Club History
Ferndown Locomotive FC: History
Ferndown Locomotive ‘T&D’ FC, started off as a 5-a-side team, which then developed into an 11-a-side outfit. Players were gathered through various sources, including the AFCB Internet Team, the team started out in the Hayward League Sunday Division Seven in 2002 with Chris Parker as Manager.
In 2003/04 season Loco under the management of Paul Phillips when the side remained unbeaten for long periods, the West Moors based side won the league title convincingly by nine points and promoted to Hayward League Sunday Division 5.
In 2005-06, the club was re-branded as Ferndown Locomotive FC. This was to reflect the natural roots of many squad players, and new home venue where we played – King George V Playing Fields, Ferndown. During the season, we not only held our own in the league, but we ended up getting promoted once again, for the second time in three seasons.
The 2006-07 season saw Locomotive competing in Hayward League Sunday Division Four. Once again, Locomotive had another fruitful season, at the end of the season Paul Phillips, who had been working tirelessly in the manager’s position at Loco for 5 seasons, was to step up as Chairman, in order to shake the team up a bit with a fresher faced manager. This position was taken up by current player Paul Cashmore.
Under Paul Cashmore’s management Loco progressed and in 2007-08 secured promotion to Hayward League Sunday Division 3. In the 2008 – 09 season Paul stepped down as manager and was replaced by then Club Secretary Alistair Carmichael.
With Ali’s stewardship the Ferndown club continued to improve as a club with the introduction of a gruelling preseason training schedule and weekly training sessions, helping the club climb the division three table, and Ali’s team were unfortunate not to be promoted in 2010-11 when Loco finished 4th in Division 3.
Due to an expanding family Ali stepped down as Manager and Loco embarked on a new season in Division 3 without Mr Carmichael involved in the clubs running for the first time in 6 or so years. The recently formed committee moved quickly to appoint then club captain Jimmy Redford as new loco manager. After a successful preseason with new recruits added, Loco started the season well going 10 games unbeaten in league and cup, which has brought this Ferndown side to their first ever Semi Finals appearance in the clubs history.
Special mention in the Ferndown Locomotive FC history to:
Sean Barker – all-time Top Goal Scorer and Loco Legend
Ali Carmichael, Andy Smith and Sam Davis (joint) – All Time Appearances.
Rob Frank, Scott Mountfield, Chris Parker, Paul Moore, Sean ‘Salva’ Barker – Founding Fathers of Ferndown Locomotive T&D FC
Chris Parker, Paul Philips, Paul Cashmore, Alistair Carmichael, Jimmy Redford – Loco Managers
Andy Smith (Secretary), Dave Hall (Chairman), Ben Haines (Treasurer) Jonny Haines (Social Sec.) – Current Committee
Ferndown Locomotive FC would not be in existence today without the generation donations made by our sponsors in previous years.
However it is fair to say that current sponsor Koozai, a Southampton and London based Intelligent Digital Marketing Company, have provided the level of investment in the club not previously seen, which has secured the clubs future for this and many years to come. The club would like to take this opportunity to thank Ben Norman (Managing Director of Koozai) for his continued support. www.koozai.com
Ferndown Locomotive FC (UK) twinned with FC Nelson Locomotive (NZ) ** www.locoboys.co.uk **
