What We Fund

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Our model is based on awarding grant funding to existing delivery partners in order to increase the impact of their activities.

We focus on existing delivery partners as we know they have a proven track record of success, established engagement with the target beneficiaries and a deep understanding of effectively delivering football-based activities. We ensure that these delivery partners are aligned with our purpose and values, and adhere to the same high standards that we have in areas such as Governance, Safeguarding, ED&I and Data Protection.

We focus on grant funding as an effective way of enhancing the delivery that is already taking place. Our robust screening and assessment process means we ensure grants are awarded where they will have the most positive impact for our beneficiaries. We also distribute these grants with sustainability in mind, so that we can be confident that the benefits and impact will continue after the grant has ended.

We focus on impact as we know it is important to quantify and understand the benefits that our grants are having. This is not only good governance, but it also helps with establishing and sharing best practises, key learnings and avoiding repeating any mistakes. We document and share this information not only with our grant recipients, but also publicly to maximise the benefit from it.

Our target beneficiaries are those from a lower socio-economic group and those with a disability.

We define lower socio-economic group through the National Statistics Socio-Economic Classification (NS-SEC) classification. The “lower socio-economic groups” are defined as NS-SEC groups six to eight, and include people aged between 16 and 74 who work in semi-routine occupations (such as bus drivers or hairdressers), routine occupations (such as cleaners or waiters) or who have never worked or are long-term unemployed.

We define disability through social model term, ‘disabled people’. This term refers to people who have a long-standing and limiting disability or illness. A person can have a long-standing disability or illness without it being limiting.