Penn vs Westside

Westside FC was founded by Graham Holder, current chairman, in May 1996 and is based at West Side Church in Wandsworth. Graham travelled to the USA in 1994 with Ambassadors in Sport to coach and evangelise in San Jose, California during the 1994 World Cup. While he was there, he had a vision to form a Christian football club on his return to the UK. In 1996 this happened. With the team only having seven players, it joined Division 5 of the Kingston & District League. By the start of the season, the team had 17 players mainly from the West Side Church youth group. In this first season the team, player managed by Graham Holder, won KDL Division 5, the Tec Cup, and the Sportsmanship Cup and were runners-up in the League Junior Cup. Not a bad start and with Dave Doran scoring 55 goals. Current first-team manager, Steve Walters, current treasurer Peter Cox and current third-team manager, Alex Dowdeswell all formed part of that very first starting 11 on the park pitches back in September 1996! The club grew to have three adult men’s teams in the KDL with brothers, friends and friends of friends joining. The first team progressed through the divisions of the KDL and in 1999/20 were Division 2 champions and were promoted directly to the KDL Premier Division, and won this the following season in 2000/01. The club decided to have a further season in the KDL Premier and apply for promotion to the Surrey South Eastern Combination Intermediate League (SSEC) the following season. Unfortunately, the plan went wrong when the team ended third. Graham decided to take a gamble and transferred the team into the SSEC Junior 1 and it gained promotion to the Intermediate League in 2002/03. Graham Holder remained manager until 2008/09 and after 12 years, stepped down to manage the reserves in SSEC Junior 1. His assistant manager, Steve Walters took over the job of first team manager.

Steve Walters led the first team to the SSEC Intermediate Division 2 title in 2014/15 and Division 1 the following season, gaining promotion to the Surrey Elite League when Westside switched to playing their home games firstly at Croydon Arena and then at AFC Croydon Athletic. In 2018/19, they finished third and gained promotion to Step 6 of the national football structure, thus entering Combined Counties Division 1. Westside moved to ground share with Chessington & Hook United and despite a relatively good start, their season like many others was curtailed by Covid-19. In season 2020/21, they moved to a ground sharing0arrangement at Colliers Wood United FC. Also, in 2004, the club became the first Christian team to take a mission tour to Senegal in West Africa. A great adventure, two years of planning and a difficult one for a Christian team in a mainly Muslim country. The tour was a great success and they returned in 2007 with an even more gruelling schedule of matches, coaching and Christian evangelism. There were some very unusual pitches and football in the jungle is a real experience! Westside also have connections with Romania and Sierra Leone. They believe that their original vision to be a multi-team club has blossomed over the years since 1996. The club has expanded greatly since starting youth and girls’ football in 2002 under the overall control of Jane Walters. For season 2019/20, Westside joined forces with Sean McInnes and have numerous teams playing in the Surrey Youth League. They now have over 35 youth boys’ teams from U7 to U18 with teams playing on both Saturday and Sunday. All these teams have also won numerous trophies across all levels of the club. Westside won the Division One Cup final 4-1 v Molesey in their first CCL season.