Rebel Rebels - A Worthing FC webzine

The John Keeley Dodgy Dyed Barnet “Kajagoogoo” Award – shared by Wes Lopez and Andy Walker. Tom Graves disqualified due to excessive natural gingerness

The Phil Reid “could go anywhere” goal-kicking award – Matty May

The Damian Webber highest clearance of the season award – Danny Stevens

The Jimmy Quinn award, jointly sponsored by Mothercare prams and Toys-R-Us – Jimmy Quim

The “Suburb of Pagham” song of the year – Jointly awarded to “Give us a B” and “Tooting want their stand back”, both Lewes away

The “Lewes ‘til I Die” bandwagon-jumping glory-hunters of the year award – Bognor Regis fans towards the end of the season (average crowd until march – less than 260)

The team of the year – the “yellows”, after beating the “greens”, Tooting away (league cup)

The Mark Knee career-threatening injury of the year award – the soon to return Gavin Jones. The cruciate injury, not the pallet he dropped on his head!

The “Nobby” mad fan of the season award – Jacques of Dorking

Worst game of the season – choose from a wide selection, listed on the middle pages, from October 2002 to March 2003. My personal selection would be Windsor away (0-2)

Best game of the season – Lewes away in the league, 2-0

The friendliest club of the season award – jointly awarded to Ashford Town (Middlesex) and Corinthian Casuals

Best compliment of the season – “It’s all the Worthing fans’ fault – they provoked him” Terry Parris, Lewes Chairman. So we got our tactics right on AND off of the pitch then?

Best quote of the season – “Unlucky Flo. Next time, why don’t you try a shot?” Ben Carrington offering Florian words of consolation away at Epsom (Flo and Ben both scored two that night)

The Ben Carrington crucial penalty award – the equaliser against Bognor, scored by Gary Young

The Herman Goebbels Pointless Propaganda award – the endless “Worthing FC Youth/Youth FC” drivel on the once-great message board

The Parallelogram of Power – the conclusion of the “league within a league within my head”

Well, the final table is in, and due to a last-minute amendment to the rules, whereby Goal Diffrence has been replaced by a FIFA style “in the event of a tie, the results between the two tied sides will be taken into consideration”, I can exclusively reveal that the mighty Rebels are top of the pile*. Of course, some may argue that Lewes’ superior goal difference should have lifted them above us, but then they shouldn’t have lost 2-0, should they?

	Pl	W	D	L	F	A	Pts	GD
The Pride of the Coast	6	2	3	1	10	10	9	0
B Grade Wannabees	6	2	3	1	9	8	9	1
Chalet-Dwellers	6	2	2	2	9	9	8	0
Young Conservatives	6	1	2	3	10	11	4	-1

And whilst we’re on the subject, remember the “harshly-maligned Seaside town” comments about Bognor from the Homes of Non League Football book? Well, there’s more! A new book from The Idler, entitled “Crap Towns: The 50 Worst Places to Live” singles out Bexhill, Peacehaven, Hastings, Crawley, Brighton, Horsham (a town for Young Conservatives run by Old Conservatives) and Bognor for abuse.

Apparently, “Crawley stands on the axis of evil – the train line to Horsham”, whilst “Bognor stinks of chip fat in the summer and death in the winter. The most common car after an XR3i is a hearse”. And you thought I was scathing! The mayor of Hastings retorted “the only major Sussex town** that hasn’t been singled out for criticism is Worthing, which is pretty horrible itself”. Miaow. This from a town that once had to bus out the junkies for the visit of the Queen.

(* My head: my rules)
(** Correctly, the Mayor of Hastings has observed that Lewes isn’t a major town. It’s a hamlet near Ringmer)
The quotes above have been paraphrased from the Evening Argus, Thursday 24th April. They had to be paraphrased as Mrs Horseman (yes, the “Flying Horsewoman”) had thrown the paper out in a fit of efficiency.

Review of the season

As the evenings lengthen, and the shrill “caw, caw” of birds fill the air, and our thoughts turn to DIY and barbecues, it can only mean one thing – time for a new scarecrow. And the season is coming to and end. So how has everyone done?

Well, it’s no real surprise that Cash-arlton have gone up, although at time of writing the championship remains undecided. Graham “Nice Guy” Roberts’ team has not won many friends this season, but their fans are actually quite nice, so we’ll give them the benefit of the doubt. The battle for second place, and what may or may not be promotion, is still open – Butlins Regis Town have to win at Walton, or Lose could sneak second (a win if Bognor lose, or a 6-goal win if Bognor draw). Of course, Lewes ground is currently a B grade (which some would argue is still pretty generous), although an appeal may be in the offing. The likely scenario would be for just Carshalton to go up, Lewes’ appeal to fail and they and Bognor will be joining us once more for fun and frivolity next season.

It has been a pretty good season for the Sussex sides in the league, although the crowds don’t really bear this out (for all their second-placing and “500” fans at our place on Easter Monday, Bognor will finish the season below us in the attendance league). There is also talk of a boycott by Lewes fans in protest at Jimmy Quinn’s behaviour (as apparently he doesn’t treat Lee Newman as the messiah he truly is!). Horsham’s encouraging start fell away in early Spring, as although they carried on playing when other pitches were submerged, they also kept on losing.

Other teams that “coulda been a contender” include Whyteleafe, who’ve done very well for a village side, particularly as it looks the big number 7 (Peter “the hills are alive…” Garland) was getting more than his fair share of the post-match sarnies. Windsor & Eton went on an amazing run, only to come off the rails at Woodside a few weeks back, and Dulwich (with their partially lit supermarket car park stadium) will unfortunately be remaining with us next season.

Down at the bottom, Chertsey provided their fans with non-stop entertainment and goals galore – apparently their goalie has one of the most flexible backs in the league. Molesey and the Met Police are both still flirting with the drop, with Ashford, Bracknell and Corinthian Casuals not safe at the time of writing. Thankfully, our friends from the North, Leathered, pulled away from relegation with considerable finesse.

But enough of that – we all know that the most exciting battle of the season is for twelth place, and that is what Staines and the Rebels will be shooting it for today. To the victor, the spoils.

Someone’s left the cake out in the rain, and I don’t think I can take it,
as it took so long to bake it, and I’ll never have that recipe again, oh no
Laters, The Horseman

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Site launched
7th Feb 2004