Fair Game update -- the latest on the campaign to reboot football

By Ray Simpson

Fair Game update -- the latest on the campaign to reboot football

The campaign gathers momentum

Here's the latest update from Fair Game, and their chief executive Niall Couper.

You can sign up to the newsletter here:

https://www.fairgameuk.org/subscribe-to-our-newsletter

 

News

It's been a week where politics have taken central stage. 
  • On Wednesday, Oliver Dowden was replaced as Secretary of State for Digital, Culture, Media and Sport by Nadine Dorries, the MP for mid-Bedfordshire. It is on her watch that the very future of our national game now depends. We look forward to working with her in the weeks and months ahead in a constructive way.

Meanwhile, we received a number of new political endorsements. 
  • Yesterday, Tim Farron the former Lib Dem leader has given his full support, read about that here.
  • On Sunday, the Conservative MP Damian Green was unequivocal in his backing for Fair Game in a live interview on BBC South, a view echoed by the Labour MP for Canterbury Rosie Duffield


New support
 
The week we are also delighted to welcome three new clubs:
  • Altrincham from the National League
  • Doncaster Rovers from League One
  • Shrewsbury Town from League One
Brian Caldwell, CEO of Shrewsbury, was quick off the mark and was on BBC Radio Shropshire espousing the virtues of Fair Game. Thanks Brian! Doncaster Rovers will officially announce their involvement in the next few hours.

Also, we officially announced Dion DublinBrian Deane and Adrian Goldberg as our new ambassadors. You can read about that here.
 

The auction League table

All the shirts from our launch event (signed by representatives of the clubs present) are now on eBay. The funds raised will be split three ways. One third to the club concerned for their community work, one third to Fair Game, and the final third to Her Game Too.

Her Game Too are partners of Fair Game and are doing a fantastic job in tackling discrimination against women and girls at football.

So how is your club doing? As of 6am this morning, here are the latest bids...

1, Bury AFC £53: https://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/185048240057
2, Rochdale AFC £42: https://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/185047891780
3, Cambridge £31: https://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/185048229500
4, Chesterfield £30: https://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/185048216606
5, AFC Wimbledon £27: https://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/185048236410
6, Bristol Rovers £26: https://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/185047893144
7, Accrington Stanley £25: https://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/185048217869
8, Carlisle United £25: https://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/185048247949
9, Dorking Wanderers £25: https://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/185048213559
10, Grimsby Town £25: https://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/185047894638
11, Lincoln City £25: https://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/185048238290
12, Maidstone United £25: https://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/185048226931
13, Newport County AFC £25: https://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/185048242755
14, Tonbridge Angels £25: https://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/185047889549
15, Leyton Orient £22: https://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/185048253866
16, Chester £20: https://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/185048221560
17, Curzon Ashton £20: https://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/185048245340
18, Darlington £20: https://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/185048215126
19, Ebbsfleet United £20: https://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/185048223092
20, Luton Town £20: https://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/185048225045
21, Worcester City £20: https://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/185047894076
22, Basingstoke Town £15: https://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/185047886923

Get promoting your club!!
 

Volunteering

Our No 1 ask right now is for time-rich volunteers with excellent project management skills. We need people to help coordinate our various work streams. If that's you or you know someone who that could be. Please ask them to get in touch asap. Fair Game is growing massively and we need as much high quality support as possible. Email me here
 

LinkedIn help

A lot of potential backed and supporters of Fair Game are using LinkedIn before speaking to me. If you could spare a little time to write a quick recommendation that would help us as an organisation. To add a recommendation go here
 

Promotion and merchandise

Fair Game survives on its profile and we would encourage you all to promote and retweet us wherever possible.

If you would like something visual, we have also been busy working on an ad, which we have now completed. And can be used in club programmes, websites, blogs, magazines and so on. You can download it here. If you would like the ad to be personalised for you do please get in touch with our head of marketing Jonny Kerr.

We also now starting a merchandising range with profits going to Fair Game. If you fancy getting your hands on a Fair Game mug click here.
 

Next steps

We believe that Tracey Crouch's report will be finalised in the next two weeks and circulated to ministers. However, that doesn't meant the work stops for our excellent advisors.

While we remain hopeful the report will be positive, we are keen to make sure it both includes our main asks and doesn't become a dusty document on the shelf.

We are looking at various ways to make our various proposals outlined in our 48-page document Putting Pride Back In The Shirt reality. This could be either in primary or secondary legislation, tweaking existing laws, adding amendments to upcoming Bills or adjusting the rules of the governing football bodies.

That work is being led by our advisors Kevin Carpenter and James Allen and we are in the process of getting further pro-bono support to help.
 

In The Wider Interests Podcasts

Episode 5 with the brilliant Phillipe Auclair, the England Correspondent for France Football, and New York Times reporter and author of Football's secret Trade Tariq Panja, is now live. Listen here

And we are now planning our next episode with our new ambassadors.

All our podcasts are hosted by Kevin Borras
 

Club Update

The 29 Fair Game clubs are: Accrington Stanley, AFC Wimbledon, Altrincham, Basingstoke Town, Bath City, Bury AFC, Bristol Rovers, Cambridge United, Carlisle United, Chester, Chesterfield, City of Liverpool, Curzon Ashton, Darlington FC, Doncaster Rovers, Dorking Wanderers, Ebbsfleet United, Gateshead, Grimsby Town, Leyton Orient, Lincoln City, Luton Town, Maidstone United, Newport County AFC, Rochdale AFC, Shrewsbury Town, Tonbridge Angels, Tranmere Rovers and Worcester City