Kidsgrove Sports Centre awarded funding to revamp indoor football facilities

People living in Kidsgrove, Newcastle-under-Lyme and Stoke-on-Trent North are set to benefit from fresh investment into local indoor football facilities.

Kidsgrove Sports Centre Community Group (CIO) have been awarded a grant from the Premier League, The FA and Government’s Football Foundation, to install a new sports hall floor which will enable the development and promotion of football and futsal at Kidsgrove Sports Centre.

The Football Foundation is the UK’s largest sports charity and exists to improve the experience of playing football for everyone, by championing fair access to quality facilities. The grant will enable Kidsgrove Sports Centre, which is a community owned and operated leisure centre – reopening to the public Spring 2022 – the chance to provide high quality indoor Football and Futsal facilities within the Kidsgrove, Newcastle-
under-Lyme and Stoke-on-Trent North area, thus promoting and increasing the levels activity and participation within the local community.

The Sports Hall is the largest in the Newcastle under Lyme Borough and will now for the first time have
facilities which will cater for the provision of Fustal. Players will be able to enjoy a specialist Football and Futsal approved indoor sports surface, alongside a fully refurbished sports hall, which will represent a significant improvement on the previously installed surface which was 30 years old and in need of renovation.

Kidsgrove Sports Centre Community Group (CIO) have worked with the Football Foundation and the Staffordshire FA to secure a £18,542 grant towards the project.

Mark Clews, Kidsgrove Sports Centre Community Group Chair, said: “We are exceptionally delighted to have secured this Football Foundation grant which will enable the installation of a new sports hall floor, which will enable Kidsgrove Sports Centre to provide outstanding Football and Futsal provision to local clubs and the community. We have always been exceptionally keen to develop and promote the sport of Futsal within the local area, something which previously has been restricted due the size of hall which is typically required to play the indoor game.”

Kevin Staples, Head of Delivery at the Staffordshire Football Association, said: “The award of this grant will help ensure that local grassroots football clubs and the community of Kidsgrove have an excellent facility to use and help continue to support Futsal in the North of the County. There are a limited number of futsal pitches in the County, so this new Futsal space will help continue the opportunity for players to develop their skills by using Futsal as a development tool, and enable more people from the community to utilise the space and be more physically and socially active.”

Robert Sullivan, Chief Executive of the Football Foundation, said: “This grant award to Kidsgrove Sports Centre Community Group (CIO) towards the installation of a new sports hall floor suitable for futsal and football is great news for the local community. It will support people’s ability to play our national game locally and therefore help unlock football’s many benefits to physical and mental wellbeing. That’s why we’re committed to transforming the face of grassroots football facilities in this country. It’s therefore very welcome news to hear that this funding will support Kidsgrove Sports Centre Community Group (CIO) in installing a new sports hall floor, which will promote and provide facilities for the sport of football and futsal within their local community.

“The Football Foundation is working closely with our partners – the Premier League, The FA, government and Sport England – support facility development projects like this across the country over the next decade to transform our grassroots game and unlock the power of pitches.”