Sheffield & District Juniors Sunday League Weekly E-Newsletter
Issue 16
Welcome to this weeks e-newsletter. The purpose of the e-newsletters is to keep you informed of news and events within the league and the wider grassroots football community.
The newsletter is emailed out to all club secretaries on a Friday and now also appears on the website (www.junleague.com).
**LEAGUE NOTICES**
• Please remember all results have to be reported by 6pm on Sunday evening. Please send all the results to results@junleague.com
• We have a league meeting on Tuesday 3rd November, with a 7.30pm start. Remember teams not attending will be fined £20. Teams not in attendance but who have sent in apologises will be fined £10. This is accordance with League Rules. Please make every effort for your club to be represented in order to avoid unnecessary fines.
• Any club wishing to hold the League Cup finals can apply to the League. Grounds must have changing rooms, catering facilities and good car parking. The finals will take place on the 28th March for the under 9s to under 15s. The under 16 finals will take place midweek under lights and the League have asked Stocksbridge (Cup) and Maltby (Trophy) to host them
• A reminder that postponement requests for fixtures must be made to the League Secretary 28 days or more in advance. The postponement request form can be downloaded from the League website.
• The League Full Time website is currently the most viewed in the UK. To see the top 100 Full Time Leagues visit http://full-time.thefa.com/TopLeagues.do
• As always if you have suggestions on how the League can develop and improve please send them to the League Secretary (nathan.batchelor@junleague.com)
• Redfearns have asked me to remind you that no one can take dogs onto any of their pitches.
• Birley Spa have asked me to remind you that no one can take dogs onto the pitches based at Birley Community College.
• All club secretaries are reminded that when they have received a standard match card fine i.e. no sporting points they must contact the age group registrar with the missing details (as well as pay the fine).
• A reminder that clubs can bring forward league fixtures, just let your age-group registrar know. If you find yourself with a blank week and also know that another team within your division is not playing please arrange to play your league fixture, as this will help everyone.
• The Association of Football Coaches managed to pull off a massive coup last month by having Stuart Pearce as their guest coach. Individual membership is
£10 per calendar year for individuals or £50 for "club membership" allowing any number of managers/coaches from one club to attend sessions of which a minimum of 10 per year are provided. November sees John Peacock, Head Coach of England F.A. Youth, be the guest coach.
• Player Registration Cards. The rules are simple, no cards – no game. Managers are signing match cards to say that they have seen the player cards. If someone complains afterwards despite signing the match cards then both teams are liable for a charge. The team at fault will be charged by the League for non fulfilment. Under no circumstances must you agree to play a friendly fixture in these circumstances, as this match would not sanctioned and teams could land themselves in big trouble with the County FA.
• The Respect Fair Play Handshake should take place prior to all fixtures. Many of you will be aware that this happens prior to all Premier League and Football League matches.
• Teams should have in place a method to stop spectators standing on the touchline. It is recommended that clubs use the FA respect barriers (http://www.respectzone.com/) but cones, an additional white line or rope provided it is safe are more then adequate.
• A reminder that all misconduct must be reported to the County FA. This includes issues with spectators, clubs and referees.
• Sadly Spire Rangers U12 have this week withdrawn from the League.
• Cup/Trophy Draw: As soon as I have the draw, it will appear on the website.
**WORKING WITH THE COUNTY FA**
The League Chairman and League Secretary met with the County FA on Thursday (29th October) and had a very positive meeting. We discussed a number of issues which included:
9v9
The County FA and The League are going to put on a summer 9v9 league for this seasons under 10s to help them progress from mini-soccer to 11v11. This will be a pilot summer league, ideally played at a central location. The League is still discussing the proposal and welcome an early indication if this seasons under 10s would be interested, and if any venues would be interested in staging the league. The competition will run outside the current football season which takes place September – May and take place during the summer break, June – August. The proposed dates are:13th, 20th and 27th June. 4th, 11th, 18th, and 25th July. 1st, 8th, 15th, 22nd and 29th August 2010 These dates will allow enough time to prepare after the previous season and enough recovery time prior to the start of the new season. The format will be a very basic league structure and will adopt the same process of the designated leagues that the 9v9 league is embedded within. Each team will play against each other twice, 3 points for a win and 1 point for a draw. In the event of two teams with the same points it then goes to goal difference, and then goals scored.
Referees
The League are also going to be working with the County FA to give new Level 9 referees the opportunity to get the required 6 matches in, to allow them to progress to Level 7 upwards. This will hopefully be in place starting from January. The League will appoint the officials to fixtures. Clearly we will not have enough referees to appoint to all fixtures. This scheme helps clubs, the League, the referees concerned and the players and the League thanks the County FA for giving us this resource. The League are still discussing the finer points of how we will manage this process.
Charter Standard League
The League is going to be working towards League Charter Standard status. Many of you had already gained the impression that this was the Leagues objective from the start of the season.
There is a lot of work for the League to taken on but nevertheless will be beneficial to all concerned. A support network will be put in place to help clubs to achieve individual Charter Standard status. For more information on the club Charter Standard awards please visit http://www.sheffieldfa.com/Development/CharterStandard/ I must stress this at a very early stage so clubs will have time to work towards the individual club award.
At least 60% of teams in the league will have to have Charter Standard Club status* at the point of the League applying for the award. (*All other teams must have Enhanced FA CRB checks for all welfare officers, coaches and managers working with children in youth football or with vulnerable adults.
The league will have two years to ensure that all participating clubs have Charter Standard Club status. Any new clubs entering the league after Charter Standard League Status is granted will have 12 months to attain Charter Standard Club status.
The league needs to provide a minimum of three continuous professional development (CPD) opportunities per season for league volunteers and member clubs ideally on days when there are no fixtures (flexible programmes to include mentoring for club and league secretaries)
The league has to create a development plan that identifies key development objectives and targets linked to the National Game Strategy key goals and enablers
The benefits of becoming a Charter Standard League are:
*Raising standards and addressing poor behavior within the league.
*Leagues will also be demonstrating, by reviewing what they do well, what they want to do better and by identifying how they can improve, that they are committed to developing better players and to investing in the workforce. *Clear development plan in place, together with an agreed support package from the County FA.
*Commitment to the Respect programme and will have procedures in place to improve standards and address poor behaviour in the game, a key priority for all those involved in Football.
*Recognition that they are committed to a quality experience for all and that they are a well run league.
**WELFARE NEWS**
A reminder that from next season (2010/2011) in order to affiliate with the County FA, all clubs in this league must have a named Welfare Officer, who has an ‘accepted’ CRB check via The FA CRB Unit and who has completed The FA Safeguarding Children and Welfare Officer Workshop. The Safeguarding Children and Welfare Officer Workshop have to be renewed every 3 years and must be valid at the time of affiliation. In order to assist clubs, please visit http://eventspace.thefa.com/sheffieldfa/participant/s.aspx which has details of the course on offer. Clubs who have not affiliated with the County FA cannot participate in this League.
Clubs need to send details of their club welfare officers to lisa.smith@junleague.com so the League can create an up-to-date database. Lisa requires your club welfare officer name, address, phone number and email address. The League will be putting on some events for club welfare officers in the near future.
The FA RESPECT guides can be viewed at -> http://www.thefa.com/Leagues/Respect.aspx
**COUNTY FA WEBSITE ARTICLES**
Sheffield & Hallamshire FA 2 – 0
Win tickets to see England U21s vs Portugal
Sheffield Football Community unites for Kick it out
Minds over Football Tournament
FA Goal of the Month Competition
www.sheffiedfa.com
Text the word SHEFFIELD to 62018 to register YOUR support for Sheffield 2018 to be a host city if England win the World Cup bid.
**CLUB DEVELOPMENT**
Sheffield & Hallamshire FA are please to announce the launch of its Charter Standard In-Service Training programme. Taking a new format for season 09/10, the In-Service training programme aims to increase the knowledge of coaches from the Sheffield & Hallamshire FA region, who are currently working within its network of Charter Standard Clubs.
http://www.sheffieldfa.com/News/2009/10/CharterStandardInServiceTrainingProgrammeLaunched.htm
**UNDER 7 & UNDER 8**
A lot of managers in this age-group are still getting confused how to complete the match cards. To clarify the following needs to be completed on the match cards for the Under 7s & under 8s: Date, Age-group, Division, Home and Away teams, sporting points for players, sporting points for managers&supporters, the referees name (“A Parent” is not acceptable – the full referees name must be written down), red & yellow cards need to have a number or “nil” and the managers signature from each team.
That’s it for this week. I hope you find this newsletter of benefit. Please pass it around your club.
Kind regards
Nathan Batchelor
League Secretary
www.junleague.com