Claremont U13s have beeen crowned ESFA Small Schools’ Champions 2019 after a stunning 7-0 victory against Boroughbridge High School at West Bromwich Albion FC. This rounds off a phenomenal season for this talented group of players who can now add the much coveted ESFA national title to their League and County Cup wins.
Both sides had played some exceptionally strong teams to book their places in the final, but it was Claremont that dominated the match from the outset with Jaydon Fuller scoring a hatrick in the first 10 minutes. Jaydon Fuller who is already on the books of Premier League club Brighton and Hove Albion scored his first goal 90 seconds after kick off, set up by team mate Rohan Sharma from a Boroughbridge free kick at the halfway line. In the fifth minute Captain Will de Wilde found Fuller again with a perfectly executed flick on into the box to tee Fuller up for a second. Fuller’s hatrick came just a minute later off a Sharma pass that sliced through several Boroughbridge defenders like butter. Archie McGonigle found the back of the net two minutes later following another break from Fuller and his gently weighted pass to the back in the box. A wonderful cross from Aleksandr Rybakov found Marley Neill at the far post who with expert control, put away Claremont’s fifth goal with 18 minutes of the first half still to play.
In the second half, a 25 yard screamer from Rohan Sharma saw Claremont extend their lead once again – the Boroughbridge goalie getting a hand to it but the power and pace of Sharma’s strike proving too much. Some fantastic defence work from Boroughbridge in the second half saw Claremont denied more goals but Fuller’s fourth goal with just ten minutes to go, sealed the victory at 7-0 before he was rested in the 58th minute to the sound of rapturous applause from the Claremont fans.
This outstanding win against a Boroughbridge team that had already proved themselves to be one of the best in the country was a confident, convincing and ruthless performance that saw Boroughbridge soundly beaten and outclassed. It came as a result of some wonderful one touch football, skilful ball control, powerful attacking moves and some exceptional supportive play from a team that clearly knows how to exploit Jaydon Fuller’s pace and quality finishes.
The win is even more impressive given that Claremont played every single game in the competition away from home in a competition for schools with up to 65 boys in the U13 Year Group, when there are only 34 in that Year group at Claremont. The match was aired live and filmed in multi-camera HD with instant replays and a live commentary team to include former England and Liverpool defender John Scales. One said ‘It’s rare for a school this small to make a final, and to be absolutely dominating it is perhaps even rarer’
Jaydon Fuller was overwhelmingly voted Man of the Match on the ESFA Twitter page. The commentator said of Fuller ‘One of the best individual displays I can think of in a Schools’ Cup Final, and I’ve had the pleasure of watching quite a lot of them’.
Claremont Coach Jim Colston said ‘I’m so proud of the boys – unbeaten since they were first put together this season, they are a team who really work for each other and I just can’t speak more highly of them. We are a small boarding school with only 34 boys in that year group but 7 different nationalities were represented on that pitch today. I think it’s particularly impressive to bring those different nationalities together and play the game the way we did’.