Third-placed team wins title after top two docked points
Two teams locked level on points and separated only by goal difference at the top of the league at the end of a 38-game season - yet the title is won by a side one point below them.That is the story in the Combined Counties Premier South, where the top two have been docked three points each for both fielding an illegible player and the title has instead gone to Surrey side AFC Whyteleafe.It caps an amazing season for the club, who were only formed four years ago but reached the FA Vase final earlier this month, where they were beaten 2-1 by Whitstable Town at Wembley.Jersey Bulls finished top with 96 points but were docked three points for fielding a player who should have been suspended in their 4-0 win over Tooting and Mitcham United on 20 March.Second-placed Redhill were then set for the title having finished below the Channel Islands side on goal difference but have now also been deducted three points for the same offence.It means the trophy has gone to Whyteleafe, who would have finished third with 95 points, and the club have been awarded automatic promotion to the Isthmian League Division One South East.Meanwhile, Jersey will take on Fleet Town and Redhill will face Cobham in the play-offs. "I feel great that we've been crowned champions and been promoted to Step Four, but at the same time it's a very strange way to go about it," Whyteleafe boss Kelly Waters told BBC Radio Surrey."I feel quite sorry for Jersey and Redhill in the situation that they've had, I've experienced it myself before when I was managing at Balham and it's painful."But they have to enforce the rules to make sure people don't use them inappropriately and in the end we've been a beneficiary of that and we couldn't be happier to be back in Step Four."The original Whyteleafe FC folded in 2021 and the current version of the club was formed shortly after by chairman and co-manager Waters.'Leafe entered the Surrey South Eastern Combination League in 2021-22. The club are now back at the same level Whyteleafe FC had been at at the time it folded.
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