one of our excellent volunteers is standing down from his match day duties. Steve has done an excellent job for many seasons and in particular he looked after the car parking on match days. The management of the club want to thank Steve for all his hard work which has really been appreciated.

If you would like to join our volunteers please email Kate Deller at volunteer@hitchintownfc.club

HTWFC UPDATE BY CALLUM ELLIS
Results:
HTWFC 2 – 1 Everett Ladies FC
Bletchley Scott 0 – 0 HTWFC Canaries

Fixtures:
Herts FA Women’s Trophy
HTWFC Canaries v Baldock Town FC
St Christophers School, Barrington Road, Letchworth Garden, SG6 3JZ

BHWFL Division Two
Buntingford Town v HTWFC
The Bury, London Road, Buntingford, SG9 9HZ

We are still recruiting for our teams. We train Wednesday evenings at The Arena, Norton Road, Baldock, between 19:30-20:30. Get in touch today ! hello@hitchintownwomenfc.co.uk

COMMUNITY UPDATE BY MARK BURKE
Ofsted Registered
I am delighted to announce that our application to be Ofsted registered has been accepted and we will be looking to expand our services for schools in the local area.

We offer a range of services for schools including:

• Breakfast Clubs
• PPA Cover
• Lunch Time Clubs
• PE Curriculum Lessons
• After School Clubs
• Wrap Around Care
• Sport Leadership Courses
• Holiday Camps

We currently work with Oughton Primary, Preston JMI, Grange Academy, St Marys, The Priory School, Brandles and Woolgrove. Any schools wishing to enquire about our services please contact Mark Burke via e-mail at info@htcfc.co.uk

October School Holiday Camps – Open for Registration
2 School Holiday Camps will be running over the October half term and registration for them is now open on our website https://www.Northhertsarena.co.uk/holiday-courses

We will be hosting our normal Football Holiday Camp at The Arena in Baldock and following on from our successful Summer Multi Activity Camps at Preston JMI School we will be returning to host another camp.

Both camps will run from Tuesday 29th to and including Thursday 31st October and are open for girls and boys aged from 5 – 14 years old.

The camps operate from 9.30am to 3.30pm each day and costs £25 per day or £60 for all 3 days.

The Arena
The new dates for the coaching clinics at the Arena have been released and available to book via the https://www.Northhertsarena.co.uk

Monday evenings from 5-6pm we host a Junior Ability Counts session for children aged between 7 and 16 years old with Special Educational Needs and Disabilities (SEND). The course runs for 6 weeks.

Wednesday evenings from 5.30-6.30pm we host a specific goalkeeping course called Safe Hands for children of all ages and abilities.

CANARY CLUB NEWS
It is not too late to buy your ticket for the Boy George Experience at the Canary Club on Saturday. Please see details on the poster below–

BY ROY IZZARD