2013-14 UCL REVIEW

COUNTY CUPS REVIEW: SUCCESS CONFINED TO NORTHAMPTONSHIRE

The 2013-14 season wasn’t one of our most successful in county cup football with just two winners and two beaten finalists, all of them in Northamptonshire.

The only first team to taste success was ON Chenecks, who won the Northants Junior Cup with a 3-0 defeat of Northants Combination champions elect Brixworth at Sixfields. Two Adam Hancock goals and one from Justin McKenzie took the trophy to Billing Road. The silverware was certainly hard earned by Graham Cottle’s men who defeated league rivals Bugbrooke, Northampton Spencer and Burton Park and Combination champions Harpole on their way to the final. The Peterborough Northern Star second string flew the Reserve Division banner successfully in this competition, claiming the scalp of local rivals Peterborough Sports en route to a last four exit at Brixworth. In the Northants Lower Junior Cup Whitworth Reserves beat Rothwell Corinthians Reserves 2-1 in the final at the Dog & Duck. Simon Anderson’s penalty settled this one after Matt Hibberd’s Flourmen opener was cancelled out by a Ryan Clark reply. Cogenhoe missed out on the Northants Hillier Senior Cup, losing 3-0 to step 4 Daventry in the final at Sixfields. They did however claim a couple of notable scalps on their way to the final, winning 3-0 at Brackley and 4-0 at home to Corby. Peterborough Northern Star lost to Daventry in the semis having earlier knocked out Kettering. A restructuring of the Lincolnshire Senior Trophy saw step 3 and 4 clubs involved, and after Deeping and Spalding progressed through the first couple of rounds they suffered narrow quarter final defeats against Grantham and Stamford respectively.

In the Huntingdonshire Senior Cup Eynesbury and Huntingdon reached the semi finals before going out to St Ives and St Neots respectively.

In the Leicestershire Challenge Cup Oadby beat step 3 Loughborough Dynamo and step 4 Loughborough University to reach the last four, only to be removed from the competition for fielding a cup tied player. In the Senior Cup Lutterworth Athletic lost to St Andrews in a semi final penalty shootout.

OTHER CUPS REVIEW: HUNTINGDON ADD TO SILVERWARE COLLECTION

On the minor cups front Huntingdon enjoyed the most notable success, carrying off the 120 year old Hinchingbrooke Cup for the first time. The Cromwellians beat Stotfold 2-0 in the final at St Neots, early goals from Jacob Joyce and Stuart Eason taking the trophy to Jubilee Park.

Elsewhere success proved elusive, although Potton were semi finalists in the North Beds Charity Cup and both Olney and Buckingham reached the last four of the Buckingham Charity Cup.

Pre-season silverware saw Rushden & Higham beat illustrious neighbours AFC Rushden & Diamonds 1-0 to win the first staging of the Chris Ruff Memorial Cup, Tyler Merries the Lankies matchwinner. Diamonds fared better in the James Victory Cup, an Alfie Taylor hat trick seeing off host club Buckingham 3-1. The Doug Jack Memorial Cup was inaugurally won by St Neots Saints with a 6-2 success at AFC Kempston. Ryan Sharman and Tom Wood scored two apiece for Saints who also had Shaun Barnett and Dalton Harris on the scoresheet. Holbeach beat a Boston United side 4-2 to win the Gerald Starling Memorial Cup with Curtis Yeatman, Luke Hollingworth and two goal Liam Tunstall netting for the Tigers.

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