May 22, 2011

AFC Wimbledon Reaches Football League: Nine years ago, the fans of Wimbledon FC lost their soccer team to Milton Keynes in a franchise move. Saturday, a team that fans formed 12 days later from an open tryout at the bottom rung of English soccer -- the equivalent of a beer league softball team -- reached the Football League. A shootout goal by Danny Kedwell put AFC Wimbledon over Luton Town. "It only took nine years," chanted the 6,000 fans who traveled to the game.

posted by rcade to soccer at 09:00 AM - 4 comments

This is one of the greatest stories in sports. Joe McGinness should do another soccer book on this club.

posted by rcade at 10:07 AM on May 22, 2011

I agree with the unadulterated greatness of this.

A-F-C Wimbledon! A-F-C Wimbledon!

posted by owlhouse at 02:20 AM on May 23, 2011

It's brilliant, and I say this as someone with no love for the Crazy Gang.

Given the fan base, AFCW might have risen even faster by following the standard template of having one or two local wealthies back the club, but that's the template that lost them their original club.

I think a commenter on that story makes a good point about consolidation: AFCW's wage bill will likely be the smallest in League Two, but they'll also have the smallest ground, and the collective ownership will have to take stock of the club's ambitions and what's needed to achive them. The pyramid gets increasingly steep at this point, but I hope they stick around.

posted by etagloh at 02:49 AM on May 23, 2011

They're a nice squad, having watched them on Fox Soccer when they got 90th and 120th minute stoppage-time goals to beat Ebbsfleet United in an FA Cup 1st round replay. (Open disclosure: I'm part of the Internet group My Football Club, which owns part of the club, so it was a painful loss.) They almost faced MK Dons in the second round, but the Dons got eliminated. That might have been a war in the stands.

I note: GBP40 (about $65) was stiff for a Conference National final.

BTW, Ian Holloway may have been only partially correct: I think FA (and Prem) officials may have been beamed down from the Planet Zarf.

posted by jjzucal at 12:42 AM on May 25, 2011

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