2012–13 Eastleigh F.C. season

The 2012–13 season will be the 33rd season in the history of Eastleigh, being known as Eastleigh F.C. The club is competing in the Conference South for the 8th consecutive season, which started in the 2005–06 season following reorganisation of clubs in the 6th Level of English football. This will also be the first full season under the ownership of Bridle Insurance Limited, who bought the club in November of the previous season.

Season commentary

Pre-Season (May to July)
At the end of the 2011-12 season, the club announced the pitch at the Silverlake Stadium was to be renovated. Pitch specialists Speedcut Contractors Ltd have been called in to re-seed the stadium's pitch, as well as the club's training ground on Lower Hardmoor. Speedcut are known for undertaking the same work at Brentford F.C last year.

Soon after the end of the 2011-12, the club announced their first signing of the pre-season, with striker Marvin Williams joining from Salisbury City on a 2-year contract. Marvin’s claim to fame is his cousin is former England, Arsenal and Crystal Palace legend, Ian Wright. Williams started his career at Millwall as a trainee, and has also played for Yeovil Town, Brentford and Swedish club Östersunds FK.

On 4 May, the club announced 4 players were being released. Ian Herring, Richard Gillespie, Scott Rogers and Jamie Brown will leave the club. Chris Flood, who is contracted for the 2012-13 season, has been transfer listed. Several days later it was further announced that young defender Ben Wilson had been released, and long standing midfielder Danny Smith transfer listed.

The club's second signing of the pre-season was announced on 8 May as left sided midfielder Dale Binns from newly promoted side Woking. Binns started his career at Tottenham Hotspur, and has also played over 200 times for current Isthmian League Premier Division side Hendon, scoring 41 times. Unfortunately, the club jumped the gun on the announcement, as following this the player himself denied the deal had been concluded. Ultimately, this did not affect Binns joining the club.

The club's third signing came in the form of Boreham Wood’s defender Osei Sankofa, who agreed a one-year deal. Sanofa was followed by Glen Southam from Dover Athletic  and Jai Reason from Braintree Town. These signings announced in May 2012 were in addition to the signing of 19-year-old goalkeeper Jack Dovey from Southampton on a 2-year deal. The signing followed Dovey spending the year on loan with Eastleigh during the 2011-12 season. Shortly after, the club confirmed striker Lee Peacock had signed a 1-year extension to his contract, to the end of the 2012-13 season.

Further departures were announced in June 2012, when youngster Jordace Holder-Spooner left Eastleigh to sign for rivals Basingstoke Town. An extended agreement was announced on 15 June with sponsor 911uk.com, which is a Porsche enthusiast website, to continue the sponsorship for the 2012-13 season, which continues the club's drive over the last 6 months to increase and maintain the number of sponsors. This was followed by an extension to the sponsorship agreement with local motordealer Snows Motor Group, and the unveil of Lawshield as sponsors for the South Stand (opposite the clubhouse end) at the Silverlake Stadium for the 2012-2013 season.

The sole signing announcement in June was of highly regarded Scottish striker Craig McAllister from Newport County. McAllister had previously played for Eastleigh back in 2001 and 2004.

The signing of McAllister was followed in July by ex-Eastleigh Goalkeeper, 41-year-old Wayne Shaw, who returned to the club following his release from rivals Sutton United, and will double up as number 2 to Jack Dovey, and as goalkeeping coach. Shortly after, the club announced the signing on a long term contract of 22-year-old striker/right winger Moses Ademola who joined from 2011-12 Conference South champions Woking. Ademola managed 21 goals in 71 league appearances during his stay at Woking.

The Spitfires made their 10th signing of the summer when the club announced Staines Town left-back Adam Everitt had joined the club. The 30-year-old previously played for Eastleigh in the 2007/08 season.

August to October
Shortly before the start of the season, on 17 August, it was announced that Braintree Town young midfielder Callum McNish had joined the club on an initial one-month loan deal.

On Tuesday 11 September, following 3 successive league defeats, the last 4-0 away to newly promoted side Billericay Town, the club announced following a meeting  between manager Ian Baird and Stewart Donald, it was agreed that Ian Baird would leave the club with immediate effect. Baird's replacement was announced the following day as ex-Stevenage Borough manager Richard Hill. Hill has also had spells assisting John Gregory at both Wycombe Wanderers and QPR, and Brian Little at Aston Villa. He has also been employed as assistant manager at Gillingham, Tranmere Rovers and Northampton Town. Hill has been positive since his appointment as manager, still targeting promotion after Eastleigh's disappointing start to the season. The new manager began with a good 4 - 2 win in his first match, at home in the league to Maidenhead United.

On 20 September 2012, the club announced the club captain Daryl McMahon had been sold to league rivals Dover Athletic, following 2 failed bids. Glen Southam subsequently inherited the club captaincy.

Eastleigh were looking for a new assistant manager following the departure of Shaun Wilkinson on 2 October. His replacement was later announced as Guy Butters, who most recently had been manager of non-league Winchester City. Wilkinson was followed out of the club shortly afterwards by player-coach Wayne Shaw  and defender Gary Elphick. The later left due to Richard Hill having to reduce the size of the playing squad before he can bring in new faces of his own. Marvin Williams departed in late October, as Hill continued to reshape the squad, and create funds within the current budget. Williams was sold to Sutton United.

November to January
A press release surfaced on 1 November to announce that there had been an improvement in the finances of the club. Former club chairman Paul Murray had agreed to write-off loans totalling £70,000, and convert them into donations. In a similar move, current shareholder Stewart Donald has done the same with loans totalling £190,000.

On Tuesday 20 November, the club's home league match vs Truro City was called off for the second time, due to a waterlogged pitch. The match was previously called off a month previous due to the financial troubles Truro have experienced recently.

The club announced on 27 November that they had created a new partnership with local Premier League club Southampton. The partnership will see some of Southampton’s fixtures in the Barclays U21 Premier League staged at Eastleigh's Silverlake Stadium, and will also see the two clubs’ youth programmes share ideas on how to develop local youth football.

On the same day, the club also announced the departure of joint top scorer Moses Ademola to league rivals Dover Athletic. Ademola, who signed for Eastleigh in the summer on a long term contract, is the second first team player to have been sold to Dover in the 4 months since the start of the season. Admeola was ultimately replaced on 13 December with journeyman striker Richard Pacquette, who had been released on a free transfer from Bromley earlier that week. Earlier during the week, the club's home match vs Truro City was postponed for the third time. The latest 2 postponements due to a frozen pitch, and the first time due to the financial problems of Truro. The match has been rearranged to be played on Tuesday 22 January 2013.

On 20 December, concerning the situation regarding the stadium, the club announced that an offer had previously been made to the board at ‘Ten Acre Holdings’ (the current owners). Following discussions the board of Ten Acre Holdings felt that they were willing to accept the offer presented to them as long as the remaining shareholders also felt a desire to sell the ground at this stage. On this basis a full shareholders meeting was called and the outcome was that a clear large majority were in favour of accepting the offer and that the sale of the freehold should progress.

Ten Acre Holdings had been set up to safeguard the club and enable it to get back on a sound financial footing, which it has achieved over recent years. The proposed purchase is intended to provide the football club with the strongest possible opportunity to continue its progression.

During late December, Richard Hill mentioned his intention for the club to move towards full-time training. The club have twice gone down the road of daytime training before, most recently at the start of the 2011/12 season. On that occasion it was mainly youngsters involved as part of the club's player development programme. But this time Hill will be working exclusively with the first-team squad, where possible. This is due to many of the players having jobs in addition to playing for the club, where they are not in the financial position to be able to give up these jobs to train full-time.

The changing nature of the first team squad continued in January 2013, with the transfer listing of defenders Osei Sankofa and long serving player Tom Jordan, and the return to Gillingham of on-loan goalkeeper Ross Flitney who was recalled. Striker Richard Pacquette was also released after spending just under a month at the club, scoring once from two appearances. This has been offset by the arrival of defender Alex Lacey from Conference National side Luton Town on a one-month loan deal, and the permanent signing of former Hereford United, Northampton Town and Luton Town central defender Dean Beckwith, who has arrived on a contract until the end of the 2013/14 season. Another defender was also signed in Chris Todd from Forest Green Rovers on 10 January on an 18-month contract. Todd has previously played for Exeter City and Torquay United.

February onwards
Given the buildup in the number of defenders by the end of January, long serving defender Tom Jordan was released after 4 and a half years with the club. Jordan was quickly signed by ex-Eastleigh manager Paul Doswell at Sutton United.

Squad

Coaching staff

Transfers

Statistics

Appearances and goals

Accounts for all competitions up to & including match vs Welling United on 27 April 2013.
Last updated 23:06, 03 May 2013.

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Top scorers

Accounts for all competitions up to & including match vs Dover Athletic on 4 May 2013.
Last updated 12:54, 11 May 2013.

Disciplinary record

Accounts for all competitions up to & including match vs Welling United on 27 April 2013.
A red card resulting from 2 yellow cards in 1 match is recorded as 2 yellow cards, and 1 under 2 yellow cards column

Captains
Accounts for all competitions up to & including match vs Dover Athletic on 4 May 2013.

League position

League table

Results summary

Matches

Pre-season

Conference South

Playoffs

FA Cup

Hampshire Senior Cup

FA Trophy

References

Category:Eastleigh F.C. seasons
Eastleigh F.C.