Season 2009-10 marked a step up in standard for Woodstreet Football Club on a number of different fronts. There were many varied challenges to face players and staff on and off the pitch.

PROMOTION
Woodstreet achieved a first ever promotion to Division Two of the Liverpool Business Houses League. This was following the magnificent effort shown in 2008-09 when the lads won the Divisional Cup and were runners-up in the league by a mere three points.

Our first game was away at Lute Oakfield on 23rd August. The boys recorded a 3-0 victory with goals from Mark Sutton, Johnny Kilpatrick and Matty Owens.

If the first game was a marker to go by, then the season should have been fairly plain sailing. However, our second match against eventual champions, Larkspur, resulted in a 3-0 defeat and gave us an indicator of the standard we needed to be achieving to make serious progress in the league.

The Woodstreet principle is to always try and make things the best standard it can for its players, staff and followers. It is then down to players and alike to perform with the merit to meet the standard required to succeed.

CHANGES
The club moved to a new ground at Netherton Park. A brand new pitch with excellent changing facilities saw Woodstreet begin its home campaign with a 3-1 defeat of Santiago. In this match, Craig Pugh scored his first goal for the club and indeed the first goal to be scored on the new Netherton Park pitch. To quote the match report:

"A hopeful Santiago ball forward was met by Craig Pugh who in his own half sent a hopeful ball of his own toward the opponents goal. Such was the pace on Craig's clearance that the Santiago goalkeeper could only get a hand to it as the ball went into the goal for one nil Woodstreet."

We seemed to be gathering momentum and we took this onward into the County Cup. A trip to Southport to take on the Park Hotel from Division One of the Southport League took us into the unknown. Little was known about this team so we had to be focused. Historically, this cup had been a bit of a bogey competition so it was crucial that we made a decent effort in trying to progress. As things turned out, a good 5-3 victory was the outcome. Woodstreet veteran Joseph Brierley was hitting good form and smashed in four goals of the five we scored. One of the goals was good enough to win any game on its own and we turn to the match report again to provide the best illustration:

"Mark Pollard played a short ball to Joseph Brierley who was thirty yards from goal with their defence in front of him. From the right centre of the pitch and with one bounce allowed, Joseph sent a brilliant half-volleyed shot past the Park Hotel goalkeeper in to the left side of the goal. With no exaggeration, the goal was akin to Graeme Sharp's thunderbolt for Everton against Liverpool at Anfield in 1984."

Joseph had scored 9 goals in the first 7 games and was on course to set a goalscoring record for the club over the season given his form at the time. However, a freak knee accident which occurred playing for his Saturday team saw his season curtailed very prematurely. Such was the severity of the injury was that Joseph required knee reconstruction akin to that of Everton players, Phil Jagielka and Mikel Arteta. The season was to turn out to be one whereby an appalling injury list and indeed appalling injuries were to wreck the season.

IN TRIBUTE
October proved to be a difficult month for the club in all aspects. The death of former club administrator, Les Spencer, on 11th October brought great sadness to many who had been associated with Woodstreet in the early years. Les was heavily involved in the running of the club between 2004 and 2006 before illness lessened his involvement. As an individual, Les was an excellent organiser with a great sense of humour. He was taken from everyone who knew him at a tragically young age of 47.

LCFA INTERMEDIATE CUP
The County Cup was to provide a welcome escape from league action as we progressed through the rounds. Having despatched of Park Hotel in the first round, we took on Greystone from Division Three of the Liverpool Business Houses League at Netherton Park. In general it was a poor game of football which was ironically tinged with plenty of action.

Jamie Wynne opened the scoring early in the first half. Early in the second half, Greystone built on their first half equaliser by going 2-1 ahead early in the second half. Decisive action was now required to keep Woodstreet in the competition. Kev McGrady was brought out of goal and put up front. His contribution up top was to see him power home a header into the opponent's goal on 80 minutes. The game went to extra-time and a goal apiece for both teams saw the match head to penalties where our lads won 4-2.

Round 3 action took us up to Southport again to take on Stirling Athletic from the Southport Sunday Premier Division. It was a very tight game in difficult conditions at Carr Lane. It was decided with goals from Caffo and a last minute goal from Sutty. With injuries starting to kick in quite badly, this effort from the lads was quite magnificent.

Round 4 went all the way to penalties again. This time it was against Mackies Abbey from the Formers League. The match was end to end throughout. The scores were level at 2-2 at full-time with goals from Johnny Kilpatrick and Javier Gil. The first period of extra-time went against us as we found ourselves 4-2 down. It seemed like an uphill task. However, with great determination we battled our way back to dramatically level the scores at 4-4 with crucial goals again coming from Caffo and Sutty. Unfortunately though, it was all in vain as we bowed out 4-2 on penalties.

Historically, we have not done anything in the County Cup so it was nice to break a little hoodoo by beating opponents from higher divisions in different leagues and to also progress to the last 16 out of 123 teams who started.

A ROUND-UP OF THE SEASON
A club record was also set for the amount of goals we have scored in one game when we beat STL 9-4 in the League Cup.

Over the course of the season, we had SIX different keepers - Will Clark, Owen Cotterell, Kev McGrady, Michael Brierley, Andy Bott and Phil Evans. From the previous season when Will Clark was an ever-present, there was a great amount of instability in this position compared to the previous season.

The league season withered away with little to report on of any positivity. The 3-0 away win at Heart of the City was a very good footballing performance in a period of barren results and tumultuous change.

We finished 10th in Division Two. This is not good enough. Combined with an horrendous injury list and then some players proving that they are not good enough to play at the level of quality that is required, 2009-10 is pretty much a season to learn from but not one which can be looked back with any fondness.

Woodstreet Football Club will bounce back. With qualities of desire and determination, the club will again be a force to be reckoned with.