A NEW GIANT IS RE-AWAKENING

SLEEPING giant is a term which can often be overused amidst our everyday football parlance - but it certainly applies to Dudley Town who are joyfully celebrating a first league title triumph in almost four decades

The Black Country outfit have been crowned Midland League Division One champions at Step 6. It follows years in the doldrums for a team that maintained firmly established Southern League membership through the 1980's and 1990's. Matters weren't helped by losing two home grounds in a steady decline.

I went to watch their final league game of the 2022/23 campaign away to Stapenhill where a 4-1 victory took Dudley to 100 points and 101 goals scored in 40 fixtures.

It was great fun to stand among vociferous old-school away fans as I chatted to club director Jon Edwards about the new-found renaissance.

"We are absolutely ecstatic to clinch our division," he told said.

"The team just doesn't know when to lie down. It is very much an attitude spread throughout our club and has kept us alive all these years.

"We're immensely proud of our management and players. They exude the Dudley Town survival spirit. Promotion is one foot back on the path to our former higher status, although it has felt an unbelievably long time in arriving.

"Our previous title success came in 1985 when we claimed the Southern League Midland Division. In that era, it elevated us to what would be considered Step 2 now." Whilst admiring Dudley Town's renewed good fortunes, I also recall major problems the club encountered prior to dropping out of Southern League football in 1997 after 15 seasons of tenure. Edwards filled me in on what happened.