Hamilton Parish have set the bar high for the upcoming 2026-27 First Division campaign.

The rejuvenated Hot Peppers have rejoined the league after being removed by Bermuda Football Association last season and are hoping to return with a bang by pulling off the coveted First Division and Shield double.

“The expectation is to definitely mount a challenge for the title in the First Division and also the Shield, and with the guys that we've got I think it should be a good run for us,” Reid Trott, the Hamilton Parish Workman’s Club vice-president, told The Royal Gazette.

In the wake of losing 16 members of their squad over the 2025-26 summer transfer window and then coach Sergio Goater, the BFA removed Hamilton Parish from the First Division last season after the Crawl Hill club withdrew from the FA Cup and also forfeited two league matches because of a lack of numbers.

In accordance with section 7 of the General Rules for Divisional Competitions — Failure to Play and Abandonment — a team that defaults three matches within a season will be prohibited from participating in any additional competitions related to that division for the remainder of the season.

The club have since replenished and revived their senior programme from the “ground up” and are now looking forward to what they hope will be a brighter future ahead.

“It feels good to be back in the league and I knew we would be back. We were always planning on coming back once we found out we were dropping out, so that was inevitable to happen,” Trott said.

The senior club executive conceded being removed from the league was a bitter pill to swallow.

“It was very disappointing but a lot of players left; we lost 16 players that season. We tried to keep the team going with what we had, but it just didn't work out through work, family commitments or whatever. It didn't pan out how we thought it would and we just had to drop out unfortunately,” he said.

“It was a very big disappointment because no team want to dismantle and have to drop out of the league and deal with trying to rebuild another team to come back into the league. That's just as hard, and I'm pretty sure that won't happen this season. Hopefully this season we can show teams what Hamilton Parish is all about actually.”

In a reversal of fortunes, Hot Peppers benefited the most during this summer’s transfer window with 26 players either joining or rejoining their ranks from both divisions.

“We knew a lot of guys were going to come back,” Trott said.

“I think a lot of guys didn't want to leave. It was just the fact that Hamilton Parish didn't have a team at the time to really play, so they had to do what they had to do to keep fit and keep playing football. But we knew a lot of our players would come back.”

Among those rejoining Hot Peppers are Quinn Outerbridge and Leroy Lewis.

Trott is particularly excited to have regained the services of central defender Outerbridge.

“Quinn is a huge personality and we’re glad to have him back,” he said.

“He's one of the experienced players and I'm pretty sure people around him are definitely going to feed off his energy and playing style on the field.”

Trott is even more delighted to have an influx of young players join the club as they look to rebuild for the future.

“A lot of the guys that we have signed are young players. We do have a lot of older, experienced guys in the team, but a lot of the guys we've brought in are young guys that we've now possibly even created an under-18 team, so it worked very well for us.

“It's definitely a bonus and ultimately what we wanted to do. We wanted to bring out a youth team and bring out more in seasons to come, so it worked out pretty well with it happening in the first for at least one of our youth teams to come back to life.”

While they have plenty of players in their roster, Parish’s search for a new coach continues.

“We are not too sure on that right now,” Trott said. “We don't have that worked out yet.”