{"id":415629,"date":"2025-09-11T11:15:11","date_gmt":"2025-09-11T11:15:11","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/415629\/"},"modified":"2025-09-11T11:15:11","modified_gmt":"2025-09-11T11:15:11","slug":"lyons-announces-clubs-moving-forward-under-ni-football-fund","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/415629\/","title":{"rendered":"Lyons announces clubs moving forward under NI Football Fund"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>Communities Minister Gordon Lyons has announced the first cohort of clubs to be taken forward under the Northern Ireland Football Fund Performance Programme.\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>A total of 20 projects will now proceed to the next stage of funding assessment.<\/p>\n<p>Speaking at a special live streamed event at H&amp;W Welders Football Club in Belfast, the Minister said: <strong>\u201c<\/strong><strong>I am pleased to announce the 20 performance club projects proceeding to the next stage of the process.<\/strong><\/p>\n<p><strong>\u201cThese clubs, big and small, from across Northern Ireland, have impressed with their plans to improve facilities for the game and for local communities.\u201d<\/strong><\/p>\n<p>Department for Communities officials will work closely with the 20 projects on business case development and carry out detailed due diligence checks.<\/p>\n<p>The Minister added: <strong>\u201cTogether we are moving forward to achieve real change for the benefit of players, fans and local communities. And we are in this for the long haul.<\/strong><\/p>\n<p>\u201c<strong>It is clear that the need and demand at club level exceeds the current available budget of \u00a336.2million.<\/strong><\/p>\n<p><strong>\u201cI will be seeking the fair and equitable funding which is due after years of delays during which time capital construction costs have soared.\u201d<\/strong><\/p>\n<p>Paying tribute to all 38 clubs who applied to the Fund, the Minister said: <strong>\u201c<\/strong><strong>I appreciate the hard work that has gone into all of the proposals by applicants, supported by fans and players alike.<\/strong><\/p>\n<p><strong>\u201c<\/strong><strong>I have visited many grounds during my time as Minister and have seen the level of need first-hand.<\/strong><\/p>\n<p><strong>\u201cI know that some will be disappointed today. But this is not the end of the journey.<\/strong><\/p>\n<p><strong>\u201cI give my commitment today to stay with you and continue to seek further funding to meet the evidenced need.\u201d<\/strong><\/p>\n<p>Announcements on the Grassroots Facilities and National Football Centre strands of the Fund will be made in the coming months.<\/p>\n<p>The 20 applications to progress to the next stage, in alphabetical order under each\u00a0 tier of the programme, are:<\/p>\n<p><strong>Tier 1 <\/strong>(project value under \u00a31.5million)<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>Armagh City<\/li>\n<li>Ballymacash Sports Academy<\/li>\n<li>Lisburn Distillery<\/li>\n<li>Queen\u2019s University<\/li>\n<li>Rathfriland Rangers<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p><strong>Tier 2 <\/strong>(project value \u00a31.5million to \u00a36million)<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>Ballinamallard United<\/li>\n<li>Ballymena United<\/li>\n<li>Banbridge Town<\/li>\n<li>Bangor<\/li>\n<li>Carrick Rangers<\/li>\n<li>Dergview<\/li>\n<li>Dungannon Swifts<\/li>\n<li>Glenavon<\/li>\n<li>Larne<\/li>\n<li>Lisburn Rangers<\/li>\n<li>Loughgall<\/li>\n<li>Newry City<\/li>\n<li>Oxford Sunnyside<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p><strong>Tier 3 <\/strong>(project value more than \u00a36million)<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Communities Minister Gordon Lyons has announced the first cohort of clubs to be taken forward under the Northern&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":415630,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5011],"tags":[29307,142623,142624,142625,1144,139804,8541,16,15],"class_list":{"0":"post-415629","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-northern-ireland","8":"tag-coleraine-fc","9":"tag-coleraine-s","10":"tag-gordon-lyon","11":"tag-nif","12":"tag-northern-ireland","13":"tag-northern-ireland-football","14":"tag-sports-direct-premiership","15":"tag-uk","16":"tag-united-kingdom"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@uk\/115185380595959203","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/415629","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=415629"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/415629\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/415630"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=415629"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=415629"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=415629"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}