NON-LEAGUE football in Berkshire has enjoyed its best-ever season with a string of success stories.

Top of the tree are Maidenhead United, who finished a highly-creditable 12th in their first ever season in the National League with the likes of Leyton Orient and Hartlepool below them.

It’s been estimated that around 80 fans regularly travel to York Road from Reading when Royals are not playing at home on the same day.

Slough Town won the Southern Premier League play-off final at Kings Lynn on Monday to secure promotion to National League South.

Also going up are Thatcham, who recently completed a 40-match unbeaten run, and Bracknell after they had finished first and second in the Hellenic League.

The Robins appear set for Southern League East and Thatcham look destined for the West Division.

And Thatcham, of course, have reached the final of the FA Vase, facing Stockton at Wembley a week on Sunday, May 20, with up to 4,000 fans expected to travel up from Berkshire.

Bracknell lifted the Hellenic League Cup last Monday, while Binfield won the Hellenic Floodlit Cup, with Thatcham being the losing finalists on both occasions.

With an average attendance of close to 280, Bracknell have been among the best-supported clubs at Step 5 football in England, and I am still scouring the country to find a striker who can beat Reading resident Shane Cooper-Clark’s 61 goals for Thatcham this season.

  • BERKSHIRE County Sports ground in Sonning Lane – one of the most picturesque sporting venues in the Reading area – could soon be seeing new participants with Blue Coat School moving some of their sporting facilities across the road.

The BCS cricket 1st XI no longer play there in the Berkshire League, having moved to Sol Joel in Earley.

  • READING Hockey Club treasurer Peter Sherrell is to stand down at the annual meeting on May 22.

And it will be one of several changes – on and off the field – at Sonning Lane before the start of next season.

Chairman Tim Mann revealed he is expecting a “healthy set of new faces coming onto the committee.”