League sets global goal!

The Evo-Stik Northern Premier League wants fans to help make the league one the most famous names in world football by flying their club colours in the most iconic and newsworthy locations around the globe.

The NPL hope supporters heading off on holidays and trips this season will enter a new annual competition to capture their exploits on camera and help put the league's teams firmly on football’s world map.

League Operations Manager Alan Allcock was captured on camera sporting his Evo-Stik NPL Facebook polo shirt on his holidays in America this summer and urged fans to have fun with the competition and pack their strip whenever they were away.

Pictured posing in front of the Arizona's Grand Canyon, he believes the new competition will be great fun for rival fans and could even help their clubs find thousands of new supporters in far flung places as well as being an internet hit.

"The world is so connected now with things like social media so it’s the perfect way to get the names of our proud clubs and leagues out there," said the Operations Manager. "There’s plenty of Non-League fans around the world already and we could end up with a whole new army of them following us."

Allock revealed there was also a serious side to the competition, supporting the commercial efforts of both the league and individual clubs by working with fans to raise their profiles and maake them more attractive to business.

The story was featured in today's Non-League Paper and he added: "Our sponsors Evo-Stik will be happy to see the profile of the league rise even higher and I’m sure the main shirts sponsors at all our clubs whose fans get involved won’t mind either!"

As an added bonus the league say the best entry during the campaign from among the Evo-Stik NPL's 66 clubs will win two tickets to see England at Wembley. The winner could also help his own club lift the Evo-Stik NPL’s new annual Club PR Trophy next June when the season's honours are handed out.

The NPL’s Facebook group is helping to coordinate the competition which was inspired by the fans of Ashton United and their ongoing Red Flag campaign to show off their club colours around the world.

Top efforts so far have included adorning the Rod Laver statue at the Australian Open Tennis with a Robins scarf and draping others over a Finnish sign on the Arctic.

Evo-Stik NPL chairman Mark Harris believes the competition will appeal to Non-League fans’ sense of fun and pride and hoped supporters would enjoy taking part.

He said: "Non-League football is a tremendous force for good in every community served by its clubs. We need to talk up everything that is great about our level of the game and this competition, quite literally, allows the Evo-Stik NPL to fly the flag for Non-League."

For more information on the competition or to enter email Evo-Stik NPL Media Dave Watters at: dwatters@evostikleague.co.uk.