Mulroy Soccer Academy have received an invitation from the FAI to attend a UEFA Workshop in Frankfurt, Germany next month.
UEFA are inviting two clubs from a range of UEFA countries to participate in the workshop and each National Football Associations select two clubs to attend.
The workshop is about Social Return on Investment (SROI), a new UEFA initiative that measures the impact of football in a country from a social, economic, health and high performance perspective.
The FAI have selected Mulroy as their rural club, while Broadford Rovers (based in Dublin) have been picked as the urban club.
Mulroy coaching co-ordinator Fergus McAteer will attend the workshop along with a representative from Broadford, and Vincent Foley from the FAI, at the German FA Headquarters in Frankfurt, Germany on Wednesday December 11.
McAteer explained how Mulroy were selected to attend the prestigious event.
“We are one of 25 clubs in the country that have achieved the Club Mark Entry Level Award.
“We are also one of ten clubs that have been selected to go on a new pilot programme, the FAI Club Mark One Star Award.
“The club mark is like a quality mark against your club in relation to your governance and administration, and policies and programmes that you run as well as your coaching model.
“The FAI came out and assessed the club and it’s about driving the standards and practises of a club up.”
Mulroy Academy was established in 2002 by the founding members: Eamon McConigley, Colm McGonigle and McAteer.
They provide both competitive and non-competitive soccer for both boys and girls of all age groups from Under 6 to Under 16.
McAteer and the Mulroy Academy have their house in order and know the importance of organisation.
“With the way things have gone, how good a club is off the field has a big impact on how good they are on it.
“You have to try and make sure you’re running the club correctly, and are keeping an eye on budgets, and child protection, and policies and so on.
“I’m the coaching co-ordinator and we have come up with our own blueprint and coaching plan.
“The day of sending out the Under 12 coach with a bag of balls and saying see you at the end of the season are gone.
“Coach Education has been a very successful part of the FAI’s Player Development Plan. When you coach your coaches, you’re the better for it.”
In 2016, Mulroy Academy were in the local press for the wrong reasons as they had to cease their training sessions for a short period of time.
However, they soon got the show back on the road, and McAteer says this recognition is a real shot in the arm for the work that is being done down in the Fanad area.
“It’s a great boost for the club and the committee.
“A couple of years ago there were some high-profile issues and the club almost folded.
“But it was actually a real turning point for us because we re-grouped and started to get the structures in place.
“We got the right people in the right places, and I have to say that we have a really good hard-working committee there now and we have a good bond with the parents and the coaches, and this recognition from the FAI and UEFA is testament to the good work we have been doing.”
UEFA GROW has adapted the SROI model to include grassroots football, with a view to assessing the impact that the sport has on any particular country.
The focus is on four key fields – economic, social, health and high performance (in football) to ascertain the impact that mass participation in football has had in these areas. Finally monetary value is placed on the proven benefits in the first three of these fields.
A presentation on Mulroy will take place in Frankfurt and it will try to help towards putting a value on their role in the community and the proven benefit of football as a whole.
McAteer is looking forward to attending the workshop and it will be a great opportunity to network with similar-minded people from different countries.
“The great thing about this workshop is that it will be attended by all grassroots clubs and that’s where it is.
“We’re part of the Letterkenny & District League which are a great help to us, and we’re lucky that we have a lot of good well-run clubs around us, and I always say that our greatest resource is each other.
“It will be good to go over and talk to clubs from other countries and see how they run their clubs and the coaching models they have, and how they cater for players at non-competitive age groups and so on.
“It will be a very beneficial trip for the club.”