History of football in the Sunderland Sasscos leagues

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Last updated: 14 September, 2007

About Sassco.

This website is designed and maintained by Davinder Sangha. The 6-a-side league is organised by Davinder Sangha, with assistance from Michael Ames and Peter Newby. Occasional help is given by Chris Taylor and Anthony Mouat.
The 11-a-side team is organised by Davinder Sangha, with key assistance from Dave Gourlay, Mark Muers, David Staples and Chris Dixon along with Stephen Lewis, Mark Middlemiss and Mickey Donkin.

Sassco - the name - was invented by John Hunt to encompass the various projects that the league had. Originally there was only the Tuesday football league, known as the Sunderland Football League, but since 1999, there have been leagues played on Wednesday and Thursday evenings and also an 11-a-side team made up of key players in the various 6-a-side teams.

All the teams and leagues are based at the Community Sports Complex, more commonly known as the Downhill astroturf, located in North Sunderland. The overall control of the complex is with Amanda Cantle (based at the Seaburn Centre), but the complex is managed on a day-to-day basis by Peter Newby and Michael Ames.

Timeline 1999 to present
November 1999	Sunderland Football League (SFL) formed.
December 1999	SFL actively look to recruit local 6-a-side teams for the League competition. Nine teams enter the competition.
February 2000	SFL Season 1 kicks off. Herrenknecht (pre-cursor to today’s Sassco team) and Durham play out a 2-2 draw in the opening game
April 2000	Sporting Redhouse are crowned Champions after a 4-2 win over second placed Herrenknecht. Sporting also win the Challenge Cup with an emphatic 9-1 victory over surprise finalists, University.
May 2000	SFL Season 2 kicks off with 17 teams. Herrenknecht again open, this time with a 3-2 defeat against Royal Mail.
July 2000	Herrenknecht, despite being mid-table, defeat Sporting Redhouse, their first defeat for nearly sixty games in this and other competitons. The defeat allows Royal Mail to gain the initiative within the League.
September 2000	Royal Mail win Season 2 by two points over Sporting Redhouse.
October 2000	Royal Mail defeat Sporting and Groundwork to reach the Challenge Cup Final where they defeat PCB on penalties to take the Double.
November 2000	SFL Season 3 kicks off with 18 entrants in two divisions.
May 2001	Team Coulson win Division 2 with a 100% record.
July 2001	Herrenknecht stave off relegation with a last day 6-1 win over Durham. Sunderland Select win the League with an eleven point lead over Royal Mail.
April 2001	Royal Mail retain the Cup after a 1-0 win over Herrenknecht in the Semi Finals and a 2-1 win over Tyne Port in the Final.
July 2001	Major changes as the SFL League is renamed the Sassco League (Six-A-Side-Soccer-COmpany a name devised by John Hunt). The League also gains a sponsor and is renamed the JDI Consulting Football League Season 4 in the process. Herrenknecht are subsequently renamed as Sassco.co.uk FC. Nineteen teams enter in two divisions.
November 2001	Sassco.co.uk win their first ever trophy in the Challenge Cup after a 4-0 win over Sporting Redhouse in the Final
January 2002	Sunderland Select win a new competition, the Super League with a 2-1 win over Crown Electrics (previously known as PCB).
April 2002	Toddys comfortably win Division 2. Sunderland Select win the League with a nine point lead over Royal Mail, who bow out of the League.
May 2002	Sassco.co.uk form an 11-a-side team made up of various players within the 6-a-side League.
June 2002	AGUK sponsor the League which is now in it’s fifth season. A reduction in teams sees both divisions merged into one containing eleven teams. Sassco.co.uk take part in their first 11-a-side game – an 8-1 defeat against Sporting Club of Sunderland.
June 2002	Sassco.co.uk gain their first win after two defeats. A 3-2 win over Hogan’s after being 2-0 down.
August 2002	Sassco.co.uk kick off in the Saturday morning Dunsford Business Supplies Tyne & Wear League with a 5-2 win over Low Fell.
December 2002	Sassco.co.uk after deciding to withdraw from the Tyne & Wear League, reverse the decision when players from within the 11-a-side team, fund the astronomical costs of the League (upwards of £30 per month).
March 2004	Sunderland Select defeat Crown in the Final of the Super League. Sassco 11-a-side gain a sponsor in EMS Europe for their 2003-2004 season.
April 2003	Sunderland Select, again, win the League with an eleven point lead over Crown Electrics. They also win the Challenge Cup with a 4-0 win over Ellie Leisure. Sassco.co.uk defeat Select in the Semi Finals, only to lose on penalties in the Super League Final to Crown Electrics.
May 2003	Sassco end the 11-a-side season in a mid-table position with a strong 2-1 win away from home.
August 2003	Only one pre-season game for Sassco 11-a-side. A narrow 3-2 defeat against Sporting Club of Sunderland before they kick off in the 2003-2004 season. Sassco 11-a-side defeat Sandhill’s, the incumbent League Champions, 5-1 in a Cup game.
January 2004	Sunderland Select win their fourth League in a row with a seven point lead over Durham City (previously known as Sporting Redhouse.)
July 2003	Crown Electrics defeat EMS Europe 3-0 to win the Challenge Cup Final.
February 2004	Sassco 11-a-side are defeated 1-0 by Low Fell in the Ken Atkinson Final.
May 2004	Sassco Season 7 opens with 10 teams, but Sunderland Select are no longer in the League. Sassco 11-a-side play the first of their marathon series of friendlies with a 2-2 draw against O’Neill’s.
June 2004	Sassco 11-a-side decide to quit the Tyne & Wear League and join the WCFL. Tyne & Wear dispute the monies owed and report it to Durham County FA. Sassco 11-a-side appeal and a Hearing is arranged.
July 2004	Sassco 11-a-side hammer Sunderland North (formerly Sporting Club) 4-1 in a friendly.
August 2004	Sassco 11-a-side hammer Sunderland North again. This time to a tune of 6-3 in a friendly.
September 2004	Sassco 11-a-side play the last of their nine friendlies with a 5-2 win away to NIFC in North Newcastle.
October 2004	A Hearing between Davinder Sangha and Michael Booth of Sassco.co.uk and around ten members of the Tyne & Wear League Committee, also attended by Peter Maguire and John Topping, sees the decision go in favour of Sassco. However, with the huge delays involved, Sassco cannot enter the WCFL in 2004.
November 2004	Wearview Elite win the Title with a six point lead over Crown Electrics.
January 2005	Wearview Elite defeat Fulwell FC in the Final of the SFL (Challenge) Cup.
February 2005	Manpower, the global recruitment company are announced as Sassco.co.uk’s sponsor for the forthcoming WCFL season.
March 2005	Crown Electrics defeat Fulwell FC on penalties in the Final of the AGUK.net Super League cup competition.
April 2005	Sassco Season 8 commences with ten teams. Sassco 11-a-side are invited by Newcastle United’s Official Deaf team to a friendly at north Newcastle. Sassco win 4-3.
August 2005	Sassco 11-a-side are invited by Northern League Shildon AFC to a friendly at Dean Street Stadium. Sassco lose 10-1.
September 2005	Sporting Redhouse win the League for the first time since Season 2. Sassco 11-a-side draw 3-3 with local rivals Redhouse FC in the opening day of the season.
November 2005	Sporting also win the Sassco Open Cup (the new name for the SFL Challenge Cup) with a 2-0 win over TCC.
December 2005	Sporting clench the Treble with a 2-0 win over Wearview Elite in the AGUK.net Super League.
February 2006	For Season 9, nine teams enter in the strongest season so far in terms of team organisation.
March 2006	Milltech are announced as the Sassco 11-a-side sponsor for the WCFL Season in 2006-2007.
May 2006	Sassco.co.uk are relegated from the Premier Division after a poor season with only two draws to show.
July 2006	Wearview regain the League with a record fourteen point lead over second place Hylton Castle.
August 2006	Wearview Elite defeat Redhouse Youth’s 2-1 in the Sassco Open Cup. Sassco 11-a-side defeat Easington Lane, the Tyne & Wear League Champions 4-2 away in preparation for the WCFL 2006-2007 Season.
September 2006	Sassco 11-a-side are held to a 3-3 draw away to Usworth in their first League game.
October 2006	Redhouse Youths defeat Crown Electrics 3-2 to win the AGUK Super League.
November 2006	BarPure and The Bunker are the new sponsors of Season 9. AGUK still remain a permanent sponsor as they still allow the site to be hosted for free. Season 10 kicks off with 11 teams.
December 2006	Sassco 11-a-side are top of Division 1 running into the Winter Break.
April 2007	Sassco 11-a-side finish mid-table after their final game of the season. MJS Claims are announced as the sponsor for the WCFL Season in 2007-2008.
June 2007	Southwick take the 6-a-side League after a Play-Off win over Redhouse Youths. They also win the 6-a-side Open Cup after defeating AFC Redhouse 3-1 in the Final.
August 2007	AFC Redhouse gain revenge over Southwick by defeating them 3-2 in the Semi Final – after being 2-0 down. They triumph in the Final with a 2-0 win over Hylton Castle.

To anyone interested...

Sassco originally sprung up in the form of the Sunderland Football League back in 1998. I was then playing in a below par football league in Washington, playing against teams called "Craggy Island" and watching them turn up wearing trackies, jeans and god knows what else, anything apart from a decent kit. Only a few teams took it very seriously and my lot, Sunderland Retailers, was one of them. We were also getting charged around £18 a game as well. At the time I was working at Herrenknecht and myself and my colleague, Michael Booth, decided to set up a league ourselves as we were sure we could do much better. Learning modern internet techniques and blitzing the local areas with adverts, we eventually grasped 9 teams and the original Sunderland Football League was ready to go. The first ever game was my team, Herrenknecht, against Brian Gettins' Durham Pine team. It was a cracking game as John Hunt scored in the last minute with a disputed goal to equalise. An ideal start. Another team, Sporting Redhouse, eventually went on to win the league.

The second season saw an expansion and also the introduction of some very well organised teams. By this time, I had clamped down on the kit rule which saw all teams fully kitted without wearing odd coloured socks etc. It was a success. Royal Mail won both the league and cup and Season 3 saw another expansion and also the introduction of Sunderland Select, a team which would dominate for Seasons 3, 4, 5 and 6. They bowed out and declined to enter Season 7, but individual players moved on to other teams. Season 7 was taken by Wearview Elite, while Season 8 saw Sporting Redhouse triumph containing a few key Select players as well as previous Sporting players. Season 9 saw Wearview Elite utterly dominate before retiring and Season 10, by far the most exciting to date, saw Southwick FC leapfrog the two other favourites, Hylton Castle and Redhouse Youth, to take the Title after a League Play Off. During Season 3, the term "Sassco" had appeared, invented by John Hunt it means "Six a side soccer company". We had commenced a league on a Thursday night along with a Wednesday night league. The Thursday league saw a good opening season, but for some reason it didn’t have the staying power and eventually got abandoned after two seasons. The Wednesday league still continues and is now run by exclusively by John Hunt. The Thursday competition faded away due to work and time commitments, but was revived during the summer of 2006 as a mini experimental tournament. CNSC (as it's called) Season 4 contained four teams playing one hour games each. Hylton Castle took the first title in this one hour edition. The most recent edition in 2007 was an excellent mini-league with five entrants and Hylton Castle retaining the League while Sassco took the Cup.

The Tuesday night saw its previous peak in Season 4. 16 teams in two divisions and a good sponsorship deal with JDI. A triumph, but from then it was a steady decline in terms of well organised teams. Season 5 saw entrants being reduced and so did Season 6 and 7. The organization was still there, but competing leagues and also lack of time from players and managers was crucial. However, a brilliant Season 8 has now saw a complete revival in the standards of the League and Season 9 saw no teams leave the League during the season and only one team being fined for not turning up on the day. All future seasons have exceptional standards. We have been supported and sponsored by AGUK.net since Season 5 to make life easier for us. We also gain a huge amount of support from the Complex attendants, from Amanda Cantle, the overall controller of the complex, with Mark Banks at the start, then Si Williamson and now, Mickey Ames with Peter Newby. Since 2006, BarPure, a Sunderland based Bar and Restaurant have taken over sponsorship duties for Season 10 and become the first Sunderland based organisation to sponsor the League.

Innovations in the league since 1999 have included a full website which is always updated and is now absolutely huge, containing all the archive records from seasons 1 to present as well as the Thursday leagues and the 11-a-side. Custom 70's styles footballs are also used in the league. We've also produced match video's now with technology available on DVD. Match report sheets, web reports, message boards, all pioneered back in 1999. We’re still going strong on the 6-a-side. The League has become more stronger than ever and, more importantly, much more stable. We’ve leveled out at around 9 to 10 teams each season (11 at the moment for Season 10), but the teams are generally well organized and understand what the league requires of them - which is the main goal in setting all this up back in 1999. Seasons 8 and 9 were a roaring success and revitalised the competition, so we're back to our best and hope to keep it that way.

An 11-a-side team was a spin off from the six-a-side back in 2002. Made up of players exclusively from the 6-a-side leagues, the team had a difficult first season, dogged by financial worries in an expensive league. But a sponsorship deal with EMS Europe helped the funding and eventually the team levelled out with a core squad of some fiercely loyal players. With two seasons behind us and an enforced break in 2004-2005, the team kicked of in the WCFL in August 2005, but suffered a poor season with player problems and poor results and a poor decision to start in the top division as opposed to the bottom. The team had secured a sponsorship deal with the global recruitment company, Manpower, which made life so much easier. The deal was initiated by Jason Amour, who replaced the long suffering, Michael Booth, as Team Secretary. For 2006-2007, the new revived side, with sponsorship from Milltech (courtesy of Dave Watson) saw some superb results and a very content side who genuinely enjoyed their football. The team was firmly back in my control, in terms of paperwork, etc. but the core players who have been there since 2002 (and before) assisted greatly to make life much easier. The team is now looking forward to the 2007-2008 season, despite a mediocre and generally eventless second season in the WCFL. Eventless as in there were no crisis or major problems. We also secured a new sponsor in MJS Claims initiated by Dean Matthews which allowed the funding of two sets of new shirts as well as building up the equipment needed.

Financially, the sponsorship helps a great deal. The 6-a-side is reasonably self sufficient, but the 11-a-side is also quite cheap with the WCFL charges being one of the lowest in the region for 11-a-side. Spin off ventures such as the sale of custom WCFL balls to the League have also helped in finances. For the 11-a-side, all the players are very good in donating towards the team. We've never had money problems which dogged our stint in the Tyne & Wear League. It's safe to say that Sassco are probably one of the most cash rich teams within the League which allows us to invest in high quality equipment such as polo shirts, custom balls, stylish kits with high quality badges and any equipment which is needed. The team is also backed by the huge website which is viewed by thousands of people each month now. But saying that, despite the massive publicity, the ethos of the team is to obtain a good set of regular players and remain loyal to them. I've no interest in getting in superstars who turn up when they want and have always focused on the squad as a unit saying "we win with this lot, or we don't." The marketing and promotion of the Sassco.co.uk name is hugely important. The team has now achieved Charter Standard for Adults and is also looking to affiliate with a Youth team (anyone interested, please apply)

So, things are really looking up. It's safe to say that everyone is enjoying their involvement in Sassco, from the new teams in the 6-a-side to the regulars in the 11-a-side who've been there since the start.

Davinder Sangha
League Secretary, June 2007