Authors Note
This is a side save to my Keegan Adventure but the urge to do it just swung it for me.
Background On Leamington Brakes
Leamington Football Club is the main football club in Whitnash, Leamington Spa, Warwickshire, England, currently playing in the Conference North.
In 2005 the team beat 5 teams (with 2 replays and penalty shoot-outs) to make excellent progress in the FA Cup, gaining significant national media coverage, culminating in a 9–1 defeat to Colchester United, a professional team six leagues above Leamington, in the First Round Proper. To celebrate the cup run the Warwickshire Beer Company created a bespoke beer called Brakes Fluid, only available from the club shop. At the start of the 2008–09 season the senior team became affiliated with Leamington Lions, the ladies team and the Leamington Junior Brakes teams.
History
The club was founded in 1933 as Leamington Borg & Beck, known as Lockheed Borg & Beck, as they became associated with a local works. The team soon became Lockheed Leamington, and then AP Leamington in 1973, as the works team for Automotive Products. In 1985 the club returned to their original name, but within three years the ground had been sold and the club went into hiatus until re-emerging in 2000.
With the club at its playing pinnacle, Automotive Products decided to sell the Windmill Ground in Tachbrook Road for housing. The last match was played in April 1988.
The club was relaunched in 2000 playing at the New Windmill Ground in Harbury Lane, Whitnash, (a small town adjoining Leamington to the south), and winning two successive promotions: the Midland Football Combination Division Two title in the first year and as runners-up in Division One a year later. Three years later Leamington gained promotion to the Midland Alliance. The current 2012/13 season saw the club win the Southern Football League title.
Famous ex-players include former Coventry City captain Charlie Timmins (1958–1961), and George Green, who won the 1925 FA Cup Final with Sheffield United.
Kits
The New Windmill Ground
The New Windmill Ground has been Leamington's home since the 2000–01 renaissance. The ground is built in the shadow of nearby Chesterton Windmill on Harbury Lane, Whitnash just outside Leamington Spa. It is fully owned by the club.
As of February 2008, the ground contains a match pitch and a practice pitch, car park, licensed clubhouse and changing rooms, a snack bar, club shop and a tuck shop, and an electronic scoreboard. There is covered terracing on the South side ("The Harbury Lane End"), covered seating on the East side ("The Sheepside"), terracing on the North side ("The North Bank"), and a new small covered stand on the West side. The ground has full floodlighting and PA facilities. Entrance is via turnstiles at the southwest and, since February 2008, northwest corners.
Supporters
Leamington used to enjoy a high level of support for the club's position in the league system. The average attendance for home matches for the 2011–12 season was 507. The highest attendance at a New Windmill Ground match was 1,634 when Stourbridge visited on 5 May 2008.
Leamington does not have an official club song but in the early seasons "Pomp 'n' Gold", a fusion of Elgar and Spandau Ballet was used prior to the teams walking out onto the pitch. For the 2011–12 season The Roller by Beady Eye is played whilst the teams run onto the pitch. In addition a popular song on the terraces is 2Bods adapted from an FC United of Manchester song with the words changed to suit the club. To celebrate the FA Cup run of 2005 the Warwickshire Beer Company, a local microbrewery based in Cubbington produced a special ale called Brakes Fluid especially for the club which is still sold today. The club's fanzine is entitled Windmill Wonderland. Since 2000 the club have had three supporters organisations. The first was The Friends of Leamington F.C. which was followed by the Leamington F.C. Supporters' Club. Currently there is a supporters' trust run by the fans named The Brakes Trust.
In June 2007, planning permission was granted for further development, intended to bring the ground to the standards required by the Southern League. This planned development includes a new covered stand on the west side of the ground (subsequently completed in 2010), and an extension to the clubhouse. In December 2007 terracing to the North Bank was completed and first used on 26 December for a league game against Romulus, which ended as a 1–1 draw.
In April 2008 the ground was awarded a 'D' grading making it suitable for use in the Southern League Premier Division. New terracing to the Harbury Lane end, consisting of six steps, was unveiled in a pre-season friendly against Conference South team Newport County on July 19, 2008.
Newton (61)
