The club had received a number of expressions of interest and applications from local candidates to fill the vacant 2nd team post, but have made the decision to ask last season’s promotion winning 3rd team managers “the Dan’s” Macdonald and English, to step up and run the clubs reserve team for the coming 2018/19 season.

The Dan’s will be assisted by Tom Read, who continues his role as assistant manager and will also be looking to make another addition to the management team in the very near future.

First team manager Mark Moore spoke about his excitement in promoting managers from within “Since Dan and Dan have come to the club they’ve worked tirelessly in pursuit of improving the standards of how things are done, both on and off the field. The opportunity to promote them is one we’re looking forward to, as it means a chance for some of the successful young squad of last years 3rd team are playing at a higher level, which is ultimately closer to the first team and can only serve well for the football club”

The Dan’s said this about the appointment “The Reserve Team role is one of the hardest at the club and we both wanted to make sure we could really commit to everything that is needed to run a successful team in a tough NS1 league. The support structure needs to be right and we have asked Tom Read to remain as part of the team (Tom is currently completing his various coaching badges). We are also looking to add a further member to the coaching team to assist us with training (anyone interested in this role should contact the club directly). The reserve team already has some great footballers who we both know well and trust, and we want to integrate these lads with some of the excellent young players that did very well last season and are good enough to play at this standard. We want to keep the current crop of proven players we have, make some good additions and build a team that is extremely competitive in the league/cups, but our priority is to provide a platform for young and ambitious players with the right ability, to play their way into our First Team (Hellenic Premier)”.

The appointment of Dan English and Dan MacDonald has paved the way for more managerial changes within the club.

Chris Little & youth team manager Tom Shaw will run the clubs 3rd team who will play in the Stroud and District Division One after promotion last year.

Grady Izzat will continue to runs the clubs 4th team.

All teams are actively recruiting new (or former) players, to play at Stroud League, Northern Senior 1 & have aspirations to play at Hellenic Premier level”.

The club starts pre-season training at Saw Mills End (first team ground- Corinium Ave, GL4 3DG) on Wednesday 20th June at 6:30pm. All new and former players are welcome to attend this and future sessions. Alternatively, get in touch with longlevens AFC on Facebook or Twitter.