As World Cup fever starts to grip the country ahead of the kick off in South Africa on June 11th - Harrogate Veterans FC will once again be heading to Thailand two weeks earlier in the hope of landing the first half of a football World Cup Winning double for England this summer. The Veteran football players from North Yorkshire will once again be representing England in the Seniors World Cup, which will once again be held in Thailand, this time on the country's largest island, Phuket. 

The competition begins on 31st May with England in a tough group with the host country Thailand, Iran (the losing semi finalists last year) and newcomers Armenia, whom they will open against, before playing the other sides on the following two days. Three group games in three days is something that would not be contemplated in the professional game, but if England progress they will face a semi- final two days later, and potentially a final the next dayon June 5th. Add in the heat, an eight hour time difference and the fact you are in a country that is experiencing some serious political unrest and that is some challenge! However this is virtually the same situation that the english team found themselves in last year and still they were able to bring this particular World Cup back home with them - the first time a football world cup had been won by England since 1966.

So what are the teams chances of doing it again ? "We are going back with a stronger squad" says manager Paul Bell, " we have added some very good players from Liverpool, Teeside and Essex, so we are actually more national - but the core of the squad, 18 players, are still from the Harrogate club" One of the new additions is Adrian Owers, who played for Brighton and Southend - but now captain of Great Waverley Rovers Veterans , who last week won the Essex County Veterans Cup. "Veterans football is taken seriously down here and there are five divisions and we have won the first division as well as the County cup" said Owers " - but getting involved with Harrogate to go to a World Cup is something special" Like all the other players, Adrian has had to fund his own flight - but in his case his employers Danbury Sports Club have decided to back him give that he is representing the country. " Quite a few of the players, have managed to achieve some form of individual sponsorship and we have also been able to get the support of local and national businesses to help fund the many costs associated with participating, which we really appreciate" said Bell.

To prepare, the squad fly out on the 26th May to give themselves time to acclimatise to the time difference and the heat. "The first two days are fairly relaxed and gentle" said Bell" but then we have a warm up match against a Bangkok Veterans League X1 and then a couple of afternoon training sessions to prepare ourselves for playing in that heat during the competition." The team then fly from Bangkok to Phuket the day before the tournament starts. " We are obviously keeping an eye on what is happenning in Bangkok, but as bad as it looks on TV, it is restricted to a small central area of the capital which we have no intention of going near!" The team will be based on Karon beach on Phuket - "it's a beautiful location, but not too lively, which suits us as we are are there to focus on the football" said Bell "the daily schedule which includes a light training session in the morning, team lunch and then a game late afternoon or early evening does not allow for too much idle time - and it could be like that for 6 days!. Hopefully we can have something to celebrate again at the end of it and then maybe we can enjoy a drink or two before heading home."

The club go out to Thailand on the back of a 4-1 victory in the York Charity Veterans Cup Final last sunday   -  making it a third consecutive  league and cup  double  in the local competitions , but there was to be no third national success for the Veterans this year after going out of the National Umbro Cup on penalties in a semi final they dominated. "It was disappointing" said Bell " we have not had a good record at penalty shoot outs over the past few years - but,the one we did win was in the World Cup semi final last year!"

"We will practise this time though, in case the situation arises again . I'm lucky to have an enormous amount of managerial and coaching experience within the squad - John Deacey, Paul Marshall, Mark Smitheringale, Charlie Brown, for example have all had a very successful season in charge of their clubs - and collectively that is a great asset. John for instance ran some thorough sessions on set pieces last year and they proved to be crucial as we scored the only and winning goals in the games against Thailand and Australia from them." Skipper, Deacey, along with Godwin Douglas are the two injury concerns, having missed both the past few games. "physio Steve Bradbury is telling me that they will both be fine by the 31st, which is reassuring as both are key players within our game plan" said Bell.

So can they bring the cup home again? "We know that the other countries will be aiming to come back with stronger squads - they all want to win this cup. Thailand have been preparing all year  and i'm hearing that up to 16 of their squad will be ex internationals. Likewise New Zealand have pulled together an ex international team, and although they may have previously beeen regarded as minnows in World football, all these players would have been playing professionally across Europe. What we can draw on is the fact that the majority of our squad have played together most weeks of the season in over 30 games , so we will hit the ground running. The desire amongst the boys as you would expect is very strong and we aim to make everybody back home proud of us again."