Danny Lye is looking ahead to Larkfield & New Hythe’s first season in the SCEFL Premier, but knows that his hard work has only just begun. 

The Larks won the final spot in next season’s Premier Division when they beat Staplehurst in the Division One Play Off Final – a day that the boss will remember for a long time.

“It was third time lucky for the Club,” he said. “We came in at the end of the previous season and didn’t quite make it, but after a whole rebuild this year, we did it the hard way!” 

“We dropped points against the bottom four in the first seven games and knew it was going to be tough, but the boys dug in and got us through in the end.” 

Lye who in his own playing days took no prisoners as a tough tackling midfielder went on, “You have to play with your heart every week and we played some physical sides last year and we had to match them and thankfully did.” 

“It was a tough league to get out of (SCEFL Division One) and if I’m honest we didn’t have a lot of knowledge about the League, so we put a side together to play football and we did get bullied at the start of the season – that’s something that won’t happen next time!”

“We were forced into changing the way that we wanted to do things and at the end of the season, that undoubtedly helped as we could change our shape, put different personnel in and that was difficult for some teams to cope with.” 

“Our promotion is very big for the Club as they have been pushing for it in the past few years. We are a small Club and trying to get the boys down to come and play at this level was a challenge last season and we have really had to work hard to get the quality players down to play here.”

“Being in the Premier, hopefully it will be “easier” to attract the players and we will be up against some “proper” teams and Clubs with a structure!”

“Add to that the gate revenue that the Club will receive from playing the bigger Clubs will help us in the development of the Club. The Club is going big places – there are plans already to relocate to a new stadium and there are massive things happening in the pipeline.” 

“We did well in the Cup games that we played last season against the Premier sides we faced because you know how they are going to play.”

“With respect to Division One, sometimes it is a tough one to know what to expect. That said, we made our home our own little stomping ground and we are hard to beat here, and we will be looking to carry that on.”