Bridlington hoping to revolutionise female football in East Yorkshire

The club are among the latest recipients of a grant from the Trident Community Foundation, established by league sponsors Pitching In, a multi-million-pound grassroots sport investment programme powered by Entain.

Having previously used the funding towards a successful disability football scheme, Bridlington hope to enjoy similar success in allowing girls and women in the area to fully take part in the beautiful game.

"This time around, we thought that it would be an excellent vehicle to allow us to explore our vision moving forward, which is to have a ladies team and get more participation in the area from ladies and girls in football,” said the club's chief executive Gavin Branton.

“The grant will enable us to push that vision forward as we go towards the new season where we'll have a ladies team playing in one of the local leagues.

“It will also allow us to have girls participating as well and moving forward we might be able to have a girls' team associated with Bridlington Town as well.

“It'll allow us to offer football to girls and women at Bridlington Town, which we aren't been able to do at present.”

The ground-breaking Trident Community Foundation initiative sees Step 3 and 4 clubs receive grants of up to £5,000 to launch new or expand existing community-based project and has awarded more than £400,000 to clubs since its launch in 2020.

The Seasiders, currently mid-table in the Pitching In NPL Division One East, have witnessed first-hand how the grants can break down barriers and Branton is excited to see their latest plans develop.

He added: “As with all non-league clubs at our level, cash is difficult. We always look at ways to generate cash and this enables us to not worry about how it's going to be paid for.

"We've now got that money to make sure that we fully engage and bring sport forwards in the area to girls and ladies.

“We'll be looking at the infrastructure of that running up to Christmas and then putting it into practice afterwards.

“That will allow us time to publicise what we want to do and get the right people in place to provide that. I'm really looking forward to it.” 

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