The FA Vase
First Round Qualifying
Saturday 17 September 2005 - 3.00pm

Bedlington Terriers - losing semi-finalists in The FA Vase last season - won’t be amongst the teams competing in First Round Qualifying for The FA Vase in Partnership with Carlsberg this weekend - but would like to be.

It’s just five months since the heartbreak of their semi-final defeat to AFC Sudbury on penalties, five months since they stood on the threshold of a dream.

It was the day the Gods looked the other way, Tony Chapman came off the bench for them and might have had a hat-trick, and Bedlington deserved to win by a two- or three-goal margin.

Now Chapman has gone. So too skipper Ian Dixon and left midfielder Kevin Walton, who went to league and cup rivals Whitley Bay.

But there’s no bitterness, just an exasperated resignation. And perhaps even the hope for a new beginning.

"The spirit’s not what it might be right now," says Club Secretary Jeff King.

"Sure, we had a lot of plaudits last season; everyone was commenting on how unlucky we were in The Vase. There was a lot of sympathy but that’s all gone now.

"We’re not playing well, we’ve lost seven of the squad we had last year and were recently dumped out of The FA Cup by a side we should have beaten comfortably.

"That’s why we’d like to be playing the early rounds of The Vase. The club needs some momentum. I know Keith (Perry) the manager would prefer for us to be in there this weekend."

The dividing line between success and failure can be the width of a coat of paint on a goalpost. King is too generous, too pragmatic to let it hurt him. But there’s no mistaking in him the feeling that Bedlington’s near misses last year may cost them for a season or two.

"People can get easily disillusioned when so much is possible and then it all goes up in smoke.

"But we have to get on with it. We’re rebuilding. We’ve got in a crop of new players. We didn¹t fancy our chances last season and look how far we got. We’ve got to move on."

The FA Vase resumes this weekend with the First Round Qualifying. Click the link below for the full list of fixtures.