Sport North East ISSUE 01 | Page 4

Northumberland FA FOLLOW US ONLINE TWITTER.COM/SPORTNEMAG Northumberland FA The Northumberland FA plays a crucial role in helping the game to develop in their area and have some exciting plans in place for 2019. Sport NE Magazine recently caught up with their Commercial Manager Andrew Cook and CEO John Ackerley to find out more. SNE: Could you tell us a little more about the main aims and objectives of the Northumberland FA? JA: The current agreed tagline of our company is ‘Inspiring All To Take Part In Football’ this is really at the heart of everything that we do. This overarching vision is underpinned by our three key strategic objectives; making football safe, improving the quality of football and increasing participation. When we are deciding to put on a new event or fund a scheme the staff group must ask themselves whether one or more of our objectives is being recognised through putting that scheme or event in place for football. If the answer is no, then we have to work to ensure the venture can be molded to meet our expected model. AC: From a personal point of view, the plan is to rapidly commercialise certain parts of Northumberland FA as a business; up until about 2 ½ years ago the Association had no commercial contracts in place and many of its commercial agreements were simply done through a handshake. At the time that was ok, however that also represented a great deal of risk for the Association as to whether our partner or sponsor was still going to be there season on season. Since then we have worked hard to put in place a robust infrastructure to protect our investment into the game. Now this baseline work has been done we are looking to expand our network and diversify our partnerships to work with forward thinking organisations for the betterment of the game in Northumberland. SNE: How’s the general mood there at the moment? AC: This time of year becomes really busy for Northumberland FA, we are on the cusp of cup finals season where we rollout some sixteen cup finals across the full spectrum of the male and female game as well as, for the first time, hosting our inaugural Fair Play Cup Final. All in all, the mood is positive however our staff, board of directors and council are well aware of the hard work and long hours which goes into the culmination of the grassroots football calendar. We hope that for the first time we will have not one, but two of our county cup finals held at Newcastle United’s St James’ Park. Northumberland FA is incredibly lucky to have a fantastic working relationship with the club and our Techflow Marine Senior Cup Final has been hosted at the venue for as long as I can remember, it is hoped through our longstanding relationship with another sponsor, Stelrad, that players from outside of the national league pyramid will have the chance to play at a world class venue. #REEVESGRASSROOTS Investing in the future www.reevesifa.com 4 Issue 01