Corsham Print
Wiltshire Senior League
Wroughton End of Season Awards
Picture courtesy of Stuart Beggs
Defending champions Wroughton, who were having such a good season when the Coronavirus struck, held their end of season awards last weekend, with Club Secretary Stuart Beggs hosting a virtual presentation event on Zoom. The event was a huge success with all the players in attendance and with the evening’s entertainment also including a quiz, forfeits, some fancy dress and plenty of beer.

The awards on the night saw Anthony Packer pick up the Players Player of the Year Award, whilst the Managers Player of the Year award went to Aaron Maximen. The Top Goalscorer Award went to Shane Hibbert, the fourth consecutive season he has finished as the club’s leading scorer. Tyler Wilkinson’s headed extra-time equalising goal at Purton in the Fountain Trophies Cup, a goal which sent the cup tie to penalties, was voted goal of the season on the night, helped by Your Sport Swindon  catching the goal on film in the entertaining 3-3 draw. 

Wroughton were in fourth place when the season ended but in reality had been the league leaders for much of the season and had seven games in hand over leaders Corsham Town Reserves, who were five points ahead of them, at the point the season was ended. Had the league been permitted by the FA to use Points per Game to decide matters, like leagues below Step 7, Wroughton would have been champions.  Their defence of the title had started with a bizarre opening day postponement due to a waterlogged pitch in August at Westbury, little did they know at the time that such wet weather was going to be a key feature of the season. When they finally did get to start the defence of their title they won all of their opening 12 league games to head the table. They were also did very well in the early rounds of the Wiltshire Senior Cup, wins over Stratton Juniors and Laverstock & Ford seeing them become the first side from the league to reach the semi-finals of this prestigious competition since Season 2003-04. They eventually went out at the semi-final stage having taken Western League Division One leaders Calne Town to extra-time on a wet and blustery night at Melksham.

The knock-on impact of their extended county cup run, coupled with the awful wet weather that had become a key feature of the season, meant they got behind with their league fixtures and slipped out of the top three. It will forever remain an unknown as to whether they would have gone on and joined the exclusive group of six clubs who have previously defended the top division title on at least one occasion in the leagues 44-year history. On the one hand they had yet to lose a league game at the time of cessation but, on the other hand, had drawn their last three league games and crashed out of the Fountain Trophies Cup. They were also set to lose one of their top players, Aaron Maximen, to Highworth Town but had also made an astute signing in Matty Bennett to replace him. All conjecture now and no-one will ever know how the Premier Division season would have played out. In the overall scheme of things, in the end, football is secondary to ensuring that all involved in the league as players, managers, coaches, committee members remain safe and can get back involved with the league when it once again becomes possible to play the game. One thing that can be expected is that when football resumes, Wroughton are once again likely to be one of the sides challenging for honours in the Corsham Print Wiltshire Senior League.
Players Player of Year  Anthony Packer
Managers Player of Year Aaron Maximen
Top Goal Scorer Shane Hibbert
Goal of the Season Tyler Wilkinson
1-06-2020
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