Non-League and Academy football writer

Rafael Trape is the chairman of Middlesex Division One (East & Central) side LBS Lions. The club whose first team will be playing in the East & Central division (step 8) of the Middlesex County Football League this season, were playing in the South & West Division (they finished second in that division) during the 2023/24 season. Having finished runners up to an excellent SL Benfica side (in the South & West Division), last season, LBS Lions will likely be up there challenging for the Division One (East & Central) title, in 2024/25. However, I recently had the pleasure of speaking to Rafael Trape, about a bit of the history of LBS Lions, as well as some of his memories of the club and their senior Saturday side, so far.

Could you talk me through a bit about your background in football?

Rafael: I’m from Brazil, and throughout my youth I played football. I’ve always loved the sport, and so I played in some football competitions with my school, etc. So although I played at a good level I never really considered pursuing a career in football, as a professional. So I went on to study at university, and I’ve have since gone on to work in finance, which is what I currently do as a job. Back in 2013 I moved to London, as I chose to do a masters in finance, which was at the London Business School, which is where the LBS part of LBS Lions comes from. So at the university we had a football club, and I ended up joining that team. I then became the captain of that team, and I just loved playing football over here. I did an FA coaching course (up to level 2), which was mostly for personal interest, rather than changing profession or anything like that.

Would you be able to talk me through how the idea of starting the club (LBS Lions) came about? 

Rafael: So it came about as the result of a natural progression. In the university I was really enjoying playing for a team, and then once I had finished my studies I was thinking that I’d definitely like to continue playing football, and I wanted to find a way of continuing playing football. I basically gathered a group of people together, and many of them had also been LBS students/alumni. From that group I wanted to see what we could do, and then we would join the same Sunday league which we had been playing in for the university team. So I started it all as a bit of an alumni team, and back then we didn’t even have a name for this team. So I have a good friend of mine from Brazil, who was a footballer. He is called Kaká. In 2014/15 I can remember mentioning to him about having started this team in London, and so I wanted to go for a neutral colour for our shirts, which probably no other team uses. At that time Kaká was playing in the US, for Orlando City, and he was about to retire. 

I said to Kaká that I was thinking of buying some Orlando City jerseys for my team, and so I asked him whether there was a way of me buying them, and he just said leave it with me, and how many did you need. He would end up sending us the kit of Orlando City, which we used for the first year. And then later on when someone asked me what this club’s name should be, I told them that I wasn’t sure. But with the logo of Orlando City, there was a big lion on it, and so I said that we were going to be the LBS Lions! Everything just evolved from there. We had a lot of alumni as part of this team, and I happened to know a number of the Brazilians who were also a part of the team. We’ve also had some interesting players play for LBS Lions over the years, such as Edgar Davids and someone who played for the Brazil national team (when we won the World Cup in 1994) called Raí. But that was the initial history of the Lions, pretty much.

Could you talk me through some of the history of LBS Lions, since it was founded?

Rafael: So we started playing Sunday league football in 2015 and we joined the  second division of the London Accountants Football League, which was a league that has/had changed, but it’s a very old league. This particular league mostly had teams from accountancy firms, but also companies such as Amazon and J.P. Morgan. It was Sunday league and so it was amateur in some ways, but it was also quite well organised, and it was a decent standard of football as well. In our first season in division two/one there were about 20 teams competing in it, but in our first year we’d already won the second division, and so we got promoted to the first division. Since then we would basically win the first division every year, and even in the year that we didn’t, we still won the league cup. Playing in that league cup final was also really cool, because we played at the home ground of Hampton & Richmond. 

I started a second team of the LBS Lions, because the level of the first team was getting higher and higher, and also I wanted to continue playing myself. After all of this time in Sunday league, someone said to me that we are of the level to play in a Saturday league. That was when we created the third team and we moved the Lions’ first team to the Saturday leagues, in the Middlesex League. So two years ago we were in the East & Central division, and we actually did quite well during our first season in the Middlesex League. We had six or nine points deducted because we had a player who didn’t have international clearance, but we finished third in the league that season. We drew against Camden & Islington United twice, and then we played against Soccer Stars Fennecs, and I can’t remember it very well, but I think that we were unlucky in one of our games with them. As we only had one substitute during that match.

So in our first year we did well in the Middlesex League, but then the league asked us to move to the South & West division, for the following season. We did pretty well in that league last season, finishing second to an amazing team called SL Benfica. We actually did pretty well against them when we played against them last season, and we could have won that game. It was 2-2 at one stage, and we were pushing and pressing to find a winner. But we couldn’t find the third goal, and then they went and scored the third on the counter, and then we started playing really attacking football, but they scored one or two more goals. So we’ve enjoyed playing in the East & Central and South & West Division, so far.

What have been some of your standout memories of LBS Lions, since the club was formed?

Rafael: We are actually quite different to the other clubs, as we are mostly a group of friends, and we don’t want to achieve too much, even though we still want to win, but we are more relaxed as a club. I think that the thing that stands out the most for me in this league, is we’d do our usual warmup with our 11 players and two or three subs. I can remember arriving at our first game of the Middlesex League, and the other team had about 20 people with them, and five of them were part of their coaching staff, as well as quite a lot of people who were watching the game. We were really amazed by this, as they were really taking things seriously. Even an hour before the game had started the other team were preparing their warmup, by putting the cones down on the pitch. So this is something that really stood out to me.

We are not just an international group/club, with many of us coming from the London Business School, but we help other people from the club to find jobs in sports management and finance, etc. So the networking is great, and a lot of us help people within the club to find jobs, which is something that I think is really good.

What were some of your thoughts on last season (2023/24) for LBS Lions, at step 8 of the Middlesex League? 

Rafael: Across all teams in that division last season, there was a really good level. For example, during the year before in the East & Central, there was some very strong teams, and also some teams who weren’t very strong. But last year in the South & West, all teams were pretty level. Of course Benfica was a level above everyone else, but all of the teams were of a good standard, and there was also a team called Sporting Duet Academy, who were a great side. And I think that they will win that division this season. The game against Benfica during last season, was our standout game. We played some incredible football, and even their coach came to me and said that they’d never played against a team like us before, and that we were the best team that they’d played against.

In your opinion, who has been the best/most difficult team (for their quality) that LBS Lions has played?

Rafael: It would be SL Benfica, by far! And that team had a lot of Brazilian players in their team, as well.

Looking ahead to the new season for LBS Lions in the East & Central division of the Middlesex League, what are some of your thoughts/hopes for this season?

Rafael: I can remember Soccer Stars Fennecs and Camden & Islington United’s first teams before, and they were very competitive teams in that division. Now they have their reserve squads, and those sides are going to be big challengers, I reckon. Also, I think that FC Marylebone has improved a lot from a couple of years ago, and I think that Westminster & Kensington are another good side from that division. We want to win the league next season, but I’m not sure if we’re ready for that next step, with the amount of games and also the travelling that there would be.

What are some of your hopes for the future for LBS Lions?

Rafael: I think that at the moment we are at the right level, and we just want to continue to enjoy our football, and not be too stressed with our football. So for the future we want to stay at a similar level to where we are now. Also, I think that I can say that we are the most international club in the world, as we have players from over 50 countries across our three different teams. We even play our own World Cup competition as a club, with the teams representing their countries.