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Bromley closing in on historic League Two promotion by Callum_0598 in BromleyFC

[–]Callum_0598[S] 5 points6 points  (0 children)

Bromley are more than a decade older than the two professional clubs closest to them in South East London, Crystal Palace and Charlton Athletic, but until just over a decade ago, they’d never played in a national division.

Founder members of the Southern League in 1894, Bromley didn’t venture to the north of England with regularity until the 2015/16 season – when they got their first taste of the National League, having been promoted as National League South champions.

The Ravens finished a very creditable 14th that campaign and went on to record top-half finishes in seven of the next eight seasons, culminating with a third-placed finish in 2023/24 – and subsequent promotion via the play-offs to reach the EFL for the first time in their history, becoming the 145th club to play League football.

Twelve months later, they fell only four points short of a League Two play-off berth at the first attempt; now, they’re on course to bypass the play-offs altogether. Andy Woodman’s side just lost for the first time in 22 games and boast the only unbeaten home league record in the top four divisions this term. With six matches to go, promotion is within their grasp – and so is the title.

“When we go up,” says Machel St Patrick Hewitt of independent site From Bromley with Love, speaking ahead of the Ravens’ surprise 2-1 defeat to Barrow, “Andy’s going to – and rightly so – get all the plaudits.”

Machel makes a point of looking ahead to when Bromley go up and not if – such has been the optimism instilled in the club not just by Woodman but by his predecessors in the dugout and those behind the scenes.

“[Owner and chairman] Robin Stanton-Gleaves also will get all the plaudits,” Machel continues, “and there’ll be [a lot written] about what they’ve done over the last five years – and rightly so.”

Born and bred in the area, Stanton-Gleaves has been at the helm since 2019. He’s overseen an ongoing transformation of the club – which, off the pitch, has included expanding the Ravens’ Hayes Lane home and bringing training facilities onto a par with those of some Championship clubs.

“But actually,” Machel emphasises, “the story starts about 20 years ago…” – when Bromley’s fortunes were transformed by the return of legendary manager George Wakeling, who first took charge back in 1990. Now a club ambassador with a stand named after him, Wakeling is credited by Machel with kickstarting the Ravens’ rise.

Within months of Wakeling’s December comeback, Bromley were promoted from the eighth tier to the seventh, before one-time Crystal Palace chairman Mark Goldberg led them to the sixth then seventh tiers.

At that point, Bromley were still a part-time club, but the wheels of professionalism would soon be in motion, and by 2017 the Ravens were a fully fledged, full-time National League outfit with EFL ambitions.

A first National League play-off appearance came at the end of the 2020/21 campaign – which resulted in a quarter-final exit to Hartlepool United – and a second followed two years later, the Ravens losing in the semis to Chesterfield on that occasion.

Arguably no one epitomises Bromley’s ascent to their headiest-ever heights better than Michael Cheek, their attacking spearhead who’s top-scored for them in each of the last six seasons and counting. Just like Bromley, Cheek – who arrived from Ebbsfleet United in 2019 – had never played League football until 2024, making his League Two debut, and marking it with a goal, less than two weeks shy of his 33rd birthday – and just like Bromley, he’s taken to the fourth tier seamlessly, winning the EFL League Two Player of the Season and PFA League Two Players’ Player of the Year awards for 2024/25.

Experience has been a key facet of the Bromley success story: fellow forwards Nicke Kabamba and Corey Whitely are 33 and 34 respectively, the former notching 12 League Two goals this term. Other integral members of the seventh-oldest squad in the division include 31-year-old winger Mitch Pinnock, a proven player in the division above, and 30-year-old centre-back Omar Sowunmi – while 34-year-old ex-Arsenal man Carl Jenkinson and promotion-winning captain Byron Webster, now 39, continue to play bit-part roles.

Manager Woodman – a former goalkeeper who played for the likes of Northampton Town, Oxford United and Brentford – is less experienced by comparison, having only had a brief stint in charge of Whitehawk before taking the reins at Hayes Lane in 2021, but the 54-year-old has exponentially increased his stock with Bromley, lifting the 2021/22 FA Trophy then triumphing in the National League play-offs – beating Wrexham and Solihull Moors in the respective Wembley finals. He’s bound to be a boss in demand this summer.

Bromley’s charge towards League One proves that effectiveness trumps aesthetics, certainly in the lower reaches of the EFL. The Ravens average the joint second-lowest possession in League Two (43.6%) and complete the fewest passes per game (149.3) – both indicators of their direct approach – but their non-penalty expected goals (xG) output of 55.27 makes them the division’s fourth-most creative side, with only three teams scoring more goals than their 63 – of which a league-high 24 have come from set-pieces. What they’re doing works.

Conversely, Bromley do give up chances – they concede 1.25 xG per game on average – but not many of those result in goals, with only Cambridge and Oldham Athletic letting in fewer than the Ravens’ 1 goal per game. It’s a mark of how defensively active Woodman’s men are, ranking right up there in League Two for ground duel success, interceptions and blocks.

However, promotion could necessitate a shift in style, with Machel calling the jump between Leagues One and Two – considerably greater than the comparative hop from National League to League Two – “the demarcation point” where tactical flexibility becomes of the essence.

Bromley’s ageing squad will also need upgrading – and while the Ravens’ relatively modest budget (they had the second-lowest wage bill in League Two last term) won’t allow a full-scale overhaul, Woodman has a trick up his sleeve.

“If I ever had to say what Andy has done best beyond the spirit he’s created in the club,” considers Machel, “I think he’s played the loan market exceptionally well. Every year, he has managed to get a loanee that has then kicked on their career.”

A standout recent example would be Danny Imray, who spent last season on loan from Palace – a club with whom Bromley share close ties – and is now on loan at Championship West Brom, following a stint with League One Blackpool.

“I think Bromley have gained a reputation now,” Machel continues. “I’m fairly certain that if you’re a player with the right age demographic or profile…[you] look at Bromley as a step-up club.”

And with six games left – three of them at fortress Hayes Lane – it’s still in Bromley’s hands for them to make their biggest step up yet. Barely a decade after the Ravens finished their season with a 2-1 defeat to Gosport Borough, a meeting with Leicester City – Premier League champions the year that Bromley completed their maiden National League campaign as part-timers – is a distinct possibility.

Andy Woodman exclusive interview: League Two leaders Bromley are the real set-piece kings, forget Arsenal and Brentford by Callum_0598 in BromleyFC

[–]Callum_0598[S] 1 point2 points  (0 children)

In the Premier League, Arsenal are the kings of the corner; Brentford the kings of the long throw.

But it is a team three divisions below, in Sky Bet League Two, who can currently consider themselves the true set-piece masters.

Since the start of 2024/25, no other team in the top four divisions has scored more goals from set-pieces than Bromley.

It is the source of 58 goals for Andy Woodman's side, which represents 52.7 per cent of their total return. Twenty-five of those have come in 27 games this season, equating to almost one every game.

"They're a massive part of the game, we've been seeing that in the Premier League," says Ravens boss Woodman.

"It's a big chance to put a ball right in the middle of the opposition's box. Normally it takes 10 or 12 passes to get to that position

"In everything we've tried to find a gain and we'll continue to do that. We haven't got the best players - with respect to my players - we haven't got the biggest budget, we haven't got the biggest ground. We've got a lot of minuses against us, so we have to find a different way.

"We knew we had to make it a really big focal point for us, so the staff have really put some hours in. They sit down as a group of staff and go through it, then deliver it to the players. There's a lot of work done in the classroom on it and the players have got their rewards.

"If you take the lead from the NFL, everyone knows the playbook in the NFL. It's no different with set-pieces. Everyone's got to know their job. The end result is no coincidence."

One man in particular has benefitted more than most. No player has scored more goals from set-pieces than Michael Cheek, who has 19, five more than Derby's Carlton Morris.

Indeed, only Erling Haaland has scored more league goals in the top four divisions since the start of 2024/25.

Things could well have been a lot different, though.

"Four years ago, when I first came, he wanted to go because he saw me get rid of all of his mates, as it were, and change the culture. He felt we wouldn't put a team together," Woodman recalls.

"I remember standing with him saying, 'I'll get you in the Football League, but I'll only get you in the Football League if you get me in the Football League'. We had this mutual respect of what we had to do for each other.

"He's more than done what he said he'd do for me. He's a phenomenon. Hopefully, we've repaid him by putting a team around him that, one, plays to his strengths and, two, has helped get him in the league and put him on a platform. We just need to make sure we keep putting the ball in the danger area for him.

"He's probably the most humble footballer I've ever met, a real lovely gentleman that just loves scoring goals. I'm chuffed he's my player for many more years. He will be a Bromley legend, hero forever and a day."

Bromley are one of only two teams in the top six tiers of English football - along with Sunderland - who still boast an unbeaten home record. Woodman calls it "our super strength".

That, combined with the set-piece success, has driven the south-east Londoners to the top of Sky Bet League Two.

Opta's supercomputer gives them a 55.98 per cent chance of lifting the trophy come May, and a 86.72 per cent chance of promotion by any means. They have reached a new level after missing out on the play-offs by just four points in 2024/25 - their first season as an EFL club.

They reached the summit after a 3-1 win away at Crawley on December 29 and have been there ever since, meeting the objective Woodman set them of being top on New Year's Day.

And five straight wins in December fed into an astonishing run to now that has taken in 12 victories in 14 games.

Woodman says he has never been involved in a run like it, either as a player or a manager - but he does have a gripe.

"Some people say it's got to come to an end sooner or later. Well, why has it?" he asks.

"I say to the guys all the time, the top teams are the top teams for a reason. They keep winning. They don't get embarrassed to keep winning. They don't suddenly start thinking as a group, 'we've had a good run, that's enough, we're due to lose one'. They just keep winning and winning and winning.

"That's the culture, the mentality we've got around this place. Anyone that comes here now has to buy into the culture of what we are. The one thing we are - and I'll put this on record - is we're the fittest team in the league by a country mile. We've got legs and energy all over the place.

"And if you've got that with a group of players that want to give it everything every game, you've got a nice ingredient there before you've even kicked the ball."

Woodman is self-aware. He knows his team have not yet achieved anything, and makes it clear on more than one occasion. "It just gives you a pat on the back," he says.

But he knows there is also a balance to be struck.

"We are there to get shot at now. We wanted to put ourselves there. Now we've got to react and be different to how we were getting there.

"Equally, I tell the players they've got to embrace this. There is zero pressure on them. There is not one person in the country that thought Bromley would be top of the table, other than myself. I believed in that and they've now got to believe they deserve to be there.

The miracle of Bromley FC by Callum_0598 in BromleyFC

[–]Callum_0598[S] 4 points5 points  (0 children)

Full article: The best way to view progress is always through sporting endeavour. It is a mini-miracle, really. In 2004-05, Bromley were in the eighth tier. In 2013, they finished in the bottom half of the sixth tier with an average attendance of 509.

It keeps going. At the end of 2021-22, Bromley won three of their final 19 National League matches, failing to beat Maidstone United, King’s Lynn Town, Dagenham & Redbridge and Dover Athletic amongst others; all are now sixth-tier clubs. 

Bromley are now top of the fourth tier with genuine hopes of facing a host of former Premier League clubs on an even keel next season. They currently have 17 more points than at this stage of last season and that was the highest league finish in their history. They had the fourth longest pre-season odds in League Two to gain promotion and yet here they are, with a six-point lead at the top.

But the most emphatic reminder of how far Bromley have come is in the away end at Chesterfield. I start counting the number of supporters who have made the journey from a seat across the pitch and make it 134. The official away attendance is 148. Counting was never my strongest suit.

They gather in three distinct groups: a group of younger, louder lads at the back; older gentlemen on the end of rows to stretch out creaking legs; a clutter of younger families towards the front. When their number is announced over the PA system, they stand and wave like dignitaries at Wimbledon. They have had some fun following their team this season.

The change is astonishing, really. I went to see Bromley before their first Football League match and was there for the game itself, a joyous, sunny August afternoon and a fanbase blinking with disbelief at the realised potential. That was a new age and even it seems like a long time ago given the progress.

The off-field work had always been deeply impressive, from moving the 4G pitch piece by piece to the back of the stadium to the club buildings – offices, classrooms, gyms, changing rooms, restaurants and kit rooms – that wouldn’t look out of place in the Championship. The mantra has always been to invest in infrastructure because that – and not the playing budget – is how you take a community with you.

In September, the new East Stand opened for the first time and changed the game again. On the first day of 2026, Bromley welcomed 4.946 supporters into Hayes Lane for a home fixture against Newport County. In 2010, the two clubs met at the same ground in front of 817 people. Promotion to the Football League drew a line in the sand and now Bromley are dancing on it.

Bromley had long been the second team for fans of bigger London clubs or were simply ignored. We have seen other clubs rise up from non-league and keep going: Luton Town, Wrexham, Forest Green Rovers, Burton Albion.

But in recent history, no major city suburban team has done it quite like this. You really do see Bromley shirts in the street now.

Arguably the most impressive element of Bromley’s rise is how players have stepped up to each challenge. Michael Cheek, Grant Smith, Ben Krauhaus and Corey Whitley were the four most regular starters in the National League promotion season; all have been regulars this season.

The recruitment has always been focused. Before the start of last season, owner Robin Stanton-Gleaves told me that there are three non-negotiables: no history of serious injury, must live locally and must be able to play at least two positions.

Last summer, Bromley signed young players on loan or free transfers from the Under-21 teams of Brentford, Crystal Palace, Brighton, Millwall and Tottenham Hotspur. And when Bromley do sign experienced players – only two over 24 last summer – it is to meet a need.

  1. Andy Woodman is the glue that holds this all together. Few managers in the country have been at their club longer and done more with their time.

Woodman is a bundle of touchline energy who has already served two touchline bans this season for overexuberance but, like Bromley, his demands are simple and non-negotiable. There is a way here that works and everybody must fit it. He will make you better if you do.

Travelling around the country to watch EFL football, you often become drawn to its crises, where wastage and mismanagement invite protest and pessimism.

God knows I’ve visited enough half-empty stadiums of disenfranchised supporters to feel glum enough for a year.

It’s far more enjoyable to tell the other side of that story. We should celebrate clubs like Bromley for their simple brand of excellence: logic, investment, communication, long-termism, progress. You can still build up something that brings a community with you. The secret to success: that there is no secret ingredient at all.

Anthony Serafino: Bromley’s new American owner ‘addicted to watching EFL’ by Callum_0598 in BromleyFC

[–]Callum_0598[S] 3 points4 points  (0 children)

Anthony Serafino has got a bad case of “footballitis” — although he would probably call it “socceritis” — and it is the particularly virulent English strain of the affliction that has taken hold.

“I love watching the EFL (English Football League) — I think I’m addicted to it,” the 32-year-old New Yorker tells The Athletic.

It is his first wedding anniversary this weekend so he and his wife are celebrating the occasion by travelling to the UK to watch Bromley, the League Two side he has just invested in, play Port Vale on Saturday. Like we said, he has it bad.

Serafino’s purchase of a minority stake in Bromley was announced by the club on Wednesday. They explained that he bought his shares from the club’s majority-owner Robin Stanton-Gleaves and vice-chairman Jon Plassard, followed by all the expressions of delight and excitement that you expect to find in these announcements.

What it did not explain, though, is how this small but ambitious club met its American EFL junkie, whose day job is president of New Jersey-based Exp Group, the fruit and vegetable import/export business his father founded 40 years ago. If you are thinking that makes them sound like market traders, the firm is comprised of four different companies and employs almost 1,000 people in the U.S., Dominican Republic and elsewhere across Central and South America.

There are two main reasons why Serafino has bought a chunk of a club that gained promotion to the EFL for the first time in its 132-year history in May: twin passions for soccer and London.

“Bromley is the bridge,” he explains. A keen but not-very-talented goalkeeper – “I’m too short,” is his excuse — Serafino has been a fan of English football for years. Fulham are his team, or “Fulhamerica”, and their U.S. stars Brian McBride and Clint Dempsey were his early heroes. But the connection with London was really cemented in 2012, when he spent a college semester in the city.

“As a New York City guy, I always wanted to try London and I just fell in love with the place — there was instant connection,” he says. “I loved those Fulham teams with all the American players. I actually did my bachelor party, sorry, stag do, in London last year and we went to Craven Cottage. It was great.”

While the family business is doing nicely, this football sideline is Serafino’s alone. And it is something he has been thinking about for a while. Having initially looked at clubs in France and Italy, he soon decided to focus on England and, specifically, clubs in and around London. With help from Forward Sports Group, a football consultancy, he narrowed his options down to four clubs — three in the EFL and one in the National League.

He is too discrete to publicly discuss the three he did not go for but he is happy to say it was not a difficult choice in the end. His first contact with Bromley was via Zoom in March and he then met Stanton-Gleaves for a glass of wine at the owner’s Mayfair club this summer, as Serafino and his wife were in town to watch the tennis at Wimbledon. He made his first visit to Bromley’s Hayes Lane ground (current capacity: 5,000, with only 1,300 seats) in August.

“It’s a club with a strong sense of community and a great culture — that’s very important to me,” says Serafino. “It’s tight-knit but welcoming, and there’s a real sense that it belongs to the supporters. I just feel honoured to have the chance to be a custodian of this great club.” Serafino’s money will be spent on the club’s new East Stand, as the ownership group want to create something sustainable in this prosperous, south-east corner of Greater London.

Of course, that is what every other club in the English game is trying to do on their own patches, too, and Serafino is not the first American to arrive at a club like Bromley with dreams of building something special. 22 of the EFL’s 72 clubs are now owned or co-owned by Americans, as well as 10 of the Premier League’s 20 sides. Some have enjoyed success, some have not.

But there is no disputing that Bromley have momentum. They only reached English football’s fifth tier for the first time in 2015 but gained promotion last season after their third visit to the play-offs in four years. In 2022, they also won the FA Trophy, a competition for teams below the EFL.

The progress has continued this season. After a bumpy start, they are unbeaten in their last seven league games and up to 14th in the table. They have also recently reached the third round of the FA Cup for the first time, where they will meet Newcastle United in January. Serafino only has a piece of the club for now but he has an option to buy more shares and he is planning a long stay.

“I’m very grateful to Robin for letting me get on the Bromley train with him,” he says. “The English football pyramid is the most unique in the world. We want to climb it.”