Hilltop Football Club is based in Stonebridge and was founded in 2005. The club is currently a member of the Combined Counties League Premier Division and ground share with Hillingdon Borough at the Middlesex Stadium.
The club was named after a road in Stonebridge called Hilltop Avenue, where most of the players lived at the time when the club was formed.
In 2007, Hilltop joined Division Three of the Middlesex County League and gained promotion to the second division at the first attempt. Then, after just two seasons of playing in Division Two, the club left the league.
Hilltop eventually re-joined the Middlesex County League Division Two in the 2014/15 season, and the following season were relegated to Division Three having finished bottom of the league.
However, the club’s management was reformed at this point in their brief history, and success followed. After finishing second in the league, the club was promoted back to Division Two and has since enjoyed a series of triumphs. Winning the league at the first attempt and, with it, earned promotion to the Middlesex County Leagues Division One.
The 2018/19 season was another turning point for the club. At the first attempt, Hilltop won the league without losing any games and only conceded 13 goals over the whole season. The club also won the Middlesex County Junior Cup, defeating Western Athletic 6-1 in the final, but were denied a treble as they lost the final of the Jim Rodgers Presidents Cup to Clapton CFC.
After the reconstruction of the non-league football pyramid, the Hilltop were promoted to the Combined Counties Football League Division One on the back of winning the 2019/20 Middlesex County League Premier Division on points-per-game after a season that was ended early due to the Covid-19 pandemic.
In their first season as a semi-professional club, Hilltop surprised many with their style of football and managed to finish 2nd in Combined Counties Football League Division One and losing the playoff final, missing out on promotion to Combined Counties Premier Division.
However, the club was promoted to the Combined Counties Premier Division, having been offered the vacancy left by Staines Town. This makes it back-to-back promotions for Hilltop, who continue to go from strength to strength.
As the first team has risen through the leagues, the wider club has developed too. Last season, the club launched a reserve team who competed in Division One of the Middlesex County League, as well as a women’s team that compete in the Greater London Women’s Football League, not to mention a number of youth teams.
Hilltop draws many of its players from the Somali community in London, and from time to time enters Somali tournaments around the world, having done so in Canada and Somalia. The club also participates in the Somali British Champions League, of which they are the current holders.
The team’s success in recent seasons, and their exciting brand of football, has not gone unnoticed. Hilltop manager Abdullah Mohammed was recently appointed as the assistant coach of the Somali national team, and forward Ali Mohamed received a call-up to the senior Somalia side for the first time in 2021 as well.