Worthing played Slough Town in every season that we were members of the Corinthian League. In our inaugural season we did not meet until the final two fixtures, the first encounter coming on 5th May 1949 at their Dolphin Stadium ground, when Ron Wood scored both of our goals in a 2-1 victory.
Our largest margin of defeat in these encounters is ten; we lost 11-1 at Slough on 10th November 1951 in a Corinthian League fixture.
Our largest margin of victory is five, which we have achieved three times: 29th October 1949 (6-1 at home), 3rd May 1951 (5-0 away) and 2nd May 1964 (5-0 at home). The first two of these took place in the Corinthian League and the last one was an Athenian League Division 1 match, the victory ensuring that we gained promotion as league runners-up.
One match worth mentioning is the home league encounter in 1960-61, which we won 6-5, the last time we managed that score (despite recent efforts!). Amazingly, we had the same score (against Horsham) less than a month earlier.
We played Slough once in the Corinthian League Memorial Trophy, that competition’s league cup. In 1963, the Corinthian League was taken over by the Athenian League, to form its new Division 1 and the league cup was rebranded as the Athenian League Memorial Trophy; we also played Slough once in that competition, in the inaugural season.
After our promotion, we were playing in the Athenian League Premier Division and met Slough in the last two of our three seasons at that level, before we were relegated.
In 1972-73, Worthing reached the final of the Athenian League Cup for the only time, and played Slough at their ground, losing 2-0 after extra time. We received the Memorial Shield for this, it now being given to the runners-up in that competition.
Ten years passed before we met again, during which time Slough had moved grounds to Wexham Park Stadium and we had been promoted to the Isthmian League Premier Division. We played them in each of our four seasons at that level, before being relegated in 1987.
Slough came to Woodside Road in 1994 for our next encounter, this time an Isthmian League Full Members’ Cup tie that our visitors won 6-3 (after extra time).
We then had one season facing each other in Isthmian League Division 1 (2001-02) and one in Division 1 South (two years later, by which time they had lost the use of Wexham Park and were now ground-sharing with Windsor & Eton at Stag Meadow).
We both became members of the Premier Division in 2004 and were then league opponents for the next three seasons, until our relegation.
The next time we met was 2022, our only meeting in the FA Cup, and this was played at their current ground, Arbour Park. That match meant that we had travelled to four different venues in order to play against tomorrow’s opponents.
For the past two seasons we have both been members of National League South. The most recent meeting was at Woodside Road on 23rd January this year, the league fixture ending 1-1, Ollie Pearce scoring our goal.
A summary of our results against tomorrow’s opponents is shown below:
Competition | Played | Won | Drawn | Lost | Scored | Conceded |
FA Cup | 1 | 1 | 0 | 0 | 3 | 1 |
National League South | 4 | 1 | 3 | 0 | 8 | 5 |
Isthmian League Premier Div | 14 | 8 | 4 | 2 | 30 | 22 |
Isthmian League Div 1 South | 2 | 1 | 1 | 0 | 3 | 1 |
Isthmian League Division 1 | 2 | 1 | 0 | 1 | 1 | 3 |
Isth League Full Members’ Cup | 1 | 0 | 0 | 1 | 3 | 6 |
Athenian League Premier Div | 4 | 1 | 0 | 3 | 3 | 10 |
Athenian League Division 1 | 2 | 1 | 0 | 1 | 6 | 3 |
Athenian League Cup | 1 | 0 | 0 | 1 | 0 | 2 |
Ath League Memorial Shield | 1 | 1 | 0 | 0 | 4 | 0 |
Corinthian League | 30 | 7 | 6 | 17 | 59 | 83 |
Cor League Memorial Shield | 1 | 0 | 0 | 1 | 1 | 5 |
Total | 63 | 22 | 14 | 27 | 121 | 141 |