Welcoming our new clubs

The Cheshire League are pleased to announce we have five new teams joining us this season: Unicorn Athletic, FC St Helens, Litherland Remyca Reserves and Halebank will be joining league two, while Mersey Valley Development Squad will enter Reserve League Two.

FC ST Helens was formed in 2014 and was created to be the official open age section to what is known as St Helens Town Junior Football Club and has no relation to its very similar named club in the NWCFL. Today the club as a whole have 26 teams ranging from U6 to U18 including girls teams. Affiliated to Lancashire FA, FC St Helens secured Community Club Status within its first year and plans were set in motion very quickly to establish the club and secure a home ground at the newly named sports facility, Windleshaw Sports.

Windleshaw Sports was formerly known as St Helens Cricket Club and plans are already in place to build a new state of the art facility that will allow extra parking for players and officials as well as dedicated new changing rooms. This project is to be started very soon with the ambitious goal of completion within the next 7years. Today, Windleshaw Sports has benefited from a £50k investment to modernise the changing and shower facilities at the club with further improvements to the pitch, including a spectator pitch barrier in readiness for their debut season in Cheshire Football League 15/16. They now look forward to hosting our fellow member clubs to the home of FC St Helens over the coming years.

Halebank FC was formed in 1968. The club is based in the village of Halebank in Widnes and has strong links and great support from the local businesses and community. The club is based on a solid foundation with the Chairman Phil Sheridan holding his position since 1980 and Secretary Bobby Whitley being in place since 1974, both are ex-players of the club.

The team have been in the Warrington and District league for the past five years and are previous members of the Central Cheshire League back in the mid 1970s. The club achieved the Charter Standard Award in 2013.

The current manager Tony Nolan took over the first team for the 2013-14 season, having held the assistant role for the previous season. He is ably supported by a strong back up team of Billy Knowles, Jamie Unwin and Nick McKay.

In their first season with the side they brought silverware to the club, winning the Widnes cup (for the first time in the clubs history) the Warrington and District Jubilee Cup and finished a creditable third in their first season in the Warrington Premier Division.

Last season the club retained the Widnes Cup and won the Warrington and District Premier Division by a comfortable thirteen points, to bring the first league success since 2004-05.

Halebank see entering the Cheshire League as progression for the club as they have been very impressed with everything about the league so far it has already exceeded our expectations and we as a club are excited for the season ahead.

Mersey Valley will be manager by Liam and Steve Ogden and will be made up of the u17s side that played in the Timperley league last season. The team had a very successful season winning the double (league and cup) and to follow on with the clubs football development plan they will now move into open age football.
The club felt they were in danger of losing some of the more talented players if they stayed in the Timperley league open age as they were increasingly getting frustrated with the inconsistent technical ability of other teams their own age.

The team will offer the opportunity to develop youth players together in a competitive and well organised forward thinking league. Mersey Valley have decided to cap the age of players in this squad to under 23 as it is anticipated that the majority of players will be aged around 21 years old.

The team will be run separately from the first team to avoid the tag of “reserves”. They will be supported in their development and standards expected in senior football by the clubs football development officer (Dave Wood) who will facilitate close working relationships between first team and development squad coaches and players. The club envisage that there will be massive benefits from the age cap, as it will allow a greater number of 18 years olds upwards to stay involved in competitive football and they are looking forward to more exciting times for their players to develop into good open age football players in the Cheshire league.

Unicorn Athletic have joined us from the Altrincham & District League where they finished third and secured promotion to the Premier Division along with making it to the final of the Broadheath Central Cup where they lost to a penalty in extra time.

They chose to join the Cheshire League through their desire to play at grounds which are carefully vetted to ensure they meet a good standard with a better quality of football played.

Unicorn will be playing their home games at Valley Road, the former ground of Flixton FC meaning the ground is of North West Counties standard with floodlights and a stand, boasting capacity of around 2000.

Litherland Remyca first team were promoted into the North West Counties League three years ago and started to look into developing the club further and creating a pathway from the under 15s to the first XI. Once the first team had made the transaction into Step 6 football and completed the first season the decision was taken to change the reserves into a development squad to help feed the first team with young hungry players, as the worry at the time was that the reserve team were not producing these players.

Remyca chose the Cheshire League because as a club they are always seeking progression and that is exactly what the Cheshire League stand for. They hope to use this pathway to flourish their players, from under 15's going into a youth team in the North West Youth Alliance and then onto the Cheshire League team and first team.

Remyca are looking forward to the new challenge that the Cheshire League will offer and the way it will develop the players, mentally preparing them for games and getting there early, ready to play football and hopefully this will help once they step into first team action. Below the under 15s they have a fantastic junior section which has the emphasis on football for all from under 7s upwards, where the youngsters can have fun and learn without being put under pressure to win. As a club, Remyca feel it is important that all players feel comfortable in playing, enjoy the experience and learn along the way.

We look forward to welcoming all clubs to the Cheshire League and wish you all the best for the season.