It has been a successful season for the entire Futsal squad taking part in the Football League Trust’s Futsal Education Programme. With the talent that arrived in September, in the form of our new first years, there was to be healthy competition for games in the five teams we have at the Community Trust. We have seen a huge improvement in the technical and tactical ability of all of our students.
We hope that come September this year, with even more new recruits, we can have the same impact and continue to develop. The discipline of the players, in terms of behaviour on the pitch, has been spot on receiving just two red cards across all teams this season.
Seven of our students were selected for trials at the North West Centre of Excellence this year with one of our students, James Poxon, cementing a place in the NW squad. Next season we hope to increase that number further.
We reached the National Semi Finals of the FLT Plate losing out to Bristol City who went on to beat Chelsea in the final. This is a great achievement as we didn’t make it through the first stage last season.
Congratulations need to go out to our two top Goal scorers Steven Linecar and Tony Penfold who both finished the season off with 22 goals.
Our A team finished third this year missing out on the national play-offs by just 3 points, which is a tremendous achievement considering we finished in last place last season.
The B team started off well, but displayed inconsistent performances as the season went on. With the side being predominantly first years, we hope that they can learn from experience and improve next time round.
Our C team finished off in fourth position against some really competitive sides with strong programmes and were deserved of their mid table slot.
The D team have had a very difficult season, playing in a C league with some extremely strong competition. In their very last fixture they managed a draw against Bradford which shows how far they’ve come tactically and physically matching Bradford showing that desire is a big part of the game.
The E side finished in third place seeing solid performances from Connor Redman and goalkeepers Ryann Eaves and Jordan Huddart on a regular basis.
Fantastic progress has been made, with students for next year signing up daily, and we hope next season we can go one better and be title contenders and have another good cup run.
With funding raised by the students, they are able to travel to Alicante for a pre season training camp and fixture with Racing Club Dinamita Albatera Futbol Sala which will be a great experience for everyone involved and get us off to a great start next season.
The educational side of the course has also gone from strength to strength, all of the students are on track to achieve fantastic results and the Community Trust look set to be at the top of the educational league table once again. The Year 1 students have made great progress and all of them will complete the year with at least MMM (Merit, Merit, Merit), this grade is the national average set for students enrolled on a BTEC Level 3 course. 12 of the Year 1 learners look set to finish the year on target to achieve the highest possible grade D*D*D*.
The Year 2 learners, who last year as a cohort achieved the best results in the country, have done it again, the best way to describe the second years’ achievements is that they have finished top of the league by a country mile. A MASSIVE 14 out of the 18 learners finished with D*D*D*, three learners finished with D*D*D and one learner in DDM, this grade profile has been described by our external partners TVS Education as the best they have EVER had in the three years the course has been running. Not bad considering some of the learners struggled within a school environment!
14 of the Year 2 students will now go on to complete their Foundation Degree In Community Football Coaching and Development, one student has been offered a scholarship at the International Futsal Academy based at Loughborough University, two students are going to UCLan to study Sports Coaching and one learner has been accepted into the army.
If you are aged 16 or 17 and are interested in playing Futsal next year we are running a BTEC Level 2 in Sport and a BTEC Level 3 Extended Diploma with Futsal. If you’re looking to go down the coaching route we are also running a BTEC Level 3 in sports coaching. For more information contact Blackpool FC Community Trust on 01253 348691
