Kingsteignton Athletic Football Club

The Rams

TAKEN FROM KINGSTEIGNTONATHLETIC.COM

Kingsteignton Athletic affectionately known as the Rams, after the fact that every year the village of Kingsteignton celebrates by holding a ram roasting festival. Formed in 1930 and commenced South Devon league competition in the 1930-31 season. There are records of football being played in the village long before the formation of the club, even in fact long before the formation of the football association in 1863. It was not until the 1920's when there were two village clubs, Kingsteignton Forrester's and the Kingsteignton Liberals that newspaper match reports appeared with any resemblance of regularity.
The current club owes its existence to no small degree to one man a Mr J Cooke, a Forrester player; it was he that proposed the joining of the two Kingsteignton clubs to form one new club Kingsteignton Athletic. Home fixtures were played at Orange Farm, where St Michael’s road now stands & it was not long before the newly formed team found success, Herald cup finalists in 1931 and 1936 and winners of the trophy in 1935. In 1934, Athletic were the South Devon league champions & runners up in both 1935 and 1936.
Since those early years of high success, the club has experienced pinnacles of success intertwined with troughs of mediocrity. Certainly no South Devon league club was more successful between the years 1950 to 1971; they won the league championship 4 times and were runners up on a further 4 occasions. They won the coveted Herald cup five times, including the prized hat-trick in 1553 to 1955 and were finalists on eight further occasions.
Matters though have not always gone quite so well for the club, in the early 1960's the Athletic faced potential disaster. The Devon and Courtenay Clay Company required the club's then home ground, Homer's lane for ball clay mining, for a desperate few months the club was potentially homeless. The club would surely have folded had it not been for the generosity of one lady, Mrs W Goodyear, she offered the club a home on approximately a quarter of an acre, comprising of two fields divided by a hedge, in Broadway Road. Mrs Goodyear agreed that the ground should be called Broadpark. During the time that the teams were playing their football at Homers lane there were no pitch side facilities, so the home and away teams changed at the local pub the Dewdrop.
The first league match at Broadpark produced a 2-1 win by the reserve side over Torbay. Richie Caldwell gaining the honour of scoring the first goal on the ground with Dave Bowen scoring the winning goal after Torbay had equalised. The Broadpark ground and facilities have greatly improved; the current club house was completed in 1972.

Honours
SDFL champions:
1934, 1949, 1953, 1954, 1966, 1967.

SDFL runners up:
1935, 1936, 1957, 1963, 1964, 1969.

Herald cup winners:
1935, 1953, 1954, 1955, 1967, 1971, 2000, 2001.

Herald cup finalists:
1931, 1936, 1949, 1950, 1952, 1957, 1964, 1965, 1969, 1995, 1996.

Fred Hewings cup winners:
2001.

George Belli cup winners:
1996.

Devon Senior cup finalists:
1965.

Div 1 champions:
1983.

Div 1 runners up:
1985, 2000.

Senior two Winners:
1966, 1967

Senior two runners up:
1970

Division 2 Champions:
2002

Division 2 runners up:
1970

Lidstone cup winners:
1967, 2002

Division 3 Champions:
1993

Ronald cup winners:
1993

Charity Shield Winners:
1997.

Devon County U18
champions: 1997

Devon County U18
runners up: 1998
Pioneer league U15
champions: 1995