English Schools' Football Association

ESFA Chief Executive, John Read

Happy New Year to all and good luck for the remainder of the season. We, at ESFA, have a busy and exciting run in to the end of the season. The annual round of boys' under 18 and girls' under 15 internationals, the multitude of National Finals and Easter Festivals will take us to the 4 corners of the British Isles and the Republic of Ireland. We will also be working with The FA, Premier League and Football League to iron out the obvious problems with the new Elite Player Pathway Plan (EPPP). Discussions are being held with certain Premier League clubs in the hope that local District Schools' FAs could use their Academy facilities to play their Saturday morning fixtures. This we hope will give more boys the opportunity to play a higher level of football, but for me more importantly we can rescue the boys 'dropped' from the Academy system and reintroduce them to Schools' Football.

As the schools' representative on the Football Association Council and National Game Board, I will be heavily involved in the delivery of the 150 year FA celebrations. An exciting programme of events has already been announced. I attended the launch of the celebrations, live on Sky Sports, earlier today and in the coming months England will play Brazil, the Republic of Ireland and Scotland at Wembley and have an away match with Brazil. There is also going to be a "NATIONAL FOOTBALL DAY" in August, which I hope (despite the school summer holidays) Schools' Football can be part of.

On top of all this discussions are being had with the National Council for School Sport, the Education Minister and Sport England. ESFA intends to be involved in all these high level talks to ensure that school sport in general and school football specifically is allowed to flourish especially after the great success of the recent London Olympic Games.

Just a reminder as we go into the New Year that Schools' Football is not only about playing the game, but involves education, discipline, team work and sportsmanship. That is what separates us from the Sunday morning youth games.

John Read
Chief Executive