AFC Totton
AFC TOTTON vs GLOUCESTER CITY
Southern League Premier Division South
Promotion Play-Off Final
VENUE:
Snows Stadium, Salisbury Road, Totton, Southampton SO40 2RW
Monday 05 May 2025 | Kick-Off 3:00pm
This match is all-ticket and has already SOLD-OUT.
SO, IT ALL COMES DOWN TO THIS. After more than 3,870 minutes each of football in 2024/25, The Stags and The Tigers will face-off for a third time this season in the Southern League Premier Division South’s Promotion Play-Off Final with a place in next season’s National League South at stake.
But how close it came to all being so very different. Just 20 minutes into their respective semi-finals, Dorchester Town and Walton & Hersham were seemingly sailing on course to meet each other in a Play-Off final that would have taken place at the Elmbridge Xcel Sports Hub in Surrey, having both established early two-goal leads on a balmy Wednesday night that will live long in the memory of everyone who witnessed events at either venue.
Back in SO40, still toiling at 0-2 down when the fourth official put the board up to indicate 11 minutes of stoppage time at the end of the game, The Stags gained new self-belief within 60 seconds when substitute Scott Rendell halved the deficit against the 10-man Magpies from the penalty spot. Seven minutes later, Tony Lee fired home a rebound from Ben Seymour’s parried effort to level the scores, and then the prolific striker sent the home crowd into pandemonium by racing clear of a worn-out Dorchester defence to latch onto Craig Tanner’s exquisite long pass and steer the ball into the bottom-left corner of the net… and that’s only half the story! Visit our Play-Off Semi-Final Match Report to read the rest…
GLOUCESTER CITY – THEIR SEASON SO FAR:
Having dropped from the National League North at the end of last season, The Tigers were reshuffled into the Southern League Premier Division South, and by the time they visited Totton on Saturday 19 October 2024, they had already established themselves as the division’s early pacesetters with eight wins and two draws from their opening 11 league fixtures.
By then, Gloucester City had bowed out of the Emirates FA Cup courtesy of a Second Round Qualifying replay at home to Gosport Borough, but they progressed in the Isuzu FA Trophy thanks to a penalty shoot-out win at home to Wimborne Town; it was the Warwickshire-based Coleshill Town of the Northern Premier League Division One Midlands who subsequently ended their interest at the First Round Proper stage by triumphing 3-2 at the TigerTurf.
A one-all draw at the Snows Stadium was no doubt seen as a decent away point, but when the two sides met again in Gloucestershire on the dawn of February, Gloucester had taken only 25 points from a possible 45 in the interim. The stand-out results during that 15-game sequence include a 4-4 draw at Walton & Hersham and a bizarre Nightmare Before Christmas defeat at relegation-battlers Plymouth Parkway, for whom on-loan Exeter City striker Mitchel Beardmore scored all six goals in a 6-0 rout, before immediately leaving the Devonians to join National League South side Bath City for the rest of the campaign.
Gloucester recovered quickly, though, beating Swindon Supermarine 3-1 at home on Boxing Day to kickstart a run of 12 league games without defeat that included their hosting of the goalless stalemate with The Stags. But half of those results were draws, and when they eventually lost 1-2 at home to Walton & Hersham on 01 March, subsequent defeats at Hungerford Town and Havant & Waterlooville must have had the City faithful looking nervously over their shoulders at the Play-Off-chasing pack – The Hawks prime among them, ready to swoop into the top five at Gloucester’s expense.
But, despite a single-goal loss at Chertsey Town on 12 April, home wins against the twin Towns of Hanwell and Tiverton, plus a 7-0 mauling of Marlow and a repeat of their 3-1 success over ‘Marine, saw Gloucester seal fourth place in the table with a game to spare.
That all appeared to be for nought, though, when they found themselves trailing by two goals just 12 minutes into their Play-Off semi-final in Surrey on Wednesday night. Strikes from Dawid Rogalski and Bobby Taylor had given Walton & Hersham a dream start on their 3G surface at the Elmbridge Xcel Sports Hub. But Joe Hanks pulled Gloucester City back into the tie on 21 minutes, and midway through the second half, Ed Williams levelled it at 2-2. There were no further goals in the remaining 20-odd minutes plus stoppages, nor in the half-hour of extra-time, so a penalty shoot-out was required to determine who would be braving the Bank Holiday traffic to make the trip down to the south coast on Monday.
The Tigers went first and demonstrated nerves of steel to convert all of their first four spot-kicks. Walton & Hersham substitute Wayne Ridgley then fired his effort over the crossbar to hand the visitors the advantage, and Ed Williams stepped up to become the hero, tucking the ball away to send Gloucester City into the final.
AFC TOTTON – LAST FIVE:
Tiverton Town (h) | SLPDS | Won 2-1
Basingstoke Town (a) | SLPDS | Drew 0-0
Winchester City (h) | SLPDS | Won 2-0
Frome Town (a) | SLPDS | Won 4-0
Dorchester Town (h) | SLPDS PO/S-F | Won 4-3 (aet)
GLOUCESTER CITY – LAST FIVE:
Chertsey Town (a) | SLPDS | Lost 0-1
Marlow (h) | SLPDS | Won 7-0
Swindon Supermarine (a) | SLPDS | Won 3-1
Gosport Borough (h) | SLPDS | Drew 2-2
Walton & Hersham | SLPDS | Drew 2-2 (aet)*
*Gloucester City won 5-3 on penalties
Ethan Taylor prepares to strike on the Gloucester City goal during the one-all Southern League Premier Division South draw between The Stags and The Tigers at the Snows Stadium in October 2024.
PREVIOUS MEETINGS IN 2024/25:
Not much to report, in all honesty. Both of the league meetings between these two sides ended in draws, with Brandon Smalley’s first-half opener for The Tigers at the Snows Stadium in October being cancelled out by a vicious Ethan Taylor strike shortly before the hour mark of an eventual one-all stalemate.
The two goalkeepers were the stars in a return match of few chances at the TigerTurf Stadium on 01 February. Jared Thompson got down well to prevent Craig Tanner opening his AFC Totton scoring account from a free-kick towards the end of the game, and Ryan Gosney made a crucial last-gasp catch on his goal lilne when substitute striker Kieran Phillips was afforded a free header from six yards during the dying embers of the encounter in Gloucestershire.
STAGS RADIO:
Monday’s Southern League Premier Division South Promotion Play-Off Final is already a sell-out. If you were unable to get a ticket, you can still follow all the action as it unfolds on StagsRadio. The pre-match pre-amble will begin at 2:45pm and LIVE, full-match commentary will commence at 3:00pm. To join Benjy Rees and Joshua Cole for a potentially historic episode in the history of AFC Totton, go to the profile page on our official X account and look for the Spaces link in the main feed.
By Ben Rochey-Adams
Image courtesy of Harvey Gerring
