LEN LEROUX STANDS DOWN
Len Leroux has decided to stand down from the club’s management committee for family reasons. Len has been the club’s safety officer and ground chairman as well as Supporters Club chairman for many years and has made a great contribution to Hitchin Town Football Club. Managing director Andy Melvin paid a fulsome tribute to Len thanking him for putting so much hard work in to his various roles. ” Len will be a very hard act to follow and I am really grateful for all he has done particularly with regard to the ground. It has been a thankless task trying to keep Top Field compliant with all the new regulations but he managed to do this despite the difficulties presented by the ageing infrastructure”.

I would like to pay my own tribute to Len who first became involved with the club when he helped to run the under 15 side 15 years ago when he worked alongside John Morrell. Len became involved in working on the ground and took over from John when he stepped down as ground chairman and safety officer. As Andy said it is a difficult job as Top Field presents a huge challenge with the preponderance of wood and antiquated buildings. But thanks to Len and his ground staff we have always achieved the necessary ground gradings required by the league.

I first worked closely with Len during the Save Top Field campaign. We were both on the special committee that was set up and became involved in a lot of detailed planning. I remember we went to Hitchin police station to ask permission to hold our protest march and Len had to liaise with the police throughout. It says a lot for Len that the police praised our organisation of the protest and they were really helpful as Len complied with their wishes. Typical of Len he was happy to stay in the background but he was absolutely vital to the whole campaign.

The next time I worked closely with Len was the 2018/19 FA Cup run. When I found out the FA wanted to hold the draw for the first round live from the Canary Club I had no inkling how stressful it would be liaising with the BBC. Len took the brunt of dealing with the BBC engineers, technical staff and health and safety advisors. The amount of red tape was phenomenal but Len again handled it with the minimum of fuss and the daw itself went off perfectly really putting the club on the map.

Again when it came to the Solihull Moors game Len came in to his own. He had to deal with the police, the local authority, the Solihull safety officer as well as the BBC who were filming the game. Having seen the volume of paperwork that Len had to deal with in a very short space of time I can only praise him for how well he dealt with it and he had to take time off work to cope. Then on the day he was in charge of safety and stewarding and the best compliment I can pay him is that the police were full of praise for our organisation.

The Supporters Club have donated thousands of pounds to the club since Len became chairman and as treasurer I was very grateful for this contribution.

So although Len will be missed he can take great pride in the part he has played in the club’s progress over the last 15 years. He has earned his retirement and will be a difficult act to follow.

GROUND REPORT BY STEVE BARKER
We had a productive morning today constructing a new side to the tractor shed after removing the old shed last week This work should be completed next Saturday.

The wire mesh was refitted to the new pitch perimeter previously erected.

The pitch had another cut today and will need cutting twice a week from now due to the rapid growth we are getting and it’s looking very lush.

We are getting a large skip delivered for next Saturday when we intend to do a major clean-up of all round the ground including the remains of the old shed.

We would be very grateful for any help our fans can provide to complete this task so it would be great to welcome any helpers from 9-30 am next Saturday 11 July. You will need some gloves.

50/50 DRAW
A reminder that it is not too late to buy a ticket for the fourth monthly Hitchin Town virtual 50/50 draw. Tickets can be purchased online by clicking here.

The draw will take place live on the club Twitter account on Wednesday 8th July at 7:45pm. Over 300 tickets have already been purchased and will be on sale until 5.00pm on the day of the draw.

You can buy as many tickets as you like and they will cost £1. We will again be donating 20% of the total take to the East and North Herts NHS Trust to show our support for their incredible efforts. We will then split the remainder 50/50 between the winner of the draw and the Club.

HITCHIN TOWN YOUTH FC
Hitchin Town Youth FC now has a club Facebook page – www.facebook.com/hitchintownyouthfc

They will be using the page to share news about the club, their teams and use it as a platform to recruit new players from in and around Hitchin.

CANARY CLUB IS OPEN AGAIN
The Canary Club reopened on Saturday.

The revised opening hours are as follows:

  • Monday to Thursday 4pm -10pm
  • Friday 4pm – midnight
  • Saturday 11am – midnight
  • Sunday 11am – 9pm.

SAVEPUBLIFE SCHEME BY MICK DOCKING

A big thanks to everyone who participated in this Budweiser initiative.

Our target was to reach a thousand pounds worth of Canary Club online drink vouchers sold and this we did and exceeded. The scheme has now closed.

Thanks massively to you all for your contributions, which, together, should mean a handy one thousand pounds windfall to the Club from Budweiser.

Vouchers can be redeemed at the bar with Steve when next you visit.

HITCHIN RETRO – NEXT GAME COMING SOON BY CHRIS NEWBOLD
Thank you to all those of you who supported and watched the 1993 Enfield League game.

Next up in the near future will be the first of the two epic FA Cup games against Hereford United in 1994. TalkSport commentator Barry Swain (who was at the game) has very kindly, at no expense to the Club, enhanced the recording by adding graphics and stats, and providing commentary for the game.

Tickets for this game will be advertised soon for viewing this game. It will be made available on a: “Pay What You Want” basis.

Here’s hoping for plenty of support.

COLLEGE PROGRAMME UPDATE
This week’s question and answer session was with ex Canary Ken Gillard who became assistant manager to Darran Salton. Ken is now the manager of Arsenal Under 18’s so is well placed to offer advice to our academy students.

MANAGER’S NOTES WITH MARK BURKE
Mark is having a final meeting with his back room staff next week to finalise plans for the return to training. He is keeping in touch with the players.