Pic: Paul Paxford
ONE of the sacrifices made for success often comes in the form of high player turnover. If your team streaks through the divisions then it’s common for fans to forfeit a consistency of regularity on the pitch.
Perhaps managers have been getting it wrong as they look to bring six or seven new faces in every summer, or trimming their squad so perhaps they can afford a little extra quality in attack.
Hungerford manager Bobby Wilkinson took over in 2010 with the team languishing near the foot of the Southern League South & West table. They were a club not going anywhere fast.
In just over a month, the tiny market town and civil parish in Berkshire will become arguably the smallest club to ever play in the Conference set-up as they enter the National League South. And he’s done it by keeping his team intact.
Incredibly, some 14 of the players that started with Wilkinson over six years ago are still by his side now, and will pull on their boots in the second tier of Non-League football in five weeks’ time.
Mission
Despite their town boasting a population of just 6,000 and their playing budget said to be around a sixth of some sides in the league, ambition remains.
The Hungerford boss said: “Our target is to win the league. It’s our mission – we get 150 fans every week at the most, we’re without doubt the smallest club to ever play at this level and our budget in this league is probably not enough to even describe as a budget! But we do have something special, it’s something very different.
“When I started in 2010, 14 players who are all here now were there as well. That tells you all you need to know. They all stay and they all fight.
“We’ve grown old together – we’re family in every sense of the word. We fall out, we don’t speak for a while and then we make up.
“There’s drama, there’s arguments and there’s laughs along the way as well. There’s a lot of love there. I don’t see my actual family from season to season, but it’s OK because I’ve got two!”
The Hungerford manager has an understanding with the club’s board that if an offer was made for his services, they won’t stand in his way.
The Crusaders won the Southern Premier play-offs when they came from behind to beat Leamington 2-1 – and the scenes at the end told a story.
In tears, it didn’t take a genius to recognise Wilkinson’s affinity with the club – but he is an ambitious man.
“I’ll be perfectly honest, this is a stepping stone for me,” he admits. “I want to manage in the Football League and I will manage in the Football League, I 100 per cent believe that. You have got to back yourself.
“I would like to think that clubs must be looking at my CV. I do like to look ahead – if you don’t, there’s a danger you could get left behind.
“I have my goals, the club know that. We have a solid relationship and a great understand of my situation. The next step on my journey is getting people talking about Hungerford as a strong National League South club.”
