Moretonville JFC Summer Briefing – Community
By Dean Woodham, Vice-Chair Football Development
I hope everyone is having a great summer. As we return to football, I wanted to share with you some key details about the season ahead.
Lots of people have been working hard behind the scenes to make sure league and club registrations are in place, training schedules are ready, and all Coaches are FA compliant. Huge thanks to all that have played and are still playing their part in this; our club secretary who continues to work tirelessly along with managers, parents, and team reps to register nearly 600 children into the club.
MJFC Background
For those who may not be familiar with our great club; we are one of the biggest sports clubs in the area with 32 teams playing next season. This will see nearly 600 children play football under the Moretonville banner. It is great to see the ongoing success of the Lionesses, we are very proud of our strong girl’s section that continues to grow. Our girls only teams now start at U9.
Alongside the match day teams we also run Moretonville minis (U5-U7), the Girls Wildcats programme, goalkeeper coaching and a player development centre. These additional opportunities wouldn’t be possible without strong local partnerships with organisations such as GK Warz and the fantastic Sports 4 All.
We also run a highly successful tournament each year and a fantastic presentation day. These events are vital for our club community and are always brilliantly run by a dedicated team of volunteers.
Club Ethos
We believe that football is a game for everyone. We want coaches who care about the young people, their character and player development. Sport is very powerful and can do so much for so many. We want Moretonville youngsters to enjoy playing and making friends. They should experience challenge and success, the glow of winning and the key lessons that you learn in losing.
All experiences are important, so our coaches are asked to give players the best possible experiences. This means players should have equal game time, should rotate positions (especially in the Foundation Phase) and those starting as substitutes should be rotated regularly. We believe this will help to give every young person the best chance to fall in love with football and become lifelong lovers of playing sport.
Volunteers
Like all grass roots sports clubs, we are almost entirely volunteer run. We have over 70 “on pitch” volunteers. These people make sure the football on the pitch happens throughout the year. Our managers, coaches and team reps who ensure the players get the best experience to play the game as possible.
In order to make the “on pitch” football happen, we need a strong team of “off pitch” volunteers. These people cover roles that include everything from safeguarding, player registrations, making sure teams have a pitch and ref and importantly you have a cup of tea on match day!
We have been operating for some time now with a skeleton number of volunteers, which is now impacting on the successful running of the club. There are several committee and non-committee roles available (see list below). We are keen to get some new faces involved, to engage with new ideas about how we run the club and to continue improving the experiences of all those playing at the club.
It can be daunting to get involved. Everyone leads busy lives, so fitting in additional responsibilities isn’t easy. However, we also find volunteering extremely rewarding. Giving back even a couple of hours a month would be hugely welcome and make a significant difference.
Please consider whether you could give some of your time each week or month to support the running of this great club. Equally do you know someone you think has the skills & enthusiasm to do a good job?
Committee Opportunities
- Chairperson
- Head of Team Reps
- Vice Chair Operations
- Football Development Officer
Non-Committee Opportunities
- New player enquiries
- Match Day Co-ordinator
- Referee Secretary
- Training coordinator
- Tuck shop coordinator
- Match day duties coordinator
- Minutes Secretary
I will share Job Description’s with team reps. Please speak to your team rep for more information. We would love to hear from you. Even if you are not sure what you might have the potential to be involved in, talk to us. We would be happy to talk more about the roles for those who are keen to help, but don’t know how.
We would love to have these positions filled before the start of the season on 8th September and certainly ahead of our club AGM on Sunday 17th September, 7pm @Buckingham FC (The Ath)
Ground force morning
We will be having our annual ground force morning on Sunday 3rd September. More details will follow but this is an essential time when we need as many people as possible to pull together to get the grounds in the best condition possible ahead of the new season KO.
I am looking forward to seeing you all soon, to enjoying the smell of fresh grass and watching hundreds of children enjoying, learning and being active. Thank you to everyone for your continued support and for being part of Morteonville JFC.
Dean Woodham
Vice-Chair Football Development
