Saturday 10th July sees a first in the long history of Cray Wanderers and the short history of Hashtag United as the sides meet for the first time in a pre-season friendly at Hayes Lane. KO 3pm.
The two sides could possibly have met this weekend in Jersey in the VBET Cup competition but due to Covid travel restrictions between Jersey and England the tournament will now take place next July.
After a bit of a delayed start to pre-season with the Sevenoaks Town game on Tuesday being cancelled, the Wands made their first appearance of pre-season at Chatham Town on Thursday and in a hard fought contest, Cray won 2-1 with goals from Jack Hanson and Anis Nuur. There were some impressive performances with as well as Nuur and Hanson catching the eye, Jack Turner was superb in goal while Ejiro Okosieme, Lee Lewis, Cameron Brodie, Emmanuel Oduguwa, Anthony Cook and Andy Drury all played well and the perfect start to pre-season.
This is the first of three scheduled home friendlies with AFC Wimbledon visiting on Sunday 18th July and Welling United on Tuesday 3rd August. The Isthmian Premier League starts on 14th August and the league fixtures will be announced on Wednesday 14th July.
A team very interested in the fixtures release will be Hashtag United who begin their first ever Isthmian North league season after promotion from the Essex Senior League on points per game after the last two seasons were curtailed and with Hashtag top of the league in 2019-20. Hashtag groundshare at the Len Salmon Stadium, home of Bowers & Pitsea.
Their pre-season had already begun and a busy start with a 2-1 win against Bowers & Pitsea, then 3-2 v Coggleshall Town & drew 1-1 with Frenford at home on 6th July.
The club were founded in 2016 by You Tube E Sports presenter Spencer Owen and have garnered a huge following on social media especially You Tube on which their games are filmed and have around 250,000 followers. After starting out as playing exhibition matches the club applied for full time Saturday status and in 2018-19 after playing in the Eastern Counties League South won the title at the first attempt gaining promotion to the Essex Senior League. The team manager is Jay Deveroux who was previously Assistant Manager at East Thurrock United.
It promises to be a great match and we welcome in advance the Officials, Players and fans of Hashtag United and hope they enjoy their stay with us and have a successful and prosperous first season in the Isthmian North.
Tickets are available to purchase online at https://www.cray-wanderers.com/tickets/ but please note there is pay on the gate, £10.00 adults, £5.00 concs/U16s.
Please note the Ravens Bar will be open but take out drinks only and also a tea/refreshments bar will be open.
