Match Preview: FA Cup 1st Qualifying Rnd
\nBasingstoke Town vs AFC Stoneham
\nWhen: Saturday 5th September 2026 Kick-off 3pm
\nWhere: Winklebury Centre, Winklebury Way, Basingstoke. RG23 8BF
\nAFC Stoneham (The Purps), 2026-27 Isthmian South Central Division Current Position 21st
\n<\/b>
\nSaturday\u2019s deserved comeback beating rivals Bracknell Town 2-1, gave us our second league win of the season, and our first three points at home.
\nWe now switch to the FA Cup, and host a team (AFC Stoneham), that three seasons ago, in the same competition, we were strolling to victory (4-1), then out of nowhere we capitulated to a team two steps below us, going on to lose 5-4, and another FA Cup season halted way too early.<\/p>\n
Our Opponents
\nThe Purps are jointly managed by James Phillips & Mick Marsh. Phillips became the youngest to manage a team in the FA Cup at the age of just 22 when he managed Lyndhurst Town. Marsh, as a footballer was part of Liverpool\u2019s 1992 FA Cup winning side, and was an assistant manager at Turkish club Besiktas, before returning to England.<\/p>\n
In the previous round of the FA Cup, AFC Stoneham defeated Badshot Lea 2-0 in a replay, following the original 3-3 tie. In the league however, they are still to get off the mark in the league, having played just two games which they both lost including Wednesday\u2019s 1-0 defeat at AFC Portchester. With this and the prior 4-1 loss to Winchester City, this leaves them in 21st place. Their strikers include Jamie Johnston, regarded as a pacy winger, who joined in the summer of 2024 from Southern League Bashley having previously been at Alresford, Hartley Wintney and Wimborne Town. Portuguese born Duarte Martins, can play anywhere across the front line, originally from Alresford Town, he has been their talisman for a couple of seasons, and had a short stint at Farnham Town. He has three FA Cup goals this season. Owen Fee is another striker who joined in the summer of 2023, having played for Blackfield and Lymington Town in his early career.<\/p>\n
In midfield they have ex-Poole Town winger Tyrrell Sampson, who is in his second stint with the Purps, and has two cup goals this season. Arty Kerton, was a youth player for Stoneham, before spending a couple of seasons at Baffin Milton Rovers, before returning to Stoneham in July 2025. Joe Warren, is an ex-Havant midfielder, who spent some time in the US, before returning in 2025, and joined the Purps, at the start of this season. Another ex-Havant player is defensive midfielder Nigel Atangana, who we\u2019ve crossed paths a couple of times, in recent seasons.<\/p>\n
In defence they have Ryan Cluett, who was at Southampton until the age of 18, and spent time at Sholing then Shaftesbury, before joining Stoneham in the summer of 2023. At left back is likely to be Lewis Nagle, who joined from Hamble in 2022, and has enjoyed three successful seasons. Ash Wells joined in October 2024, from Shaftesbury, having previously played over 300 games for Weymouth over a ten-year period. They also have Ex-Sholing defender Dan Miller, who was club-captain for the Boatmen, making 478 appearances for them. In goal will likely be Ross Casey, who was on loan at Downton FC towards the end of last season, but rejoined the Purps, and regarded as a vocal keeper.<\/p>\n
Our Basingstoke Town Side
\nBasingstoke\u2019s first win at Winklebury, not only brought a sigh of relief, but was also given more meaning, as the victory was against a club that many of our fans truly dislike. Despite a fairly even first-half where we trailed 1-0, the second-half saw us put on a dominating performance, as we pinned Bracknell in their own half, for large parts, winning numerous free-kicks and corners.
\nMore impressive, was the performance of our captain Billy Upton, who many fans were surprised that he was even allowed to have a fitness test, let alone don the No.6 shirt an hour later, as the game got underway. Not only did he put in a strong defensive display, his second-half brace of headers, epitomises why he\u2019s loved around the club and fanbase.<\/p>\n
The win pushed us upto fourteenth in the table, with our record at Pld 6 Won 2 Drawn 1 Lost 3, GF 11, GA 12 and 7pts. Our strikeforce may be one short from Saturday, as Miles Obodo\u2019s, month-long loan is up, but just announced his loan has been extended. For the record he is our joint top-goalscorer with 3 goals. This means Jeremiah Okine-Peters & Christos Papkonstantinou, and Finn Evans will compete for the other starting roles. Cheick Sylla, is close to his first action of the 26-27 season, and would assume the same could be said of Andrei Chiriac.<\/p>\n
The midfield pressed and bullied a good Bracknell midfield, as James Henry, put in his best performance of the season, and has won the free-kick taking role for the team. Louis McGrory did the gritty work alongwith D\u2019Andre Brown in the middle, whilst Tom Blake continues to be the main creator of our attacking moves throughout the game. Alex Solomon was a late substitute on Monday. He could be joined by Amardeep Singh, who I expect could earn a role on the bench tomorrow.<\/p>\n
Apart from Billy Upton\u2019s performance, the defence took an early hit as O\u2019Loughlin (groin injury), was replaced by Jonathan Gjoshe, as the back four reset, pushing Casey Bocarro into the left-back role. Bernie Tanner replaced Sulayman Ceesay in the middle of the defence, and will retain that role tomorrow afternoon. Ceesay, will start his suspension for his red card at Taunton last Saturday. The trio of Scott Armsworth, Jack Ball & Ben Jefford, are still a week or two away from any gametime. Simon Grant will wear the goalkeepers jersey once more tomorrow.<\/p>\n
Despite, AFC Stoneham moving up a level to step 4, what I saw of them in the replay against Badshot Lea, should not really trouble, a Basingstoke side, if it performs anywhere to the level it did against Bracknell last Monday.
\nBut as we know from our last match-up, and our dismal FA Cup participations in recent season, fans will be not be taking anything for granted, and I am sure our Manager Dan Brownlie, will be instilling that message in to our matchday squad.<\/p>\n
To confirm the winners of tomorrow\u2019s tie, will receive \u00a32,250, whilst the losers just \u00a3750.
\nThe weather is expected to be warm and sunny, so why not make that trip down to Winklebury tomorrow afternoon, and get behind your Basingstoke side.<\/p>\n
Let\u2019s Go Stoke !<\/p>\n
Match Preview by Martin French..<\/p>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Match Preview: FA Cup 1st Qualifying Rnd Basingstoke Town vs AFC Stoneham When: Saturday 5th September 2026 Kick-off 3pm Where: Winklebury Centre, Winklebury Way, Basingstoke. RG23 8BF AFC Stoneham (The Purps), 2026-27 Isthmian South Central Division Current Position 21st Saturday\u2019s deserved comeback beating rivals Bracknell Town 2-1, gave us our second league win of the […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":3533,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_exactmetrics_skip_tracking":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[95,107,108,2],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-9138","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-2023-24-news","category-2025-26-match-preview","category-2025-26-news","category-featured"],"jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/www.btfcsc.co.uk\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/06\/1200px-Fa_cup.svg_-e1560015798571.png","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.btfcsc.co.uk\/pl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9138","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.btfcsc.co.uk\/pl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.btfcsc.co.uk\/pl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.btfcsc.co.uk\/pl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.btfcsc.co.uk\/pl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=9138"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/www.btfcsc.co.uk\/pl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9138\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":9141,"href":"https:\/\/www.btfcsc.co.uk\/pl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9138\/revisions\/9141"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.btfcsc.co.uk\/pl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/3533"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.btfcsc.co.uk\/pl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=9138"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.btfcsc.co.uk\/pl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=9138"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.btfcsc.co.uk\/pl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=9138"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}