Sassco.co.uk

Sassco is a professionally organised 6-a-side Football League based in Sunderland. The games are played on artificial turf (AstroTurf or Omniturf to be precise) at Downhill Complex (official name: Community North Sports Complex) in North Sunderland. The name is an acronym for Six A Side Soccer Company.
The organisation's representative 11-a-side association football team recently toured Malta in 2008.
The 11-a-side team team plays within the WCFL (Wearside Combination Football League) and also takes part in their internal cup competitions. The team recently encountered Northern League . West Auckland Town FC in a pre-season friendly, but suffered a heavy defeat.
The teams within Sassco are affiliated to the local body, Durham County Football Association, and have been featured in their articles.
The Sassco footballing organisation is unique in the way that all the activites are focused around the website which is the central point in any communication for the team.
Since 2008, Sassco.co.uk's 11-a-side team have been sponsored by iKobo. Previous sponsors have included EMS Europe, Manpower Inc., Milltech and MJS Claims.
Sponsors for the 6-a-side have included JDI Consulting, Service Corporation International, AGUK.net, Red Fox Hosting, Bar Pure, Schiedel (part of the Monier Group) and most recently, Bunker UK.
Kit and equipment supplier
Since 1999, Sassco have worn Adidas branded strips. The team briefly wore Kappa for the 2008-2009 season, but due to unpopularity, the design was discarded. The complete set of Sassco shirts used since 1999 can be found on the website
The footballs that the team use are custom made from factories in Sialkot in Pakistan. The design is based on the 1970's Telstar style and contains the Sassco logo as well as current sponsors. The two different balls used are for the 6-a-side, for use on hard and unforgiving artificial turf surfaces and the 11-a-side balls used mainly on grass.
Venue and home pitch
The venue for the 6-a-side competition and the 11-a-side team's home games is the Community North Sports Complex at Downhill in the northern part of Sunderland, Tyne & Wear.
The venue contains a full-size, floodlit Omniturf pitch. It also contains several grass pitches. Pitch F is the designated area for Sassco 11-a-side. The complex also contains a play area, which was built over a disused bowling green. It also contains a basketball court as well a small court for open play. Unfortunately, the area is in an open space and is heavily vandalised. Sunderland Council have failed to secure the entire complex by enclosing it and it is rarely promoted in their literature.
Brief history of the 6-a-side
Sassco originally sprung up in the form of the Sunderland Football League back in 1998. The founders, Davinder Sangha and Michael Booth were then playing in a below par football league in Washington, Tyne & Wear, playing against teams with silly names, such as "Craggy Island" (a practice most small sided leagues still allow) and watching opponents arriving wearing tracksuit bottoms, jeans and rarely encountering well organised sides. Only a few teams took it very seriously. Sangha and Booth's team was called Herrenknecht as it was sponsored by their employers. The costs were quite excessive as the teams were being charged around £18 per game.
Sangha and Booth, decided to set up a league, convinced they could created something more professional. Learning modern internet techniques and contacting local companies with adverts, the fledgling league managed to gain 9 teams and the original Sunderland Football League began. The first ever game was Herrenknecht against Durham Pine. It was an outstanding introduction to the league and an excellent game as John Hunt scored in the last minute with a disputed goal to equalise for Herrenknecht in a 2-2 draw. Another team, Sporting Redhouse, eventually went on to win the league.
The league has had its ups and downs, but rarely looked close to folding. The rules were tightened up in the forthcoming seasons and any below par teams usually quit the competition early. It is now on its 14th Season with the same number of teams(as of August 2009) as in the inaugural season, but all are highly professional and well organised.
11-a-side team
The 11-a-side was a spin off from the 6-a-side. Davinder Sangha, as General Manager, selected two to three players from each 6-a-side team and the 11-a-side commenced play with a heavy defeat back in the summer of 2002. However, from this inauspicious beginning, the team developed and spent two seasons in the Dunsford Business Supplies Tyne & Wear League, which saw games played on Saturday mornings. A dispute with the league led to Sassco.co.uk (as the team were now called) withdrawing and spending the 2004 season as a touring team with a grand total of 11 games played without being members of any league.
This changed in 2005, when they joined the Wearside Combination Football League and remain to this day. The opening season was a disaster, as Sangha made the poor decision to start in the Premier League of the WCFL. They were quickly relegated, but an almost new team started the following season in the lower division. The team has spent the last three seasons in a mid to upper part of the league, but failed to challenge for a top spot. Part of the reason was Sangha's strict rules on players contributing towards match subscriptions and also refusing to bring in players who failed to show for every Saturday afternoon. Another reason was that teams in the top division tended to fold and then new teams tended to come in at the bottom division with several top flight players.
Nevertheless, the team has achieved so much off the field with the marketing and promoting of the team. For example, anyone looking for football in the area using any Internet search engine will invariably find the site due to its high ranking. Several players have gone on to other teams within the WCFL and achieved great success, but any search for their names will find the Sassco website. So, success has be achieved in the promoting of the team and its activities.
Famously, the team is now widely known for its massive pre-season programme, which sees nearly ten games played every summer. This is long before any competitive ball is kicked. The team has been welcomed by esteemed opponents such as Shildon AFC and West Auckland Town FC; both Northern League teams who tend to shun lower level opponents.
Current pre-season squad
The listing was updated 5th August 2009. The squad changes from time to time and the latest version is available on the Sassco website.

The new signings for the 2009-2010 are Anthony Langan, Steve Farquhar, Dan Campbell and Gareth Greener.
The website
The original site was a simple holding page created using Adobe PageMill in 1999. However, with expansion, it changed into a frame based site, with the contents produced in Microsoft Word.
Eventually in 2004, the site was converted to Macromedia Dreamweaver and frames were abandoned. The look and feel of the site was re-designed and the elements remain to this day. The site was also widened to increase to 800px wide and eventually 1000px wide to cater for the new monitors. The last width change was done in 2008.
A radical overhaul was done during the summer of 2009. The site was converted into a content management system website. The core software was the Open Source Joomla software.
The site is now fully automatic with the ability to generate new sections, menus and articles with ease. Also, the results system is now integrated. Prior to 2009, the League Tracker software was used to track results and the exported HTML was pasted into the Dreamweaver site. Now the JoomLeague software within Joomla generates tables based on results and team line ups. The section is very intuitive. For example, clicking on to the team names leads to other options such as team information, results, details of games at the venue and even maps showing the directions.
The archive sections are yet to be changed, but the new seasons on Tuesday, Wednesday as well as the sections on the 11-a-side and its overseas tours to Malta and Portugal are all in the same format.
Other new facilities on the site include an in-built download section as well as a newer and more easier to use message board. The media section has also been revived with all the current videos available on one single video player.
Overseas Malta Tour 2008
One of the major ambitions of the General Manager, Davinder Sangha, was to take the team overseas during the winter months for a footballing tour. The idea was broached in 2004, with the United States being the chosen venue. The tour was to take place in Florida, but the costs were excessive. Israel was then chosen, but again, the costs were excessive. Finally, a warm port in Europe was chosen. Cyprus in 2007 was the destination. The venues and opponents were earmarked, but by the summer of 2007, only ten persons paid the deposit. However, the idea wasn't abandoned, but revived in the winter of 2008, but the interest was lacking.
Finally, Malta became the venue when the organisation managed to arrange low cost flights, and more importantly, came into touch with a ground based tour operator in Malta.
The team itself managed to pay the initial deposits and a total of 12 persons were ready for the tour.
Malta was chosen as a venue due to cheap flights and good climate. The quick response by the designated tour operator meant that Sassco were confident in his ability. The opponents, hotel and the venue were all arranged by Pierre Azzopardi. It was an ideal situation having a person on the ground in Malta with the contacts. Mr. Azzopardi’s contacts were mainly rugby orientated, but his football links were of similar stature. There wasn't a specific need to pick a tourist company, but for a football tour, a local football association person or someone who would run a team would be an ideal person to gain contacts from. The tour itself was based around the flights, which is now a key issue for any future tours. The dates were to be flexible until the flights were confirmed.
The opponents were confirmed about one month before the tour was to start. Davinder Sangha also made direct contact with the opponents by email and all confirmed the fixtures and provided extra details on the stadium and the standard of opponents. This was a peace of mind aspect to make sure that everyone was aware that Sassco were coming to Malta. The match officials were provided by the opponents / tour operator.
Contact was made with a radio station in Malta called XFM Malta. The station mentioned the team and the fixtures during the week prior to the tour starting. They also had a nightclub called Fuego, which provided the team with free drinks when they first came in. Ken Camilleri was the host and was very sociable. Fuego and XFM are linked on the Sassco website. Additional publicity was achieved by contacting Sheffield United (sponsored by Visit Malta) and then VisitMalta.com who added the tour as an official event on their website (see references).
The Victor Tedesco Stadium
The Victor Tedesco Stadium was a superb venue that was over and above Northern League standards and probably good enough to match Non-league grounds. The pitch itself was third generation artificial turf (3G). The venues in Malta had similar surfaces, which replaced the previous dusty and dry grass due to the climate. Under the main seated stand were the changing areas with a vast number of rooms. Next to the main stand was the club bar. The facilities were excellent.
Sassco.co.uk lost all three games on the tour, but that was to be expected. The team played a game on Friday, Saturday and Sunday, with a threadbare squad of only 12 persons.
So, a marathon set of three games in three days with a small squad passed without any major injuries and generally, everyone enjoyed it. Presentations were made of pennants and other items such as wooden plaques to Sassco before the games against Kirkop and Mdina Knights. We were aware that this could happen, but the lead-time to produce our items (pennants) was too long. These are going to be sent retrospectively to both Kirkop and Mdina. Also, there really should have been a large, custom Sassco flag to either adorn the hotel or during the games.
The tour was expected to be a one-off, but during the tour, the attendees were speaking about a possible second tour. Eventually, Portugal was chosen and once more, 12 to 13 persons will be travelling there in October 2009 for the Portugal Tour.
Malta Tour 2008 squad

Portugal Tour 2009
A representative team will be travelling to Portugal in October 2009 for a weekend tour with three games against local opponents. The tour has been arranged inconjunction with Destination Football, a local tour operator based in Albufeira in Portugal.
The hotel bookings and flights were arranged internally by Sassco to keep costs low. The actual tour cost is significantly cheaper than it was for Malta. Only one player from the Malta Tour will be missing from Portugal. In addition, three extra players will be making the trip.
Portugal Tour 2009 squad

* *Yet to be confirmed.

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