Hellingly Hound Dogs – Founded 2016
2016 saw the launch of Hellingly HoundDogs with the aim to offer every child a chance to play, train and compete in the Sport of American Football. We were set up initially to offer Flag Football to the youth of East Sussex. Since then, we have gone on to establish teams at both U11′ and U14’s Flag Football as well as U17’s and U19’s Kitted/Contact Football.
2017 saw us launch our kitted team at U17 age level and compete in the SEYAF league where we played several games against teams from the South East. 2017 also saw our club’s Chairman, Luke Boorer, win Volunteer of the Year Award at the Sussex sports Award, organised by Active Sussex.
2018 Saw the launch of the HoundDog’s U19’s team, thus enabling a pathway for children from the 7 to stay with the club till they go to University or Adult Football. The club also achieved the recognition of becoming the 1st Youth Only American Football ClubMark Clubs, a universally acknowledged accreditation scheme for community sports clubs. Again, club Chairman, Luke Boorer was again nominated and shortlisted for Active Sussex’s Sport Award, Volunteer of the Year, as well as Hellingly HoundDogs winning Active Sussex’s ClubMark Club of the year at the annual Sussex Sports Awards 2018.
2019 saw the HoundDogs join with Kent Phoenix and East Kent Mavericks at U19 age group to form South East Legion. This was to bolster all three teams, player numbers. In their first season they learnt a lot including just how hard it was to compete at this age level. Their first season saw them win their first every game on the road at Cambridge Cats. It also saw the launch of the Dog Bowl. An annual tournament for kids from the South to play Flag American Football in a friendly environment.
2020 Covid struck and the year was pretty much wasted
2021 Covid again!!
2022 saw the HoundDogs step away from Contact football. The club saw several of its coaches leave due to personal reasons. This left a lot on our Head Coach who was trying to run all the teams with some help from a few inexperienced coaches. Coach Phil joined us at Flag level and took a lot of pressure of the HC shoulders. Coach Phil had gone on to provide a vast amount of experience to the flag teams
2023 saw the HoundDogs launch its new adult flag teams, meaning the club can now offer a partway from u11 through to adult footballers. The teams launched at the back end of the year will look forward to 2024 as they start to play games within the South East area.
2024
Hellingly Hound Dogs Youth American Football Club 