Eastbourne Borough's 2024 in review - from Great Escape to Big Promotion Push

We will start with a look back at the first half of the year and that escape from the drop - as seen through the eyes of Adam Murray.

The club’s tally of managers – during 60 years – is still in single figures. All have made their mark, and Murray can safely clamber up on the shoulders of Garry Wilson and Tommy Widdrington. Murray has greater responsibilities now than they had – and wears them remarkably well.

The Herald sat down with Murray one year on from his appointment – and reeled back the story to his arrival at the Lane. The background had been a half-year like no other: Simon Leslie’s purchase of the club, the setting out of hugely ambitious dreams and plans.

New manager Mark Beard awas rguably given an impossible task in a short time. Beard, a fine coach and decent, hard-working manager, had to stitch together a squad from scratch. Their ability, and particularly their experience, was not up to the demands of National South. Injuries dogged Borough and results were poor.

Beard and Borough parted company, and Murray arrived.

Herald: Adam, 12 months ago you were working happily with Darrell Clarke at Cheltenham Town. So when the call came through, to sound out your interest in the Eastbourne job – what was your first reaction?

“It was actually a No! I was in a really good place – I had a big challenge on at Cheltenham. We were picking results up and moving forward. But then after speaking with Simon (Leslie) a few times, I realised what a good project it was, and I decided to jump in!

“I don’t mind saying that it was one of the toughest challenges I’ve ever had. We were six or seven points from safety, which was a big gap. It was a big gamble for me, career wise!

“But the vision was always bigger than that (simply avoiding relegation). Simon’s vision was: if you can keep us up, I will give you the tools to try to get out of the division at the other end! That’s been the plan, and it’s been a whirlwind of a 12 months. I’ve enjoyed every second.”

The squad that you inherited was probably not going to keep the club up?

“Well, it’s really tough in those situations. It’s easy to say that the quality of the players wasn’t good enough. But when you’re in those moments, it’s the mental and the emotional side that is the biggest challenge. And when I came in I needed to change that.

“And when we achieved that, we saw the biggest uplift in performance. We needed to have some additions to the squad, and I think we recruited well.”

And the recruitment process has never paused?

“The players you need to get you out of a relegation battle are not necessarily the ones you need to get you out of the division! It was a really tricky scenario, but we managed to pull it off, and all credit goes to the players that were here and are still here – and everyone involved. They were dark times.”

Your first game in charge, you got a point at Torquay with a stoppage-time goal! Were there other milestones and turning points?

“You expect a bit of bounce when a new manager comes in, but we didn’t really get that. A point at Torquay but then we weren’t getting results. I had to change a few things. The turning point was Hampton away, where although we lost in stoppage time, we had played a different way and played really well.

“Then we lost Leone Gravata to York, a massive turning point. We brought in Yahya Bamba, we were taking risks in games because we needed wins and not draws, and the next turning point was actually the 5-1 defeat to Maidstone. We had two sent off and they smashed us. But we came into the dressing room and we knew everything, every decision, every bit of luck had been against us.

“I told the players – if we can do that with nine men, what can we do with 11 men? From that moment, we kicked on, and nobody looked back!”

Adam’s team did indeed show remarkable determination, enterprise, energy. But National South status, we thought, would require a final-day victory at formidable Braintree Town. In the event, other results meant Borough were safe – but they went to Essex and won anyway! Players, supporters and management cavorted on the pitch. They had pulled off the Great Escape.

Now – the 24-25 campaign so far…

After survival was secured with just 48 hours to spare, the squad and supporters took a three-month breather – and then all of us, insatiable and incorrigible, returned to the action!

As the new season opened, supporters with a tenner to spare could have backed the Sports at around 7-1 for the title. Some even thought those odds were a bargain, but the betting companies are never far wrong. (“Have you ever seen a bookie on a pushbike?” - as my elderly uncle used to say, many decades ago!). Every fan, manager and club chairman enters a season, at least with hopes, and some with very serious ambitions.

And so it has panned out: the relegation places will go to four clubs from eight. The mid-table half-dozen are looking comfortable, and going nowhere. And the top eight – ten if you include Farnborough and Tonbridge Angels – are limbering up for a tilt at promotion.

The Sports remain unbeaten at home in the league, a record matched only by leaders Torquay United – although the six drawn games at Priory Lane represent a dozen points maddeningly given away. Murray and his staff know there is work to do: scoring the perfect goal is always the coach’s dream. Although the Courtney Clarke winner last weekend came pretty close. But if it gets them to the top of National South, Murray and Matt Green will happily take a freak deflection off the centre-half’s backside…

But let us take a lightning trip through the season so far:

A RASH OF SUMMER SIGNINGS

By mid-August the squad was close to complete. Key players like Pierce Bird, Siya Ligendza and Yahaya Bamba, drafted in to join the New Year survival campaign, were now joined by proven strikers George Alexander and Alfie Pavey, by terrier midfielder Dom Odusanya, playmaker Michael Klass, and by a clutch of exciting attackers including Brayden Johnson, Jayden Davis and Courtney Clarke. Pretty impressive - or as Lord Byron almost wrote: “Look on our squad, Ye Mighty, and despair!”

The team-building did hit a couple of snags: a potential goalkeeper (from Hampton and Richmond Borough) picking up a long-term injury, and nagging injuries to club captain Brad Barry. But Joe Wright has impressively grown into the goalkeeping role, and Barry remains central day-by-day to the squad and the esprit de corps.

BUILDING MOMENTUM

The first ten games saw just two defeats – an underpowered 0-2 at Farnborough and a very tight 0-1 exit from the FA Cup against Boreham Wood. Then a mixed October: a quite feeble 2-4 defeat at Chelmsford City and, later in the month, a 1-3 implosion at Hampton and Richmond. But also three successes, each distinctively different: an ugly 1-0 at Welling United, a pleasing 1-1 from the long trip to Torquay, and a triumphant 2-1 win over Boreham Wood.

The scorelines were mostly tight, but with George Alexander netting in seven successive matches, the Sports were building consistency and building belief.

INTO THE WINTER

November was packed with action – eight matches – and a bit inconsistent. Nine goals in two games, against Hemel and Welling: football with the handbrake off. But on a long haul to Chippenham Town, Borough might as well have stayed on the bus, losing 0-3 to very ordinary opposition. But this Eastbourne team never stays down for long: a thrilling Senior Cup win, 2-1 at the Dripping Pan, set up an intelligent whole-team FA Trophy victory at Dorking Wanderers. The joy of on-loan keeper Max Metcalfe reading Jason Prior’s attempted dink from the penalty spot will stay imprinted in the memory… A 1-3 defeat at Maidstone United was less memorable, although on the night the Sports could genuinely have won.

And so to December and the festive season: ignore a hurricane-driven Trophy defeat at Boreham Wood, and relish instead the six-match unbeaten run which has seen Borough enter 2025 in good shape – and with everything to play for…​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​