August 2009

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Manager Steve Munday has signed Andrew Winnery from Waltham Forest, who made his debut on Saturday, and Aaron Hunwicks from Redbridge.

Following their harsh dismissals against Tring Athletic Scott Borthwick will be suspended for one game and Johnny Offei for three. The suspensions begin on September 5th so both players will miss the FA Vase tie at Buckingham Town but Scott would be available in the event of a replay.

Mark Steadman and Matt Knight missed the Hullbridge Sports game due to unavailability and Danny Hopkins due to illness

Club physiotherapist Alan Richards reports that

Sam Dennis’s recent operation to remove a piece of damaged cartilage from his knee was successful and he is 5-6 weeks away from being available
Lee Pyne is training and we hope that he might be fit in approximately two weeks.
Matt Malton is still in rehabilitation following his cartilage operation.
Alf Dickinson has a groin strain and a muscular injury and has been unable so far to resume training
Richard Whiteman is back in training following a serious illness 
Mequel de Souza has a sciatic nerve injury
Mark Parker has a back injury which will keep him out for about 10 days
Mark Doyle has a recurrence of his ankle injury and will be out for 2-3 weeks

Barking Football Club has crashed into the twenty first century with a bang by launching it's own official Facebook page. The club's forward thinking committee believe the popular social networking site will help the club to create and maintain better communication between players and supporters old and new or anyone who has any link to the club.

It's easy for Facebook members to become a fan - simply log in to Facebook, look up our page and click on the 'become a fan' button. The page will be updated regularly and will contain news, opinions, appeals, pictures and anything fun to do with the club. Committee member Mark Harris said: 'We really hope this will help the club get our message out to a wider audience. We have a huge mountain to climb in regard to fundraising to meet the costs of having to pay the Council to play our first team, reserve and under 18 games at Mayesbrook this season. Looking beyond that we need to secure a lease on the ground to be able to take the club forward. If we can push our message out beyond our regular home support who do so much for the club already it will really help. This is a famous old club that still has a great name far beyond the local area, I think we can really benefit from this, especially when you consider we had a gentleman travel over from Japan to see one of our pre-season friendlies!

We got the idea when Press Secretary Derek Pedder informed us that a Barking legend from our Vicarage Field days, Reg Webster, had a facebook page. We thought if it's good enough for Reg it's good enough for us!'

Barking supporters will notice a convenient addition to the facilities at Mayesbrook as the club has this week taken delivery of a replacement toilet block. The block, which consists of separate mens and womens facilities will require some upgrading to meet league requirements but Mayesbrook regulars will agree it is a massive improvement on the portaloos that supporters have had to use for the past couple of seasons. The new block was delivered on Monday and will be connected up to mains services ready for use in the next week or so.

Below are some photos of the toilets being delivered - click on any image to enlarge:

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Photos by Mark Harris

Scott Borthwick and Johnny Offei will be suspended in due course following their dismissals against Tring Athletic

Club physiotherapist Alan Richards reports that
Mark Steadman missed the Tring game due to illness
Sam Dennis’s recent operation to remove a piece of damaged cartilage from his knee was successful. He is currently on crutches and should be able to resume light training in a few weeks.
Lee Pyne is doing light training and we hope that he will be fit in approximately three weeks.
Matt b has resumed light training following his cartilage operation.
Scott Walsh has medial ligament damage and has resumed light training
Alf Dickinson has a groin strain and a muscular injury which will take approximately ten days to settle down
Richard Whiteman is recovering from a serious illness 

FA Coach and Barking’s reserve team manager has provided a update regarding his latest community initiatives:

"This coming season I am proposing to organise pre-match events at our Reserves games for local youth teams. The event will also contribute to our 'Community activity' and send a message locally that the club is alive and kicking. I will lead the coaching events, these events will also be a useful tool for any 'budding' youth coaches to get involved under my supervision. I can also confirm that the Barking FC/FA skills event will take place this Tuesday 11th Aug 10am to 3pm. A few local clubs have expressed their interest and will be attending. Hopefully it will be as good as the previous event. "

Club physiotherapist Alan Richards reports on our injured players -

"Thankfully, no injury from last Saturday’s game. The latest on Sam Dennis is that he will very shortly be having an operation to remove a piece of damaged cartilage from his knee. He should be back within six to eight weeks following the operation. Mark Parker is now back in light training following his wrist injury. Lee Pyne resumed light training last week. Matt Malton has resumed light training following his cartilage operation."

On Saturday reserves manager Rob O’Brien took his squad, augmented by several members of the first team squad, to Harold Wood of the Essex Olympian League, formerly managed by Steve Munday, and played two games. We won the first 4-0 with two goals from Jovan LARONDE and one each from Dan COSSINGTON and Dale COLEMAN. 

Several of our players featured in both games and there was some understandable tiredness in the second one which we lost 4-1. Our scorer was Dale COLEMAN again and three of Wood’s goals were scored by another great ex Barking player Steve Portway. In addition to the players named above, our squad also included, among others, Simon Stone, Tom Sargeant, Danny Gillard, Dean Davis and Liam Jones.

Manager Steve Munday said that he and coach Neil Day are very pleased that all except one of last season’s squad have signed for this season together with eight new players so far.

Some of the injuries listed below are attributable to having had to play some pre season matches on long grass when the council had failed to cut the grass after taking over responsibility for ground maintenance from the club, for which we are charged a fee per match. In addition to the injuries listed by Alan, Richard Whiteman is currently recovering from illness.

Alan Richards, club physiotherapist, has provided an overview of the injured players at Barking:

Matt Malton: Has started his rehabilitation programme following his recent cartilage operation, and is expected to start jogging within the next seven days.

Lee Pyne: Making good progress with the medial and lateral ligament damage that he suffered in the second pre–season friendly against Grays Athletic. Lee should start light running in the next four to five days.

Mark Parker: Currently awaiting a second opinion on the result of x-rays on his injured wrist. However, Mark has reported that his wrist is feeling better and has been given strengthening exercises.

Sam Dennis: Awaiting the results of an MRI scan on his knee that was carried out on July 27th.