The Football Association today outlined final plans to save £30 million a year across the FA Group by the last quarter of 2015, along with proposals to restructure the organisation and to invest in elite England teams, facilities and grassroots coaching.
The majority of the £30m has already been identified through a new Wembley Stadium refinancing agreement, general cost-savings across the organisation and a reorganisation of the Senior Management Team at Wembley Stadium and St. George’s Park.
Due to potential numbers involved in the proposed restructure a 45-day consultation process will begin shortly.
Commenting on the proposed restructure, CEO Martin Glenn said: “If The FA is to meet the emerging needs of football for at least the next 10 years we need to ensure that we prioritise and adopt the practices of leading edge organisations. By investing now we protect the future.
“To do this we need to ensure we are focusing our ambitions and putting football back at the centre of The FA. In creating this extra funding pool we can start to build more 3G pitches and create bursaries for coaches, with the ultimate ambition of resourcing our elite England teams to give them the best chance of success at tournaments.
“It's about making hard choices about what activities we want to prioritise and what we pull back from,” added Glenn.
“We have looked at other sporting organisations and similar national federations and we have found ourselves to be much larger in comparison when it comes to staff numbers, even withstanding our Wembley Stadium operation.
“Quite simply England needs more football pitches and we need more and better coaches.
“We all want our England teams to be successful. Next year we will celebrate 50 years of our greatest achievement in 1966, a moment we would like to recapture. A look at the relative achievement of our women’s team in the summer tells us that the appetite for tournament success is there and achievable.
“The down side to this is that we are likely to have to lose a significant number of posts within The FA. It will be no reflection whatsoever on any of the individuals impacted during this period, but it is clear that the need for change is compelling.
“Pending a consultation we will hope to complete the organisational changes by the end of November and in doing so we want to be fair to those staff that may be affected.”
