Statement: Yeovil Town Community Sports Trust
It is with considerable disappointment that we share an important announcement regarding the Yeovil Town Community Sports Trust which was incorporated as the Club’s Charitable arm in 2008. In the intervening years there have been many challenges which the staff have assiduously overcome. Since Covid, the Charitable Trust has not only survived but flourished, providing physical education, coaching, and other football activities throughout the Community and in over 30 schools.
However, the Trust’s greatest challenge is occurring now. We have recently been informed by Yeovil Town Football Club that we must remove the club’s badge and branding from our communications and that they no longer wish to continue a formal relationship with Yeovil Town Community Sports Trust. We also received written confirmation from the club stating that we no longer have authority to operate in partnership with Yeovil Town Football Club.
It’s been sad to learn that the Club has been undermining the Trust by negotiating an education programme with Yeovil College which directly competes with the programme the Trust has been successfully running for the last two years. These negotiations and subsequent agreements have been ongoing without informing or consulting with the Trust in advance. The Club knew the Trust had 12 learners going forward into a 2nd year and had recruited a further 28 learners to start their 1st year in September. The Club is now actively trying to divert these learners to the College programme which is unprincipled in itself and fails to appreciate that many participants don’t want to attend a College to undertake the BTec course. What saddens the Trust the most is that this has been done without due consideration to the students in the middle of their studies or of their future success. An offer was made by the Trust to explore an orderly handover during the next 12 months but this has been rejected. In any event we are convinced and confident the Trust can provide the best environment for players to achieve their Btec qualifications and reach their full potential as footballers with our new Elite Performance Programme; not to compete with the football club & college but to offer wider and more unique experiences to talented footballers using all of our professional connections within the football world.
Since the Trust was formed, the mission has been simple: to use the power of sport to bring our community together. Staff have worked tirelessly to connect the people of Yeovil with Yeovil Town Football Club, delivering accessible community programmes at affordable community rates, creating opportunities for thousands of children, young people and adults, and helping grow engagement with football across the town.
Throughout this journey, we have always believed that football should unite communities. It’s incomprehensible that the current owners are choosing a path of division between the Club and the Trust, particularly as “Community” has been promoted as one of the club’s core value.
While this chapter is not the situation we had hoped for. desired or expected, it also provides clarity for the future of our organisation. The Trust has been in existence for 18 years. All the Trustees have a long standing relationship with the Club and the local Community and they are determined the Trust will continue to move forward with renewed purpose and vigour. We regard this division between the Club and Trust to be temporary. We will reunite. In the meantime, the focus remains exactly where it has always been: supporting the people of Yeovil and the surrounding areas through high-quality community sport, education, health and wellbeing initiatives. We are committed to bringing together clubs, organisations, schools and businesses from across all sports to create opportunities, inspire participation and continue changing lives through the power of sport.
If you represent a sports club, community organisation or local business and would like to work with us in making a positive difference across our town and surrounding communities, we would be delighted to hear from you. Please get in touch through the Contact section of our website.
Finally, we would like to thank everyone who has supported the Trust over the years.. our participants, volunteers, partners, schools, staff and the wider community. Your support has enabled us to make a lasting impact, and we remain committed to building on that legacy.
For us, the priority has never changed. It is, and always will be, the people of our community and the extraordinary work our staff deliver every day to improve the lives of hundreds of children, young people and adults across Somerset.
Together, we will continue to make a difference.
