We have a great women’s team that continues to grow! The team now have a sponsor and are getting their own kit too. I am very proud of them!

Also in Lincolnshire the walking football league has a women’s division in two age categories now (over 40s and over 50s) with approximately 6 teams in each last check for this coming season.

Yes, have 8-12 women attending weekly. Team entered local women's walking football league. Recently had visits from three local women's grassroots clubs looking to set up walking football sections. 

Great stuff Hannah!

Great to hear Len - what advice have you been passing on to those clubs?

Flo

A mixture of advice on organising and promoting sessions, for example on the time of sessions, outdoor or indoor locations, ease of travel to location. Importance of social media/web presence. Sharing our experience of numbers going up and down quite wildly at an early stage and can fluctuate even now when there are are holiday periods. 

Logistics of sessions. A lot of discussion on 'what is walking/not walking', importance of coach/ref managing this in a session. Same applies to contact although that is a little easier to explain. Running sessions with very different ability ranges, for example allowing very inexperienced players time on the ball and seeking balance between skills work and having a kick around. 

Goalkeepers- we rarely have a goalkeeper, the coaches need a few non-goalkeeper games in their portfolio. If you have a keeper doing work on distribution with other team members on breaking the press.

Finally the importance of listening to  the new players, what do they want from  a session etc. One of our lessons that we pass on is; refs/coaches pulling up running but also explaining what is allowed in terms of quick movement. 

I have probably missed some other issues. 

Yes we have been up and running for around 2 years. We started with funding from the football foundation and Active Humber that enabled a really proactive start with free sessions, subsidies for kit, brand new equipment, facility hire etc. We also used the Snickers Just Play later in our provision to provide new members with free sessions when they joined. This enabled us to really integrate the women into our club. We also encouraged the ladies to access the FA Playmaker learning programme and then also used the funding to put some women through the FA Introduction to coaching, FA first aid and FA WF Referee workshops. We did have a bit of a hiccup when some of the ladies who had benefitted from the funding up and left and formed an allegiance with another club in the area. We have two sides this season entered into the county league and have recently introduced a few new members into the club but despite lots of publicity through social media, leaflets and word of mouth the rate of growth has certainly slowed. We have retained a solid core of the group from very early in our existence and they not only benefit from the football aspect but also from well established friendship's that help them in so many ways. From a personal aspect I was the founder of the sessions and their coach for the first 14 months or so, it was one of the most enjoyable experiences I have had from football. A tremendous group to work with. I look forward to supporting our two teams at the WF Leagues Alliance National Cup Finals in Redditch in a couple of weeks time.