Six League Titles and Ten Cup Finals

AFC Sudbury’s first team finished their season yesterday with an excellent one nil win at Play Off bound Coggeshall. I cannot continue with this piece without thanking Coggeshall for their first rate hospitality yesterday and at the same time to genuinely wish them the very best of luck in those Play Offs. Starting at Maldon on Wednesday evening.
Anyway back to all things AFC Sudbury. For many clubs at our level the last game of the season for the first team, effectively means the end of the season. Not for us. Not by a long shot. The title of this message somewhat gives the game away. Six league titles (so far). Some won as early as February. And ten - yes ten Cup Finals. Nine of which are still to be played. The first of which was last Wednesday when the A team (u17s) brought home the Tommy Thompson cup which now sits proudly in the Academy class room alongside all of the others. I hope we are shortly going to need a new trophy cabinet.
The next final is on Tuesday for what is potentially the biggest game in the relatively short history of AFC Sudbury. The FA National Colleges final at Walsall FC. A coach load of AFC Sudbury people will be there to support the team on the night. Including players and officials who are not from the team who are representing the club that night. And this is the reason for my message. We genuinely are One Club In It Together. Everybody who represents AFC Sudbury is an ambassador for the whole club.
We don’t make a big song and dance about our achievements. Maybe we should ? Some clubs shout every goal from the roof tops. One or two even delight in criticising their fellow clubs. This is not us. We just get on with the job and do the best that we can.
But it is a tremendous achievement and a real credit to the players, coaches, managers, volunteers, officials and above all the families of those involved who collectively make it happen. Who week in week out turn out to ensure that every team in yellow and blue has the best possible chance of success. A huge thank you to everybody here on behalf of the whole club.
As some of you will know June 1st 2019 marks the twentieth anniversary of AFC Sudbury as a football club. Twenty years ago the two clubs in Sudbury Town and Wanderers, merged together to form Amalgamated Football Club Sudbury. We are at a point in our history when things are very much in a transitional phase. But a transitional phase which I am absolutely convinced will only make us collectively stronger and more successful. The club has decided that the only way in which it can survive and at the same time remain competitive is for us to grow our own players. This starts from the very youngest upwards. Boys and girls. To genuinely operate as a single football club and represent the local community in the best way possible. The success of the teams this year is proof, if ever proof was needed, that it is working. And I am absolutely convinced that we are only going to get better.
So enjoy the close season. But as mentioned in the opening paragraph, for AFC Sudbury it is far from the close season just yet. So do try and come and support the various teams as they try to win more silverware for the club. You must be able to find one or two finals that you can make. There are after all plenty to choose from ! Be proud of what we have. We really should be.
Good luck to every team playing over the next few weeks. I will try to get to as many as I can. And win or lose we know that we have represented the club in the most positive way that we possibly can.
The future is bright. The future is yellow

Andrew Long
Chairman