Leamington FC - Proper Football 'On The Road'

The venue for our latest Proper Football 'On The Road' club visit was the New Windmill Ground/Your Co-op Community Stadium, the home of National League North side, Leamington Football Club for their match against Worksop Town.

A brief history

Leamington FC is based in Leamington Spa, Warwickshire, and was formed in 1933 as the works team for a local company called Lockheed Borg & Beck, which manufactured brakes and Clutches, hence their nickname 'The Brakes'.

The original home of the club was in the town centre at the Windmill Ground, which was sadly sold off in 1984. When no other suitable ground could be found, the club went into a state of dormancy in 1988.

Despite the club's predicament, a piece of land was purchased 5 miles outside Leamington Spa by a passionate group of supporters who had also continued to pay League registration fees to keep the club alive. They transformed the new land, which was actually a potato field. Into a football pitch in 1993.

It took another seven years for Leamington FC to emerge from hibernation, and the Brakes were back in business in 2000 at the New Windmill Ground.

When we arrived at the stadium, the wonderful, friendly welcome we received set the tone for the day. Benji, one of the club volunteers, took us under his wing straight away and couldn't do enough for us, giving us full access, lining up interviews with club officials and giving us an insight into the club.

Benji epitomised what Leamington FC are all about and is a credit to the football club!

Benji also introduced us to the Brakes manager, Paul Holleran in the car park before we had even entered the ground and Paul, who has been at the helm for 16 years and has guided the club to the National League North on three different occasions was more than happy to have a quick chat, we wished him good luck for the match, which is something that has deserted the Brakes this season and sees them currently bottom of the table ahead of what was already a 6 pointer even at this early stage of the season against Worksop Town who were only 5 pts above them in 20th place, we then made our way into the ground.

The stadium has 2 covered seated stands on opposite sides of the pitch with the Mick Brady stand between the dugouts and a longer stand along the other side of the pitch, there's a covered raised terrace stand behind one goal that creates a good atmosphere and opposite is an open air terrace called the North Bank which also doubles up as an away end when segregation applies, there is also a raised hospitality area that was a nice touch as well.

 Here's a little montage so you can see for yourself.

It became obvious during the course of the afternoon that our video camera was very much underperforming (new one on its way!), so please accept our apologies for the poor picture quality on a couple of our interviews.

Here's the lads with their initial thoughts on the stadium and a preview of the day ahead.

Ahead of the match we caught up with Leamington FC chairman, Jim Scott, who was kind enough to give us his time, we discussed the difficulties the club have faced this season and the impact of playing outside of Leamington Spa and how important it is for the club to move back into the town so that the Brakes can keep growing and build on the remarkable success with a proposed move on the horizon.

It was wonderful to see a Programme/Memorabilia shop inside the stadium, which is sadly somewhat of a rarity nowadays, there was also another converted shed which housed the club shop which had a great range of merchandise and plenty of other interesting items for sale, both of the shops were run by a couple of the many wonderful volunteers we met on the day, and we took the opportunity to have a chat with Andy who has been running the programme shop for a couple of years.

As well as the club shop and Programme/Memorabilia shop their was plenty of different food outlets, there was a burger stall selling chips, hotdogs, a range of burgers plus hot and cold beverages that were very reasonably priced, down the other end of the ground their was a pop up street food bus from the local award winning restaurant 'Magic Wingdom' which we have to say the chicken was absolutely delicious!!!

There was also another kiosk selling snacks and sweets, plus the spacious, modern-looking clubhouse, which had a great selection of beers, cider and lots more!

Everything you need basically!

As always it was great to see a matchday programme, and what a superb read it was! Full of excellent content, lots of interesting information and enjoyable articles and well worth the £3 and so much better than you would see a lot higher up the football pyramid!

👏🏼👏🏼👏🏼

A shout-out to the two lovely ladies selling the 50/50 raffle tickets who were always smiling!

One of the main reasons we do our 'On The Road' Proper Football club visits is to find out about the work non-league football clubs do in their local areas and give a platform to champion the amazing projects they have running which is not only beneficial to the clubs but more importantly the community, we can't emphasise enough how important this is. Chris Knott, the Head of Football Development at Leamington FC kindly joined us for a chat to explain his role at the club and the wonderful work they are doing.

Leamington FC also have a ladies football team, and they are flying at the moment after being promoted last season and they have started off the new campaign in the same vein. The Brakes also have two new U17 & U18 female sides to create a pathway to the first team. We had a chat with two of the Ladies on the team to find out a bit more about how they are doing.

Another thing to admire about Leamington FC is 'The Brakes Trust', which was established in 2010.

The Brakes Trust, which is ultimately a supporters' trust, is a democratic, not-for-profit organisation of supporters, committed to strengthening the voice for supporters in the decision-making process at the club and strengthening the links between the club and the community.

We had the pleasure of meeting Nick Rogers, who is one of the organisers, and he gave us an insight into what they do.

Summary

Our day had come to an end, and sadly it wasn't the result Leamington were looking for, losing 1-2 to Worksop Town. We could sense a feeling of resignation around the club that they may go down this season, even at this early stage, what with their bad run of luck and other factors, but we also got the sense of optimism for the future.

We only spent a few hours at the club but we could see so many positives, it was evidently clear to see the club is in very good hands with so many wonderful and passionate people all pulling in the same direction and a community spirit that can only be applauded, a move back into the town centre is so vital for the club and we will keep our fingers crossed that the ongoing plans and discussions come to fruition.

A football club back in the centre of Leamington Spa would not only be huge for the Brakes but for the community as a whole!

National League North table

Finally, we would just like to say a massive thank you to everyone at the club for making us feel so welcome and we wish the Brakes all the best going forward.

Here are the match highlights and post-match interview with the Brakes manager, Paul Holleran, courtesy of the excellent media team at Leamington FCTV.