AFC Croydon Athletic 2 Tooting and Mitcham United 3 – 21 October 2025 Report

Match Report

Tooting & Mitcham seem to be using the regional cup competitions as a means to execute revenge missions as, following our recent successful outing to Carshalton Athletic’s ground to see off Sutton Common Rovers in the Surrey Senior Cup, we repeated the experience following another short hop – this time to Croydon Athletic in the London Senior version, as the cross-common derby provided another enjoyable night out.

The final scoreline suggests a closely-fought contest; in reality, the Terrors dominated this one – and could have won by a far clearer margin. A late rally by the hosts saw them claw a couple of goals back, but they were never really in this – and their second came so late on that it never really looked like the prelude to anything more. Thus it was that the early season FA cup exit to this same opposition was reversed and, in truth, we were never going to win the former competition (!) – this one might just be in our sights in the months ahead. We took control early on, with just two minutes on the clock when Max Oldham finished off a neat passing move in which Academy graduate Geovanni Johnson – starting for the first time – figured prominently. It was his run and inch-perfect pass which released Max for a one-on-one with home goalkeeper Marcus Hill, and the Terrors leading scorer doesn’t often miss those. He duly slotted home his eleventh goal of the season, and twenty minutes or so later added number twelve, when Shay Brennan’s shot was only parried by the home custodian, and fell nicely for the Tooting man sliding in. Geovanni had run himself into the ground with around fifteen minutes to go, and was replaced by another young starlet, Wassiem Ahmed. Just after entering the fray, Wassiem capitalised on some shoddy defending by the home side – pouncing on a loose ball to thump home number three (his first at senior level for the club). Predictably, those of a black and white persuasion who had made the short journey were in very good voice now – and the two late goals which gave the Rams a glimmer of respectability (for record keepers, scored by David Bremang and Brandon Pierrick) did nothing to dampen the enthusiasm with which we celebrated advancement into the next round.

Team Lineup