New funding to support growth of Macclesfield's unique 'Street Blues' initiative
Macclesfield FC have risen from the ashes and are continuing to make inroads into their community after receiving funding from a ground-breaking initiative.
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.
It has now allowed the Pitching In NPL Premier Division side to expand the outreach of 'Street Blues', a bespoke sporting and physical education programme designed to support disadvantaged youngsters in the community.
“It's mainly in football but we are branching into other sports as well, where the kids can come down to a local park or venue and play that sport, said Lee Folkard, Macclesfield's head of community sports trust.
“We're also linking that into the educational side as well and getting external providers to come down and deliver sessions, be that in different sporting aspects or with the police or fire service in regards to safety.
“We've been running the scheme now for quite some time and now it's just extending it to different areas.”
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.
Macclesfield rank as one of the younger members of the footballing pyramid after its founding in 2020 following the dissolution of predecessor Macclesfield Town, but their progress has been rapid in the time since, both on and off the field.
Folkard added: “There are local clubs that charge subscriptions to their services. However, there are a lot of families that can't afford that unfortunately so we put these sessions on as a bit of fun and getting those kids off the street and giving them something to do.
“It's had a really positive effect on the area and it's really good from our point of view as a football club with everything that's happened to us in the past three-and-a-half years.
“Prior to that, as Macclesfield Town, we used to get funding to do projects like this, be it from the Premier League, charity funds or the EFL trust or the National League trust, whereas at the moment we can't do that.
“For the NPL to have funding for clubs at our level that still have community projects that link into the football club is really good.”
