On This Day - 25th January 2025

The season 2002-2003 found the League under the sponsorship of the Ancient Order of Foresters who supported the League Cup and that competition had reached the semi-final stage with Concord Rangers v Ilford and Sawbridgeworth Town v Barkingside.

All the results and news etc in those days could be found on Football Mitoo.

The Ancient Order of Foresters were the first Charity in the country to sponsor a League’s domestic competition whereas it would normally tend to be the opposite.

The biggest drama of the day was at Leslie Field, home of Burnham Ramblers who were playing Southend Manor. In the 22nd minute Jamie Alexander put Burnham 1-0 up but three minutes later, Simon Cox suffered a suspected broken leg and the Air Ambulance landed on the adjacent field. Enfield Town won 3-2 at Saffron Walden Town to retain top spot ahead of Ilford who won 5-3 at Barkingside.

The top scorer of the day was Kenny Leslie of Romford who found the back of the net four times in their 5-2 win over bottom club Eton Manor. Romford were now playing home games at Rush Green and 109 attended.

Waltham Abbey would be looking forward to a match with AFC Wimbledon on 8th February in the Cherry Red Trophy, the latter having disposed of Frenford Senior at Cricklefield.

Also on this day it was F A Cup third round and Norwich beat Dagenham & Redbridge 1-0, Arsenal won 5-1 at Farnborough and in the Ryman Premier, Thurrock drew 1-1 with Braintree. A tube train hit a tunnel wall at Chancery Lane and 29 people were taken to hospital with minor injuries.

Just one other significant “On this day” was in 1990 when, Essex, despite having suffered the worse gales in living memory found only one game postponed but Southend Manor’s wooden dugouts literally flew away into the Southchurch Park East lake never to be seen again!