Saturday 11th July 2026 ko 14:00

Pre-season Friendly

KINGSTON 1 (45+2)

RICHMOND & KEW 1 (87)

Att 53 at Hawker YMCA Centre, Lower Ham Rd, Kingston upon Thames

Free Entry

One advantage of pre-season is you do occasionally get the chance to see a newly formed club play their first ever game. Kington will play in the Surrey South Eastern Division Two and were set up by resident Adam Smith to provide grassroots football for Kingston-on-Thames, in part a reaction to Kingstonian FC having moved out of the borough to groundshare at Ashford Town (Middx)

The idea, in the future is to play out of Kingsmeadow, but for now the club will play their home games at the Hawker YMCA Centre in Lower Ham Road. It used to be the works ground for the Hawker-Siddeley aircraft factory which closed in 1992 but used to be on the nearside of the ground now occupied by housing. The factory produced such aircraft as the Hawker Hawk, and the Hawker-Siddeley Harrier better known as the Harrier Jump Jet.

Post closure the grounds were taken on by the YMCA in 1999, and other than sports, there’s a well-being centre too. There is a proposal to build a 3G cage too. That won’t be popular amongst groundhoppers, but then think about the level of community benefit…

The opposition ply their trade in the trade in the Surrey Premier League, a feeder to the Step 6 Combined Counties League theoretically 2 levels better than their hosts but is doesn’t pay to attach too much to status this early in the season. The teams fought out an entertaining draw in sweltering conditions on a parched pitch.

A month later the punchline arrived- Kingston will play their home games at Dinton Fields, in Kingston, a site I believe was a short-lived home for Kingstonian (then named  Kingston-On-Thames FC) at the end of the 19th century. That sounds well worth a visit!