EASTBOURNE BOROUGH
STADIUM
Priory Lane is the home of Eastbourne and has been since 1988. However, the club was called Langley FC and Langley Sports, before the change in 2001. They had another tenant for a 4 year period, as Langley Wanderers FC shared between 2017-2021, before their liquidation. The ground holds a capacity of 4,151 which has yet to be reached with a record attendance of 3,770.
LAST SEASON’S MEETINGS
Chelmsford City 5-0 Eastbourne Borough (29th October 2022) – A rather emphatic Chelmsford performance left Danny Bloor refunding his travelling fans as it was a 5-star Claret show. It was a fast start, as Harry Lodovica and Charlie Ruff were both able to find the back of the net inside the opening 10 minutes. Ruff’s goal made it 6 in the last 7 home games for the attacking midfielder. It was nearly an hour later, but another quick duo of goals made it 4-0. A Ruff corner was headed home by Oluwo, before less than 180 seconds later, another corner was turned in, this time by Simeon Jackson. To put the icing on the cake, a deflected effort fell kindly to Jamie Yila who made no mistake in making it 5-0, with minutes to go.
Eastbourne Borough 2-2 Chelmsford City (4th March 2023) – The Clarets were on the South coast where an eventful game was kick started midway through the first half as Callum Jones was taken down by Lee Worgan for a penalty. He took authority and dispatched the penalty cooly. Eastbourne managed to strike back right at the end of the half, as Miguel Scarlett levelled with his first ever league goal. The Clarets then fell behind almost immediately after the break, as Luke Pearce was given too much space, seeing him score after just 3 second half minutes. However, a point was taken as Michael Folivi came to the rescue, scoring his first Chelmsford goal and netting an equaliser with just 2 minutes left to play.
A FEW CLUB LINKS
Last season, Jamie Yila made the switch from Essex to Sussex after joining the Clarets in the summer. Jamie made 33 appearances in the Claret shirt, netting 5 goals. One of those goals was against Eastbourne and former Claret Lee Worgan. The experienced shot stopper played for the Clarets in the 20/21 season, but saw his stay cut short due to COVID-19. He then joined Dorking, before playing over 80 times for Eastbourne. Following the departure of Danny Bloor, Lee has joined him and now plays for Welling United. Another Danny Bloor signing, Chris Whelpdale, has been on the books of both. Chris left League 2 Stevenage to join the Clarets, where he was a real fan favourite, netting 17 league goals in 66 games. He been at Eastbourne since July 2020, but taken a step back due to injuries, and now enjoys the photography side of things.
THE MANAGER
Eastbourne have had a reshuffle following the recent takeover. Danny Bloor departed and in came Mark Beard. His CV is fairly impressive, having made over 450 career appearances. In terms of coaching, his main roles include being an under-18s coach at Brighton, before on Marc White’s coaching team at Dorking. Eastbourne is the highest ranked side he has managed, seeing a big test for Beard this upcoming season.
2022-23 SEASON
After a playoff finish, Eastbourne looked to follow it up but could only managed 8th place. In a rather competitive season, this was a good finish for The Sports and they will look to build on it. Under new owner Simon Leslie, Eastbourne will hope that they only was is up.
by