1.Tell us about your team and the community it represents. What makes it special?
 International Surrey represents the county’s historical boundaries, sharing a recent, but also seemingly forgotten part of its history from before 1889 when Surrey stretched to what is now central London and covered much of the Thames southern bank. In 1889 some of Surrey, as well as its neighbouring counties, Middlesex, Kent and Essex, were transferred to create the County of London, and in 1965, within living memory parts of what had been Surrey for over a millennium had now become synonymous with an enlarged Greater London. We’re trying to teach people of the counties’ centuries-old history while also providing a platform for local footballers.
County football in England used to be common with the different county FAs playing regular friendlies and tournaments against one another, this gradually died out after WW2 as club football became more and more important and the role of county football declined, but county football still exists in a limited capacity in women’s and youth football. However, Surrey doesn’t participate in county women’s football while many of our neighbouring counties, Sussex, Middlesex and Kent do operate county women’s teams, so we want to bring back this tradition of county football for both men and women’s football.
- What is your favourite moment and memory of your team on the pitch? If your team has not played a game yet: What types of memories do you hope to create for your team’s fans?
My favourite moment would be in the build-up to our debut game against Barawa in 2018 because that’s the moment when everything that had been worked on over a number of years had finally become reality, a Surrey team would take to the pitch for the first time and no one can take that fact away from you. Seeing the kit set up ready for the players arrival just created a level of excitement for what would happen in the future because that first game is arguably the hardest because of the obstacles and delays we faced leading up to that game and in subsequent games seeing the kit set up before the player arrive reminds me of that debut game.
- What are your hopes as you join WUFA, and what potential do you see for this new collaborative alliance in worldwide football?
As previously not a member of any federation joining WUFA gives us the opportunity to participate in worldwide football in ways we couldn’t before with tournaments now a possibility and a platform not only to promote ourselves but using our platform to promote the teams around us and highlighting their stories to an audience in South East England that may not have known these teams existed before, even when then the teams have been playing games in the area longer than us like Barawa and the Chagos Islands our nearest opposition and both with extraordinary stories that need to be told and we hope we can help with that.
