Wadham Lodge

Wadham Lodge FC was a non-league football club who were based at the Wadham Lodge sports ground  Walthamstow in north east London who ended life in 2019 as Leyton Athletic FC when they resigned from the Eastern Counties League.

In the summer of 2008, Waltham Forest FC, former tenants of the Wadham Lodge ground, departed to share Cricklefield Stadium with Ilford FC so Martin Fitch, the former Forest assistant manager, decided to form the new club, Wadham Lodge FC.

Lodge began their life playing in the Essex Business Houses League, finishing in third place and progressing to the Essex Olympian League for the 2009-10 season, where they finished as Division Three champions.

The 2010-11 campaign saw the club win the Division Two title. The run continued as after a year of consolidation Wadham Lodge ended the 2012-13 season as Division One runners-up and winning promotion.

After ending in fourth place in 2014-15 Wadham Lodge were promoted to the Essex Senior League where they finished in a credible sixth place in their debut season under manager and chairman Neil Day.

The side ended 2016-17 in fifteenth followed by nineteenth the following season before new owners changed the club name to Leyton Athletic. The team finished bottom of the table in 2018-19 under manager Jason Ngandu.

A dispute with the owners at Wadham Lodge saw the club evicted from the ground as the team were relegated to the Step 6 Division One South of the Eastern Counties League. Furqon Nur Karim was listed as manager but the club resigned before playing a game as they were unable to secure a suitable home ground.

My visits

Leyton Pennant 0 Uxbridge 1 (Saturday 22nd April 2000) Isthmian League Division One (att: approx 80)

Click here to explore my experience.

Wadham Lodge 2 Barkingside 0 (Wednesday 14^th September 2016) Essex Senior League (att: 32)

As ever, matches were at a premium on a Wednesday night within the M25. It was a beautiful late summers evening and I wanted to do something with it as I was off work the following morning. My tube ride started on a packed service to Wembley Park as Tottenham Hotspur were at home to Monaco in the Champions League at the national stadium.

It was great to see the excitement of young fans in the Spurs kits. It brought back memories of my youth when I was falling in love with the game. However, I had what I considered more interesting fish to fry a few miles nearer Hotspur’s traditional home.

My tube ride eventually deposited me at Walthamstow Central, from where I boarded the 215 bus to the Brettenham Road stop, from where it was just a short walk up Brookscroft and then Kitchener Road to the entrance of Wadham Lodge.

The 3G pitches and 5-a-side courts were in good use as I passed then through the car park on the approach to the main ground, where I paid £8 admission, which included the match programme.

The ground was an impressive one, even if it had seen better days, with low covered terraces behind each goal, a covered seated stand on the near side with open standing either side. The far side of the pitch had a couple of steps of open terrace along with both benches. This is where I headed once I’d bought a cup of tea.

I was familiar with the verbal antics of ‘Side boss Gus Gulfer from a visit to Cricklefield the previous season. His counterpart Neil Day turned this into what I described in my scribbles of the time as “The Battle of the Whinging Benches”.

The nearside linesmen was doing his very best to keep order as either bench looked to wind each other up and have a go at every decision the referee made. A lone bloke further along muttering to himself complimented the scene perfectly.

On eighteen minutes Lodge took the lead from what I considered a dubious penalty decision. Mr Gulfer definitely agreed with me! Andrea Mantovani stroked home the spot kick to make it 1-0. The pitch was grassy but hard and bobbly, not that it deterred Barkingside’s tricky pair of Jason Fontaine and Michael Ademiliyu who impressed.

The game had been littered with stoppages for injuries, which didn’t help the continuity. It gave the respective benches plenty of scope for advice. Before half time the excellent ref Wally James decided he’d heard enough and gave both managers and assistants his version of events.

The midges decided that my chubby flesh constituted a tasty supper, so I moved back round to the main side before the interval for another warm drink and to read the programme in the seats.

After the break Lodge put in a decent shift and doubled their lead nine minutes in as they broke away with Vladut Gabriel Sighiartau being put through to round keeper Sam Roach and roll the ball into the empty net.

Lodge were never under any real threat as the game continued and they racked up their second home win of the season. I’d departed just before full time to catch the 97 bus back into Walthamstow. I nearly jumped out to try beers in the attractive looking Ye Olde Rose & Crown but decided to leave it for another day.

Instead I took the Overground service to Hackney Downs, from where I took the walkway to Hackney Central and a beer in The Cock Tavern on Mare Street before heading back to Kingsbury via West Hampstead to end an enjoyable evening looking at the glum faces of the Spurs fans in JJ Moons in Kingsbury.