The Northern Premier League Football Academy is boosting support for member clubs next season with first ever shirt sponsorship deals.
Highlighting the success and development that the NPLFA and member clubs have made in only their third full year of operation since a pilot year in 2014, the ground-breaking sponsorship deals for the 2018-19 campaign will see the logo of the EVO-STIK League’s academy adorning the home and away shirts of Mickleover Sports, Sutton Coldfield Town and Carlton Town.
Mickleover Sports’s Don Amott expressed his appreciation on behalf of his fellow chairman for the new level of support from the league-wide academy in a statement on Friday as four more clubs prepared to join the NPLFA’s increasingly successful programme in September 2018 to be ready for a 2019 start.
Amott said: “I am delighted with the partnership and I am excited by our relationship with the NPL Football Academy who are supporting us not only with this deal but also all the work they contribute to our education and football academy. This once again underlines the commitment to education and youth football and shows the ambition we have here at Mickleover Sports Football Club.”
The NPLFA said: “We have offered all our clubs in the programme this opportunity and we are delighted to engage and support three of our member clubs and hopefully we can continue each year and indeed look to increase that financial support.
“The clubs are more and more beginning to embrace the concept of the programme and are benefiting from it in a number of ways such as player progression, financial rewards for the degree programme and more and we are delighted to help.
The NPLFA spokesman added: “Our whole club package is getting stronger as the programme increases each year in its development and quality and those clubs who embrace the programme are certainly seeing a steady development process it’s great to see as we are only in its third full year.”
The NPLFA was founded with the backing of the Football Association at five pilot clubs in September 2014 to provide career pathways into the football industry with youngsters studying on two year BTEC courses.
Still the only league-wide academy in English football combining sport with education and now expanded to 12 members clubs, the NPLFA is offering its fourth intake of students this season the chance to continue their education to degree level after teaming up with Loughborough College last summer to launch a new higher education partnership.
For further details and information on the football education programme and the benefits it can bring to your club visit the website at nplfa.co.uk or contact them at info@nplfa.co.uk.