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Community Value

The Irish FA has been working with football clubs at all levels across Northern Ireland to demonstrate their value within their communities…

In collaboration with UEFA, the association is quantifying the value of football participation here.

Last year, using the Social Return on Investment (SROI) model developed through UEFA’s GROW programme, the association was able to reveal that football in Northern Ireland has social, economic and health benefits that add up to £470 million per year.

SROI is a form of cost benefit analysis that attempts to quantify the social change created by a programme, policy, investment or entity. It is a particularly useful form of analysis for not-for-profit organisations which seek to generate positive social changes that are difficult to measure in traditional financial terms.

Following the analysis into its own work, the association has been supporting football clubs at all levels here to go through the latest version of the SROI model (V3). More than 40 of UEFA’s 55 member associations are currently enrolled in the process.

The analysis of more than a dozen clubs in Northern Ireland found SROI values ranging from just under £1m to nearly £8m – with Coleraine FC firmly playing its part.

The value of Coleraine FC to its local community is £5.53 million each year (£0.823 million economic contribution, and equivalent of £3.086 million in social benefit and £1.62 million of healthcare savings).

These wonderful results are a combined effort of our various groups and committees who we are justifiably proud of, as they help us progress from a football club to a substantial enabler within our community. Based within two areas of high deprivation the board has always played their part in contributing to health, wellbeing and social development verified by this independent report.