Ullapool football club Lochbroom confirm they are pulling out of North West Sutherland League but will play in cup competition
AN Ullapool football club have confirmed that they will not be taking part in the North West Sutherland League this season.
Lochbroom FC have announced it will not take part in the league this year as it feared it would not be able to fulfil it fixtures.
The club joined the North West Sutherland League in 2022 as it came out of abeyance after eight years. They previously played in the defunct Ross-shire Amateur League and had a brief spell in the Inverness and District Amateur League.
However, the club says that it still plans to play in North West Sutherland cup competitions during the summer as well as taking part in friendlies over theyear.
Lochbroom released a statement on its Facebook site that it was pulling out of the North West Sutherland League.
They wrote: “As a club, unfortunately we have taken the sad decision to withdraw from the North West Sutherland league this year.
“A lot of hard work has been put in over the last four to five years to get this club back up and running.
“However, over the last couple of years we have lost a number of players which has reduced the squad available to us.
“There was a strong possibility that if we did enter the league, we would not be able to fulfil our fixtures.
“However, there will still be some football in Ullapool. We are planning on entering the league cups and also bulking out the rest of the summer with some friendlies to give our young guys some football over the summer months.
“We are so grateful for the support that we have received from the community over the last few years. We are still planning on running some fundraising events over the next couple of months to support our junior sessions and the games we do have this summer.”
A total of 10 clubs from Sutherland and Ross-shire took part in last year’s league competition, with the teams playing each other once before splitting into two groups of five.
They included Brora Wanderers, Embo, Golspie Stafford, Helmsdale United, Inver, Lairg Rovers, Lochbroom, Lochinver, Melvich and Tain Thistle.
Last season, Tain Thistle won the overall North-West Sutherland League championship, with Helmsdale United claiming the trophy for the bottom-half group.
He also confirmed the league had received interest from Alness and Dornoch to play in this season’s Championship.
