12 February 2015

Thousands of people who dedicate their time to making sport a great experience for everyone can now get free and practical help to run their grassroots clubs.

Whether they’re a club chair writing a plan to attract new members, a treasurer managing budgets or a club captain asking existing members what they want, Club Matters – the new online support tool created by Sport England – can help their clubs to thrive.

Club Matters offers a wide range of tools, top tips and quick and easy guides to help with the day-to-day running of clubs, including:

• Workshops – Free and short training sessions delivered across the country by experts on a range of specific areas.
• Mentoring – Either for long term support, or just a short call to sound out ideas, Club Matters’ flexible mentoring scheme offers personal support at a time and place to suit.
• Club Improvement Plans – Online resource for clubs of all sizes and at all stages of their development, to establish where they are performing well and where they can develop.
• Club Views – A club survey tool helping users to ask members and volunteers what they think about their club, and make suggestions.
• Clubmark – The nationally-acknowledged accreditation scheme for community sports clubs. As part of Clubmark accreditation, clubs will have the opportunity to request a Club Matters mentor to help them through the accreditation process.
• Online Support – Help and guidance in all areas of running a sports club. This includes online toolkits, quick reference guides and e-learning modules.

Nick Bitel, Sport England’s chairman, said:

“Sports clubs play an important role in community sport – providing sporting opportunities for millions of people every week.

“But clubs need committed people to run them. It’s the people whoorganise the events and encourage new members to join that keep clubs going. They’re the ones that can benefit directly from this.

“Club Matters has been carefully designed to give those involved in running clubs what they want, in a simple, easy to access way. We’ve worked to create a single support package which is open to any club that wants support and information. And importantly, it’s free.

“No matter the size of the sports club, this is a great tool and something that I know people will find incredibly useful.”

Club Matters brings together a number of existing sports club tools, including:

• Clubmark – The nationally-acknowledged accreditation scheme for community sports clubs.
• Club Leaders – Free training and support to people doing the day-to-day running of community sport.
• Help for Clubs – Sport England’s club web pages.

Joanne Robb, who founded Inspire Gymnastics Academy in Nottingham after London 2012, feels that Club Matters is set to be invaluable.

She said:

“There’s a big push for grassroots sport that relies very heavily on volunteers and local clubs. If clubs don’t get it right and don’t give young people a good experience, it can potentially put them off.

“Hopefully this new package of support to clubs is going to help us be in a better position to give a quality experience.”

All of the Club Matters resources are available at: www.sportenglandclubmatters.com

Over the next eight months, Sport England will be holding sessions throughout the country to demonstrate Club Matters to people from sports clubs, sports governing bodies and county sports partnerships.

 To find out when Club Matters is visiting your nearest location, visit the Club Matters website above.