Watched golden Flatt's under 8s & 9s training at my sport shall last night with 3 adults giving there time and money no doubt to help bring these young lads into football.
We the council give concession rates of £9 per hour which is a massive help but it made me wonder if any other football body helps at this level.

The football foundation do.

http://www.footballfoundation.org.uk/ap ... -the-game/

http://www.footballfoundation.org.uk/ap ... -the-game/

I helped get Golden Flatts up and running once we transferred from Belle Vue, and ran the oldest age group, until work forced me to move away. Two other lads set the ball rolling and provided the set up for a bunch of kids (mainly from deprived areas of the town).

The Football Foundation do provide some funding but only provide 60% - 80% of the funding you require. So for Golden Flatts it is really difficult as they dont have things like changing rooms the could only need rennovating or modifying if you like, so would need to build from scratch. A new set of dressing rooms could cost in excess of £60k, so for a club like that to find £10k is nion impossible.

We pay for the power station pitch. Its expensive but we have sole use of it.

We pay £20 a week for Dykey for an hour.

Our league and referee fees we pay through sponsorships we got, and our strips are sponsored by another company.

God knows what we would have done without the sponsers.

Its not just about funding though, kids are meant to be more active these days but there is nothing or nowhere for them to go.

Wwhen I played under 14 football we had 2 divisions in Hartlepool with 14 teams in each. Thats a lot of kids playing.

Our under 14 team play in the only league in teesside. THe TJFA, and at our age group, there are just 3 teams. Us, Greatham and Seaton. One other team play in the wearside league.

Thats 4 under 14 teams in thw whole town in 2012, compared to 28 in 1980.

This is worth a look if you're looking for facilities like pitches, training space or changing rooms. http://inspiredfacilities.sportengland.org/

From conversations I've had with them they are under subscribed from the North East too and are keen to help those with good ideas and reasonable long term plans get over the application hurdles.

The match funding they need can be given in kind, so if you have a group of volunteers running a number of teams simply claim their time as match funding, and claim any discount you get on rental fees as match too.

And for £20 I have to provide the baby oil,talk and condoms.:):)

my nephew plays for golden flatts under 8/9's i think, he loves it.

Cant wait to take my son to footy when he's that age.

U14 in 1980 yeah right

Errrrrrr yes.

Chip heard today that there will be grants made available to adult teams through the F.A. shortly.

The Saturday League is dying a slow death. From sweeping the cups and finishing second a few seasons ago, our major concern now is whether we'll field a team or not. My old man has played 3 times for us this season to make up the numbers at the age of 53 (and his legs had all but went 10 years ago as well you know!) To be fair, he was man of the match in two of the games. I play for the team run by Saturday stalwart Ronnie Moore, a team that he's been involved with for over 50 years. It wouldn't surprise me if this is his last season. We've suffered from some bad injuries (me included) but most of the lads would rather get trollied on a Friday night and stay in bed all day Saturday. Pretty depressing to be honest. I've taken up road cycling because it's easier on the knee, but I think I would have called it a day at the end of the season anyway.

great news, desperately needed mouldy

What team is that? After all there is only St. James' close to 50 year mark being the oldest team in the town

Stranton, or Fens Stranton as we are known as now. I'm led to believe the club was that old by Ronnie himself? His dad ran it and he took over when he died.