Erith & Belvedere Football Club - Official
The Deres finished on a high in 2010-11: they collected 22 of the last 24 points available to finish 5th in the Kent League, their highest placing for five seasons. Indeed had it not been for a last-minute VCD Athletic equaliser, they could have finished 3rd and equalled the club peacetime record of eight consecutive wins: they were also one of only two teams to defeat Herne Bay in the league. It was the first campaign under the management of former Millwall and Charlton player Micky Collins and former Sevenoaks boss Julian Leigh (plus ex-Wolves star Simon Osborn, who left over the summer). So the Deres are keen to see if they can continue this form into the new season and challenge for promotion and honours, blending the 2010-11 team with new signings and players from the reserve side which lost to Cray Wanderers in the Division 1&2 Cup Final.
The Deres were formed in 1922 following the restructuring of Belvedere and District FC, a club founded in 1918 (although the original Erith FC, formed in 1885, played in the inaugural FA Amateur Cup in 1893.) The new club played its first Kent League match on 26 August 1922 at its original home – Park View, Belvedere – losing 3-1 to Chatham. In 1924 the Deres reached the FA Amateur Cup Final (losing 3-0 to Clapton at The Den), won the Kent Amateur Cup, and lost 2-0 at home to Third Division Reading in the FA Cup. Later in the 20s several Deres players joined French clubs and one, Stan Hillier, went on to win Cup and League honours with Cannes and Sête.
Apart from two seasons (1929-31) in the London League, the Deres remained in the Kent League until the war. In a league featuring many semi-professional and nursery sides, third place in 1928-29 was their highest finish, but greater success came in cups. They reached successive Kent Amateur Cup Finals in 1934/5. The FA Amateur Cup Final was reached again in 1938: although they lost 1-0 to Bromley, again at The Den, the 33,346 crowd was the biggest ever for a Deres match.
On the outbreak of war the Deres joined the South-East Combination. Since local industry was important to the war effort, Erith lost few players to the Forces, and became one of Kent’s top clubs. In 1941-42 they won the Kent Senior Cup (the first amateurs to do so for 30 years) and the South East Combination League and Cup double: they dropped only one point, scored 253 goals in 44 games and had a 64-game unbeaten home run ended only by an Army side fielding four full internationals.
Having won the London Senior Cup on the weekend after VE Day, the Deres were founder members of the Corinthian League, winning the Memorial Shield (League Cup) three seasons in succession (1948-50). Along with Slough and Maidenhead, the Deres remained in the Corinthian League throughout its existence, and in 1963 they joined Division 1 of the Athenian League on its expansion to three divisions.
In the late 60s the Deres won the Kent Amateur Cup four times in five years and were runners-up in an international tournament in Belgium! They reached the Athenian premier division in 1971, and won the League Cup in 1974. The club chose to return to the Kent League in 1978, but in 1982 entered the Southern League as Kent champions and League Cup finalists, the highlight of Peter Peters’ record 17½ years in charge.
Life was hard for the Deres in the Southern League, with just six top-half finishes and a best placing of 7th under Harry Richardson in 1993. On his departure the club’s fortunes were at a low ebb until the appointment of Mike Acland in 1996. 18 months into Acland’s reign the club could have folded when arsonists destroyed the main stand at Park View on 1 September 1997. The club was based in portakabins for two years – to Acland’s credit results actually improved in these difficult circumstances – before starting a groundshare arrangement with Welling United in 1999.
Acland departed in 2003, and in 2004-05 the Deres were relegated, ending their 23-year stay in the Southern League. This was despite an impressive debut season in senior football for Chris Dickson, who later joined Charlton Athletic (as did Akpo Sodje, top scorer in 2003-04, now at Hibernian). Back in the Kent League, the Deres were in promotion contention until the final day of 2005-06, but were out of the promotion hunt in the following two seasons. 2008-09 saw the Deres reach the Kent Senior Trophy final, their first final in 25 years, but despite taking the lead on 49 seconds and twice being 17 minutes from victory, they went down 3-2 to VCD Athletic. The following season brought a dramatic collapse from 2nd in November to a 12th-place finish thanks to a run of one win in 20 and a succession of managerial changes before the appointment of Micky Collins in May 2010.
