REDDITCH United chairman Chris Swan has dismissed rumblings of discontent from the club’s junior section as ‘growing pains’.
His comments come after Mac McLaren, one of the junior team managers, said with teams like Birmingham City Ladies and West Bromwich Albion using the new 3G pitch for training purposes it was difficult for the club’s junior teams to access the facilities, and that they were being forced to change in gazebos.
“There are 56 youth teams and that’s more than 600 kids and all the managers are getting messed around down there,” he said.
“If things don’t change I can see that within 12 months a lot of the junior section will be leaving Redditch United.”
He added that there had been plans to charge parents £1 to park at the club, but that this had later been withdrawn.
However Mr Swan said he ‘unequivocally’ rejected the claims and added that the sheer rush of expansion at the club meant it was having to rapidly adapt to changing circumstances.
“With all the facilities that we’ve got we’ve suddenly become a seven day a week operation – things have accelerated very strongly and these are just growing pains,” he said.
He added that new parking procedures had been put in place, that a parking charge had never been introduced and that the junior teams could use the 3G pitch when they wanted to.
And he added that the expansion of the club would be continuing with ladies teams in particular keen to get involved.
“The popularity of the ladies section has been incredible and I can see us having nine or ten teams next year,” he said.
Earlier this year Redditch United was awarded a £561,000 grant from the Premier League and The FA Facilities Fund which, along with additional funding, heralded a major scheme that saw the installation of the all-weather 3G artificial grass pitch, revamped facilities including a new bar and changing rooms and the continued expansion of the number of teams to nearly 60 junior, women’s and disabled sides.
By September the new pitch was in use while the club also managed to secure £88,166 from the Football Stadia Improvement Fund – a partner organisation to the Football Foundation which is solely funded by the Premier League – and a further £225,000 has come from Reds chairman Mr Swan.
