Welcome to today’s FA Cup Third Qualifying Round against a now familiar foe Eastbourne Borough. Having been knocked out against them at the same stage last season, I am sure that Gavin and Junior will have the team ready to avenge that defeat. Let’s get behind the team this afternoon and hopefully we will be in the hat on Monday lunch time when the Fourth Round Qualifying draw takes place.

The next planned supporters’ coach is Saturday, 26 October for our visit to Chelmsford City. The cost will be Adults £16, Concessions £11 and places can be booked today at the Mega-container shop or online www.dhfcshop.co.uk. The last date for booking will be Sunday 20 October. We are confident that this coach will prove popular, especially as the ground is some 30 minutes’ walk from Chelmsford station and that we will be able to confirm it’s running as soon as possible.

Despite our best efforts to promote the service, due to a lack of demand, we had to cancel last weeks planned coach to Chippenham Town. As I have previously stated, the Trust is unable to run coaches at less than 50% capacity. Whilst the Board are passionate about helping fans to attend away matches, we have to balance the financial cost of this with all the other responsibilities we have to our members. Every £ spent subsidising coach travel is a £ we cannot invest in the Club or other community projects. Even at 50% capacity, the Trust pays a large subsidy to ensure the running of a coach.

Talking of investing in the club, the Trust has recently completed the purchase of 8,000 shares we agreed to obtain last season. It takes our direct investment in the club (not including merchandise profit share and other financial support) to £66,000 in the last 12 months.

The Trust continues to look to invest in the club and, outside of our membership fee, our other main sources of income are merchandise sales and 100 Club lottery.

We are always looking at bringing new merchandise lines to fans and today we are launching our Baby Rabble range of bibs (£7 each) and babysuits (£10) which we expect to sell quicker

The shop is now back-up to full stock of replica shirts with prices ranging from £25 for infants to £35 for adult sizes. Also back in stock is our full range of Trucker caps and our very popular bucket hats! Don’t forget with the cold weather coming we have a big range of hoodies, sweatshirts and beanies.

The Supporters’ Trust 100 Club is the only fund-raising lottery, following it’s merging with the 1893 Club, at Dulwich Hamlet. Monthly contributions are currently running at £545, which I’m told is an increase of £260 over the last four months. The more monthly contributions we receive, the bigger prizes become and fund continues to grow. The total raised now stands at almost £40k, most of which has been invested in shares in the Club. You can join today at the Mega-container or online at dhst.org.uk.

Enjoy the game

Mark (scolly) Scoltock

Joint Chair