Minister meets the myth busters

Evo-Stik Northern Premier League Warrington Town has been showing a Government minister how a town famed for its rugby is bucking a national trend when it comes to football.

Proud officials at the First Division North’s Wire were more than happy to also dispel the myth that Warrington is just a rugby town during a visit to the HG Driver Recruitment Stadium from Cabinet Minister Maria Miller MP, pictured.

The Minister for Culture, Media and Sport was a special guest of Warrington South MP David Mowat and said it was ‘fantastic’ to hear about the club’s 2020 vision to deliver Football League action locally and the increasing levels of participation in the national sport in the area at a time when it was declining nationally.

After learning more about a club boasting 27 junior teams, along with youth and reserve sides and a first team pushing for promotion, Chairman Richard Sutton produced compelling statistics for the club’s Westminster visitors on the levels of participation locally with 75 affiliated football clubs in Warrington running 492 teams made up of 87 adult, 218 youth and 187 playing junior and mini soccer.

The MPs also learned that despite its reputation, for every child in the town playing rugby, six played football. If she didn't already know, she'd also left with the knowledge that the Warrington Junior League was the biggest in the UK with the Warrington and District Adult League one of the biggest in the North West.

Sutton, pictured centre alongside Miller, said: "I have a copy of the 2013 FA report on participation levels in football and out of 38 similar sized local authorities across the country Warrington is top of the league. Across the whole spectrum of participation in football the national average is 5.2 per cent – in Warrington it is 10.6 – more than double the national average.

"We are passionate about the fact that football as a sport can have a hugely positive effect on the whole community if it can be harnessed in the right way. In the last 12-18 months we have been in constant dialogue with the council to try and find a site for better facilities so we can make our ambitions become a reality. We’ve looked at the old Wilderspool Stadium, the Omega site in the North of the town and also explored the Halliwell Jones Stadium. But so far we have been unable to secure any of these options.”

He also urged the two politicians to look at ways to encourage the Football Association to help fund community development officers at senior Non-League clubs like Warrington Town in the top four steps of the football’s pyramid.

Sutton added: "Despite great support from our sponsors we are struggling to fund community development and commercial roles to help move the club forward. Vast amounts of money are handed out at the top of our game, where the average player is on £30,000 a week, and some on £30,000 a day. Securing just £30,000 a year would help transform clubs like Warrington Town."

Mowat, one of the town’s two MPs, has already raised the issue of how Premier League and FA funding is distributed throughout the sport in the House of Commons and he agrees urgent action is needed. "I believe this is a genuine issue for the Government," said the Wire's local MP.