Darlington Football club would like to announce that Richard Cook has been appointed as a new director of the club.

Richard, 42, has been a fan for over 29 years and lives in Darlington with his wife and son. He currently works for the Lend Lease Group who are a leading international Property & Construction company with operations in Australia, Asia, Europe and the Americas. Richard is Director of Lend Lease's European business with responsibility for its UK Residential development business.

He is well connected and has a network of contacts especially within the Property and Construction sector within the North East, his obvious construction experience will be invaluable working alongside Malcolm Cundick, Blackwell Meadows Project Manager.

“My first game was in 1987,” says Richard. “I’ve still got the programme – Darlington v Watford in the Littlewoods Cup. We lost 3-0 at home in the first leg. The experience of going to that first game at Feethams as a teenager will always stick in my memory.

“I went to a load of games when we were chasing promotion from the Conference and the Fourth Division in the Brian Little era, and enjoyed the promotions. I also went to Wembley for the two play off finals.

“The first game my son, Alexander, attended with me, was the FA Trophy final at Wembley in 2011. Just like everyone else, I was dreading penalties, and then Chris Senior scored. Alexander told everyone for days afterwards; “My dad went nuts when Darlington scored!”

“Now Alexander is approaching the age when I went to my first game back then in 1987. I went to all the home games with my friends, walking through the town and meeting up with them along the way.

“That’s something that I want to help replicate now, I want Alexander to savour the experience of going to a Darlington home game, so the sooner we’re back in the town the better! I want to help as much as possible.”

Richard’s appointment hopefully won’t be the last to the board.

Corporate director John Tempest (JT) said; “We are continuing our search for new directors. I’m regularly asked what skills the club require for a Director appointment. Firstly prospective candidates must have the experience of working as a Director with knowledge of Profit and Loss, board level leadership, strong company governance as well as maintaining a high degree of confidentiality. The skill set could be within Finance, PR, Business Development or Legal.  With a mixture of these skills we aim to implement a strong board, with a strong infrastructure beneath it.

“As a fan owned club my own policy and that of the DFCSG is to be open and honest and so we welcome contribution from all fans to talk to us about their ideas and ways we can improve our club. We already have some very hard workers at the club, and are always looking at ways to improve the ways that we operate and interact with the fans and local community. For instance, we have set up a team to expand our commercial and sponsorship operations, which we hope will attract more finance into the club.

“There is a lot to be done, but by all working hard together, then we can achieve those aims.”