It doesn't seem long since we wrote the last one of these articles, and perhaps it is a couple of weeks less than usual as the copy date has been brought forward because of Jeff and Rosie's move.  Sarah Haines and family have stepped into the breach and will be taking on the editors' visor and typewriter - so good luck to them!

Our optimism last time, forecasting a good result in the CompassSport Cup final was well placed, and it has given us a huge amount of pride to be Chair of the club at a point in time when we have won both the junior and full national inter-club competitions.  Who knows what makes the difference between winning and being runners up?  People having good runs on the day is the obvious answer (but that's on the same level as "we scored more goals than they did").  No, what I'm getting at is how we got ourselves into a position where we can challenge for the titles.  We're a big club - that helps.  The venue was near to home, meaning more people went than otherwise might have if it had been further away.  But more importantly, we have things like an active junior section, with development activities, regional junior squad and lots of encouraging parents; as a club, we demonstrate our encouragement by providing financial support to our juniors and teams in club and representative competition.  And crucially we have a Club Captain who is tireless in his efforts to put teams together, organise transport and the like, and generally encourage people to take part in team competitions.  So, whilst everyone who ran so well at Pillar Woods deserves a hearty congratulation, we would like to give special mention to Chris Burden, without whom we are certain that tremendous victory would not have been possible.  Thanks Chris.

This edition of the newsletter is going to be distributed at the Club picnic, and unfortunately we won't be there with you.  We do feel suitably sheepish about this, particularly as it's our last time in giving out the awards, and thanks to Chris for agreeing to step into our shoes to do the honours.  When we found out that the date clashed with the World Veteran Champs, to which several Aire members are making the trip, we did try to switch things around, but it just wasn't possible with other fixtures.  Elsewhere in this edition you'll find the details of who's won what from the Club League.  We will tell you who's won the Chair's trophies and why in the next edition.