An interview with Dave Shearing

With the season coming to a close we sat down with chairman Dave Shearing to look back on his first year at the helm, the 2022/23 season as well as looking ahead to the future.

Q: You have been here a year now what do you think has been the best changes you have made to the club?

A: There’s so many isn’t there! We have had a whole new management structure implemented from top to bottom, and the result we are getting in all of our teams: the first team, the women who just won their league and the youth teams all performing excellently. The club is also generating more money than ever through new advertisement deals. The club is more financially stable than before. I want to leave this club better than I found it and so far we are achieving that.

Q: Jude recently got the backing for next season what do you like most about him?

A: He’s not needy. He is professional, eloquent and a genuinely nice guy who gets on with the job without any fuss or nonsense.

Q: What are your plans for the club in the next year?

A: To put in the building blocks to finish in the top 5 which I believe is playoffs next season. We want to try our absolute hardest to get ourselves into the Isthmian League next season. We need to be playing in the league above at least for a club of this size.

Q: Thinking more long term where do you want the club to be in 5 years?

A: Established in the Isthmian League. That’s the ultimate aim. But it has to be done properly. We can’t throw money at it. It has to be done through a good youth setup otherwise you end up bankrupting the club and it all amounts to nothing.

Q: And finally we obviously are not the biggest club in the town. As a chairman how do you go about making the club function when half the town is the sea and the other half only really seem to know about Eastbourne Borough?

A: You just have to work hard. There’s a lot of fish as most of it is sea. But there is a lot of good, honest people, good business people who are here to financially support us and there is more than enough money and players to sustain another team in the Isthmian league or higher in this town. It could be us, it could be United. But I will work to make sure it is us who is there and established and successful.