Chipping Norton Town come from the picture book
Oxfordshire town of
Chipping Norton, and have a long and successful history in the lower leagues in the South of England. Established in 1893, they were founder members of the
Hellenic League in 1953 after winning the Oxfordshire Senior League for two season before that. They went on to win the Division One title of the league in 1961 and 1971.
But it was the late 1970s that saw their really glory days. They won the Helenic Premier in 1978, taking a couple of Oxfordshire Cups around the same time, before working their way up to the Midland Combination. A couple of seasons later in 1981 they won that title, proving to be like a non-league Spurs in winning a title in a year ending in a one. Sadly though this terrific run saw them reach too deeply into their pockets and financial difficulties forced them to drop back into the Oxfordshire leagues rather than go out of business.
However, recent years have seen them drag their way back up to the Helenic Premier, and were well on their way to a dream of reaching an even higher level of football when things took a curious turn of events. Chairman Sean Robson announced that because of a lack of interest by the local residents, it wouldn't be commercially viable to continue at their current high level, and promptly resigned the club from the league, and continue at a lower level. This time it wasn't for financial reasons, but what the club called a 'lack of physical resources'. Whatever the reality of the reason, we hope that they soon wake up the good citizens of Chipping Norton into realising that they've got a passionate and very watchable football team on their doorstep and go an help them out. After all, how could you not love a team whose nickname is The Chippy!
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