Page 60 - The KRH Year of 2023 (CREST Sharing)

60 The Regimental Journal of The King’s Royal Hussars
Football
The KRH FC return to explore the beauty of the game. As the old and bold retire, the manager aims to discover young talent with a passion for football, creating memorable moments and striving for victory. The time has come to navigate a tran- sition from experienced players to a new generation, seeking both cherished memories and triumph on the field.
With post operational tour leave behind us, in the margins of Ex IRON CYCLONE prep and deployment, we had to grasp every opportunity we could to whittle 30-40 participating young thrusting footballers down to a 20 strong squad in order to tackle the season ahead. The football Officer – Capt Carl Donald, had been working extensively over his leave period to ensure the Cyprus football tour would follow through and between himself and the manager – SSgt Sean Spencer, we could take a group of individual players away for a week in the sun, train them both physically and tactically and bring home a team of disciplined, enthusiastic and well drilled squad mem- bers set for the difficult season which lay ahead.
Difficult? Well, the Army FA with their infinite wisdom, decided to drop us into the southern central premier division which is 3 leagues above what we would normally compete in so, I think it’s safe to say, the task at hand was a difficult one.
To start off the 23/24 campaign, there was only one thing for it, a week’s tour in Cyprus. This saw the squad living out of Episkopi Garrison with daily training sessions down at happy valley playing fields. Early morning sessions were delivered to mitigate the sweltering heat once the sun had fully risen over the Mediterranean Sea. SSgt Ian Freitag had managed to secure a position on the coaching team from his posting as BSM down in Bovington to get the team ready for unfortunately, only the one game we would play against 1 RIFLES as 1 LANCS had clearly seen our potential and had to pull out of the game due to “unforeseen circumstances”.
Our fixture with 1 RIFLES saw an early departure to Dhekelia camp with a well-rested team after a weekend of “relaxation” in Ayia Napa. To no surprise the team looked sharp and went out all guns blazing, sticking to the plan, and executing a well drilled setup with goals coming from LCpl Morgan Kay and Tpr Jake Hawksworth to get us the victory we went searching for with a 2-1 win.
Cyprus wasn’t just for the football, the squad had been given time to explore the island and also had numerous activities planned which saw us all enjoy a Europa league fixture at ARIS Limassol, an enjoyable afternoon in the waterpark, sea activi- ties on happy valley beach topped off with a squad meal in Paphos to end the week.
Sunrise and training sessions
On return from being pretend footballers in Cyprus, 22 Engineers were eagerly awaiting our fixture for what they thought would be an opportunity to get one over us as they served within our BG the year before. A short trip down the road to Perham Down to compete in UK South Major Unit Cup 1st round saw a feisty encounter. The match didn’t come with- out its problems, shortly after half time a couple of our spec- tators were asked to leave the pitch due to what can only be described as diabolical refereeing decisions that not even VAR could make any sense of, which in-turn led to a crazy few min- utes. Shortly after this, we conceded two goals and the game looked likely to end only one way. However, a couple of substi- tutions were made and a tactics change with some encouraging words from the side-lines proved crucial with 20 minutes left in the match. The performance that followed was something else, three goals within the last 15 minutes of the game by Tpr Harley Cocks, Tpr James Mattocks and Tpr Eldon Pompey ignited celebrations as if we had won the Champions League. It left the Engineers with a bitter taste in their mouth but all that mattered to us, was the victory. The 2nd round draw will see us again make a short journey to play 3rd UK Div signals away in Bulford in early 2024.
LCpl Ronan Villiers Enjoying The Waterpark
Last man standing