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00:00 Welcome to Everything but the Prem, the show that shies away from the top flight and places
00:10 the spotlight on the teams below. I'm Chris Holden and this week we delve further down
00:14 the pyramid than we have ever done before as we celebrate, traditionally, one of the
00:18 best weekends of the football season, the FA Cup first round. As ever there were shocks
00:22 and it all kicked off with one on Friday night when 7th tier Horsham went to Oakmeld if his
00:27 League One high flyers, Barnsley, and came away with an incredible draw. Here to talk
00:32 us through that and to relay some of the excitement of that historic night for the Sussex side
00:36 is currently Horsham's busiest man, club chairman Kevin Borrett. I don't think that's much of
00:43 an overstatement to say that you're a busy man today Kevin, is that right? Yes, well
00:51 very busy over the weekend and juggling a busy day job with lunchtime extracurricular
00:57 activities certainly. It only happens once in a generation and therefore I think we can
01:03 manage our way around it. Yeah, I think you'd probably rather be in this position wouldn't
01:06 you? Absolutely, the whole town is buzzing. My wife and I popped into the local supermarket
01:16 and I'd made the mistake of wearing my Horsham FC puffer jacket and it took twice as long
01:22 to get down the aisles as a result of that with people offering their congratulations.
01:29 And this is what it's all about really isn't it? It's become a cliche and a kind of trope
01:35 in itself of people saying there's no magic in the FA Cup anymore but when you get results
01:42 like this and you get nights like Horsham had on Friday, this is what it's all about
01:47 really. This really shows off what the English football system is really all about doesn't
01:53 it? Yeah, and look for those perhaps not so familiar with it who just see a first round
02:01 proper and some non-league teams, you've got to remember we've gone through four rounds
02:07 and in fact there's five we've got to buy from the extra qualifying round so we've had
02:12 to win four games to even get to the first round proper and to put that in context it's
02:20 not the first time, it's the fifth time we've achieved it but it's the fifth time since
02:26 1881. I was going to say, this isn't a team that's sprung up, it's a very, very old club
02:35 isn't it? It is, it's one of the oldest clubs in Sussex although it's had its ups and downs.
02:43 When non-league football was the staple entertainment on a Saturday afternoon, the old town centre
02:50 ground would have crowds of seven, eight thousand. That ground is now housing and modern grounds
02:59 are far less than that but Horsham fell on hard times, the ground was sold, debts were
03:08 paid off and we've had to claw our way back to where we are today which is why something
03:14 like this is just so, so special. Talk us through your day then, what was it like on
03:22 Friday for your entire experience? My trip to be honest started on Wednesday evening
03:29 because I was out of the UK so for me it was a flight back on Wednesday to then work at
03:36 home on Thursday before I joined the team coach which left at about half past five from
03:43 Horsham with another pick up en route so that was the manager and his team, the players
03:51 and a small number of officials. We felt the players deserved a real treat so we booked
03:59 an executive coach with tables, kitchen, coffee point, microwave, you name it, it seemed to
04:06 have it so that was a great experience and then we stayed overnight on Thursday outside
04:15 just in a hotel just outside Sheffield. So that then took us to Friday itself, the players
04:24 had a light training session on Friday morning and then they assembled mid-afternoon for
04:32 a meal, a pre-match meal and the managers obviously briefing and tactics and I got the
04:40 opportunity to address the players as well before we left the hotel and I asked for three
04:46 things. I asked them to enjoy the experience because for many of them this is probably
04:54 or that probably was going to be the high point of their amateur playing career so that
04:59 was the first thing. The second thing I asked them to give 110% because they carried the
05:07 pride of the club, the community and every other well-wisher and then thirdly I said
05:14 I'm the chairman and I have unrealistic dreams so I'd like you to come away with a tutu
05:20 draw so that those who couldn't come up to Barnsley would at least be able to enjoy a
05:27 replay so that was my chairman's pep talk at the hotel just before we boarded the coach
05:33 to the ground. If I fast forward to a for a moment to 98 minutes after the final whistle
05:41 has gone, the players are celebrating in front of our supporters, I come down to join them
05:49 and our captain Jack Brivio comes up to me and says 'chairman you told us to give 110%
05:56 so we thought a 3-3 draw'.
05:58 It was more than a pep talk.
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06:10 (upbeat music)