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Irish Football Association in partnership with Leeds Metropolitan University
25/10/05
Bobby Jameson, Chairman of the IPL said, “This
is a unique partnership and the first of its kind in local football.
Being able to draw on the expertise of the university will help
the league develop and hopefully grow new supporters.”
The Vice-Chancellor of Leeds Metropolitan University,
Professor Simon Lee:
“ We are delighted to become the official partners of the Irish Football
Association. Leeds Met has a great pioneering tradition in sport, education,
coaching and community involvement. Our faculty of sport and education is called
Carnegie as this was the name of one of our founding colleges which has educated
so many outstanding characters, including our Chancellor, Brendan
Foster.
“One of our first Carnegie students in the 1930s was Walter Winterbottom, who also played for Manchester United. He turned to coaching after serious health problems and then became a Carnegie lecturer. In the 1940s, 1950s and into the 1960s, he was also England’s first football manager and established a coaching structure. The FA spotted his coaching potential at a Carnegie summer school on our Headingley campus.
“We stepped in the summer before last when a local football club, Bradford City, was in difficulties and we have helped them with community outreach. Bradford College, which has some similarities to the Belfast Institute of Further & Higher Education, is one of the founding partners of our regional university network, which now numbers 12 colleges and 250,000 students and already ranges as far north as Newcastle. At Leeds Met we have 41,000 students of our own.
“Most of our world-class local rugby league team, the Leeds Rhinos, are students of ours. The world club challenge against the Australian champions also carries our Carnegie name. Leeds Met Carnegie has just played our first game in the new Netball Superleague, drawing with Celtic Dragons, which includes most of the Welsh national team. One of the premier hockey teams in England, Wakefield Ladies, also wear Carnegie on their shirts. Our football teams compete at the highest levels against other universities and in the wider leagues of Yorkshire. Our women’s and men’s football teams won during our annual varsity day against the University of Leeds earlier this month, when more than three thousand students watched us round off the day by winning the final rugby union match at Headingley Carnegie Stadium, where a new Carnegie Stand is being built in a partnership between Leeds Met and Leeds Rugby.
“Low cost travel to Leeds Bradford and other northern airports makes it possible for this partnership to cross the Irish Sea in both directions. We have featured our Leeds Rhino rugby playing students to highlight our ‘low-charging, high impact’ approach to lifelong learning. As we are so large, we can afford economies of scale, enabling us to be the only university in England to be charging £2000 pa to full-time students next year. We have a particular interest in combining mass participation in this way with world-class performance in the spirit of our Chancellor’s Great North Run. We would welcome more students from Northern Ireland and more ways of developing sporting and educational opportunities in partnership, as we strive to be a great north uni.”
At a meeting in Belfast between the chairmen and managers of the Irish Football League, the Irish Football Association and Professor Simon Lee, Vice-Chancellor of Leeds Metropolitan University the following comments were share publicly with journalists from Northern Ireland.
Howard Wells, CEO Irish Football Association
“This is a big step for the IFA, a partnership that will
really add value and allow us to nurture and track talented football
players. As a former student of Leeds Met I’m particularly
delighted that the IFA has in partnership with such a well established
organisation that has a great reputation, going back to 1933
with the Carnegie Institute. It’s a great idea for Leeds
Met to market itself overseas and I’m sure the relationship
will develop into a great partnership. We have massive support
for our leagues and I hope this will be a real step forward to
promote local football. I’m sure our local educational
establishments will look on this curiously and hopefully talk
to us about how we can involve them.”
Bobby Jameson, Chairman of the Irish Premier League
“This is a wonderful opportunity to develop a new partnership,
from little acorns grow great things. I know that in our clubs
membership includes young people and this is a great opportunity
to engage kids to focus on their education and to look long and
hard in to their future through for example seminars, scholarship
and marketing via the partnership.”
Ronnie McFall, Manager of Portadown Football Club
“Clubs and their communities can only benefit from this
partnership; everyone involved is to be congratulated for making
it happen.”
Roy McCreadie, Manager of Newry City Football Club, reiterated what Ronnie McFalls said adding “The partnership was a fantastic opportunity that would really benefit Irish football.”
Jim Gracey, Sports reporter, Sunday Life, Belfast Telegraph
“This is great and like nothing I remember in Irish football,
mainly it will raise brand awareness [of Leeds Met] and we’ll
support that. Leeds Met is buying into football and our academic
skills, you’re very welcome in Ireland and thank you kindly
for showing such interest.”
