Bishop's Cleeve

Bishop's Cleeve sits north of Cheltenham, and for well over a century the village's football club has carried its name in a way few outsiders would guess.

The club's honours board is a record of grinding upward through the local pyramid rather than sudden glory. It ran up Cheltenham League titles through the 1930s, 60s and into the following decade, added Gloucestershire Northern Senior League championships around 1969 and 1970, then moved into the Hellenic League, winning the Premier Division Cup in 1987-88.

Kayte Lane, the current ground, was not always home. Bishop's Cleeve started out at Stoke Road, but in the 1990s the club was forced off it to keep its Hellenic League status and spent years groundsharing, with Forest Green Rovers among the hosts, and the move finally happened in 2002. The Hellenic League title arrived again in 2021-22, sending the club back up to the Southern League, though the celebrations came at a borrowed ground: Kayte Lane was being refurbished that season, so home matches were played at Evesham United's Jubilee Stadium.

Paul Collicutt, a former defender who had already managed Evesham United, was in charge for that 2021-22 title and remains at the helm. In 2024 his side beat Torquay United, a National League South club, in the FA Cup's second qualifying round.

None of it changes what the club still is at heart: a Gloucestershire village side that grew out of Bishop's Cleeve itself, founded in 1905.