Match Preview

Originally scheduled to be played at Rede Court Road, Rochester the game has now been switched to Winch’s Field.

Rochester United was founded in 1982 as Templars and joined the Sunday Medway Football League. There they changed their name to Bly Spartans and played for 15 years before being promoted to the Senior Division. In 1997, the club successfully applied to join the Rochester and District Football League Division One. The following season they won the title and were promoted to the Premier Division. They were accepted into the Kent County Football League in 2000, being placed into the Division Three West. After two successive promotions as runners-up the club was in Division One West by 2003. In the 2006/07 season they finished runners-up, and the following season, were transferred to Division One East. They won the title as well as two cup competitions and were promoted to the Premier Division The club achieved Chartered Status in 2009 and installed floodlights in 2010, leading to their successful application to become founder members of the Kent Invicta League.

In 2012, they became the inaugural champions of the Kent Invicta League and gained promotion to the Kent League, soon to be re-named Southern Counties East Football League. In May 2012 the club announced that they had sought permission to rename themselves Rochester United from the start of the 2012/13 season. They always struggled and at the end of the 2017/18 season they finished bottom in the Premier and were relegated to the First Division. Despite ending 2018/19 in a relegation position in the First Division they were given a reprieve.

We met in the FA Cup First Qualifying Round in September 2015 in an eventful game. Just after the half hour, with the scores level at 0-0 referee Simon Finnigan sent off both Liam Quinn and Harry Brown within the space of a minute. Ricki Grundy gave Rochester the lead four minutes after the break, before it became ten against nine with Vince Collis being red carded. Herne Bay then took control with Kane Butler, Danny Walder and Giorgio Russo scoring.

Their first pre-season warm-up was a 2-0 win at Sporting Club Thamesmead. On 16th July they announced the signing of Connor Cox. Cox had made 12 appearances (7 as a substitute) for Herne Bay in 2017/2018 and 2018/2019, scoring twice. He netted twice in Rochester’s 5-1 win at Erith Town. On Saturday they were due to host New Romney, but the pitch was not ready, and the game was postponed. On Tuesday they hosted Chatham Town and the Chats came away with a 5-1 victory.