The side that lost 3-2 to Moreton in early March 2005 (pictured left) may not have been destined to win County Cup glory but it did, later that same season, get the team promoted from Division Three of the Cheltenham League.  Also included in the squad that day were six other players who are still with the club but the Reserves ambitions were thwarted by the fact that they twice fell two goals behind, with the first of these occasions being highly controversial.  Soon after the start of the second half and with the Reserves getting more and more into the game against their Division Two opponents, the ball struck an upright and was hacked clear by Andy Herbert, only for the linesman to signal a goal!  Soon after, Garth Powell reduced the arrears with his first ever goal for the club but Moreton had again stretched their lead to two before Ben Roach headed home his team’s second as we moved into injury time.  This ensured that the match ended in frantic fashion but the side were unable to take the game into extra time and took their leave of the competition even though it had previously seemed as if their name was already on the cup.  Moreton went on to win the final.

Prior to this, the club’s previous appearance in a Semi Final had involved the First team at the tail end of what had otherwise been a very disappointing first season back in the Cheltenham League, following relegation, in 2000, from the GNSL.   Despite early season expectations, the side finished in 10^th place in the League but looked a completely different proposition in the Senior Charity Cup, a fact that was never better emphasised than in the Second round.  In a match that, as it transpired, was to be the club chairman’s last ever appearance for the first team against Warden Hill, who were destined to end the season as League runners up and to be Champions the following year, the team defied the form book and won 2-1.  6 weeks later, they lost 10-0 to the same opposition in a League game.  Once again, an unexpectedly commanding performance against RAF Innsworth in the Quarter Final, which was won 3-1 at the end of March, put the side into the Semis which, because of the combination of bad weather and the most recent out break of foot and mouth disease, were not played until late April 2001.  Indeed, because of a shortage of suitable and playable pitches, the Semi Final was staged at Quat Goose Lane, the club’s home base at the time.  Prestbury Rovers provided the opposition and the First team edged the game throughout, without ever looking likely to break the deadlock until Stewart Wilsdon latched on to a long through ball and lobbed the ‘keeper with just 7 minutes remaining.  Then, with virtually the last kick of the match, Mike Brogden made it 2-0 from the penalty spot to make sure of the club’s only trip to Whaddon Road to date.  The final was played 5 days later, on a Sunday morning, which meant that Mike couldn’t play because God wouldn’t like it.  Unfortunately, it was the League team that turned up that day and not the cup side and the final itself was surrendered in fairly meek fashion, 3-0 to a Winchcombe Town outfit that was relegated from Division One two weeks later.  Of the side that represented the club that day, only General Secretary Matt Harvey, Vice Chairman Dave Nottingham and current First team Captain Tim Jones remain involved with the club. 

We have to go back a further 4 years for the club’s last successful appearance in a County Cup Semi Final, a game that was played on March 1^st, 1997.  The Reserves had been frustratingly inconsistent all season in the League, gaining some excellent victories early on to make sure that relegation was never going to be an issue, but succumbing to some awful defeats, which suggested that, once the cup run had got going, it was progress in the County Intermediate Cup that dominated the side’s attentions and not the rather more mundane matter of improving the team’s mid table Division Two placing.  With the side drawn away to Stroud League opposition in Brimscombe & Thrupp, it was difficult to know what to expect as they went into the game but, in the end, a battling performance that hardly characterised the side’s most recent League displays saw the team hold out against a barrage of attacks from their hosts and then nick the game with one of their only shots on goal.  This came from a free kick, midway through the second half, that was taken by Danny Morgan contrary to the instructions of the team’s Manager, Simon Arnett.  Danny was one of the few naturally left footed players in the side and he took advantage of an angle that would not have been available to most other players in the side to thump the ball home and put the team in the final.  This match was played on a late April evening at the home of Frampton United who, coincidentally, will line up against the Reserves in the Semi Final this season.  That night, the opposition was Park United, a side that doesn’t exist any more as it was a bunch of bandits that, almost unchanged, was on its way to spending a few brief seasons in the upper echelons of the Stroud League before disappearing.   The eventual margin of defeat, 4-0, was not representative because it could have been far more as the side was played off the pitch but the occasion still remains, as far as we are aware, the only one on which a side from our club has contested a County Cup Final.  The only person left playing for the club who was involved that day is Mark Cottell, whilst Dave Nottingham, again, was also in the side.