Grass Pitch Maintenance Fund

A fund providing six-year tapered grants to help eligible organisations enhance or sustain the quality of their grass pitches

Are we eligible?

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Who is eligible?

All applicants must have the required security of tenure and have received a PitchPower Pitch Assessment Report:

  • Grassroots football clubs*
  • Leagues
  • Charities
  • Education sites (offering community usage on evenings and weekends)
  • Town and Parish Councils (that host grassroots football clubs on council-owned sites)
  • National League System (Steps 1-6) and Women's Football Pyramid (Tiers 1-4) clubs (only for non-stadia pitches at the site that are used for community football)

*Please note, if you’re a Football Club looking to apply for Football Foundation funding, only the Chair, Secretary or Treasurer of that Club can submit an application form.

Who is not eligible?

  • Clubs, leagues or organisations without suitable security of tenure (details below)
  • Clubs, leagues or organisations without a PitchPower Pitch Assessment Report
  • Local Authorities without an eligible organisation that applies on their behalf (details below)
  • Site operators, such as education sites, that don't offer community use on the evenings/weekends
  • An individual or sole trader
  • A commercial/for-profit entity

What security of tenure do we need?

To be eligible for this Fund, one of the below will be required:

  • Freehold
  • Uninterruptible lease for the next ten years
  • Licence agreement in place for the next ten years 

Where an uninterruptable lease or licence is not available, the following will be eligible:

For more information on security of tenure requirements, check out our FAQs at the bottom of the page. 

Other criteria

This funding is available to all the eligible organisations listed above. Local Authorities aren't eligible to apply for funding - unless they have an eligible organisation that applies on their behalf that has the required security of tenure/agreement in place.

The applicant must have received a PitchPower Assessment Report which recommends the maintenance works required before applying. Payments will be paid annually in advance and applicants will need to demonstrate how those funds have been spent in the previous year to receive the next payment. Successful applicants will need to provide ongoing, twice-yearly PitchPower inspections over the following ten-year period.

The Foundation also requires a minimum of two members of the organisation to complete the Grounds Management Association (GMA)’s online Level 1 Football Grounds Maintenance course. This short course costs £71 for non-members/£50 for members and the certificate of completion will need to be submitted to the Foundation prior to the release of any grant. You can register here.

About the Fund

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We accept applications to purchase materials and engage professional contractors over a six-year period to increase the levels of maintenance works carried out on their grass pitches, with an aim of improving the quality of those grass pitches to the Grounds Management Association (GMA) ‘Good’ standard or above.

Details  of the GMA’s Pitch Grading Framework can be found here.

What we'll fund

  • Slitting – contractor works 
  • Scarification – contractor works 
  • Decompaction – contractor works
  • Selective herbicide (weed treatment) – contractor works
  • Fertiliser – contractor works and/or purchase of materials (fertiliser) 
  • Overseeding – contractor works and/or purchase of materials (seed) 
  • Top dressing – contractor works and/or purchase of materials (topsoil) 
  • Soil Sampler – purchase of a soil sampler
  • The hiring of maintenance machinery for works that have been recommended in your PitchPower report - club volunteers operating the machinery must have completed their GMA Level 1 course.

What we won't fund

  • Routine maintenance works such as grass cutting, hedge cutting, line-marking and purchase of capital items
  • The purchase of machinery items
  • Machinery repair and maintenance costs
  • Goalpost and net replacement
  • Facility hire
  • In-house staffing and/or volunteer groundsperson cost/salaries


 

Remember, the funding should only be used to carry out the recommendations listed in your PitchPower Assessment Report.

Grant criteria

Applicants will need to complete a PitchPower inspection within the last 12 months for all their pitches before they can apply.

Further details on PitchPower are available here or please speak to your relevant NGB. 

How much can we apply for?

Funding falls into two categories - enhance or sustain. Your PitchPower pitch inspection (a requirement of the grant) will provide you with a Performace Quality Standard (PQS) per pitch - which will help us decide how much funding you'll be eligible for - and a list of maintenance recommendations which you'll need to carry out as part of your grant award. Grants are paid annually for six years but tapered down during that time. The amounts below show the grant values for the first year at 100% funding. All grant values include VAT. 

Football

Enhance

For pitches with a Performance Quality Standard (PQS) of 'basic' or below 

 

Pitch size Grant value (per pitch)*
11 v 11 £3,200 per pitch
9 v 9 £2,560 per pitch
Mini soccer (7v7 and 5x5) £1,920 per pitch

 

*all grant values include VAT

 

 

Sustain

For pitches with a PQS of 'good' or higher

 

Pitch size Grant value (per pitch)*
11 v 11 £960
9 v 9 £640
Mini soccer (7v7 and 5v5)  £384

 

*all grant values include VAT

What do you mean by a 'tapered' grant?

Tapered means that we'll pay a reduced percentage of the initial grant value every two years with the eligible organisation making up the difference. For example, the grant awarded for an 11v11 football pitch that needs enhancing would be £3,200 in year 1 and 2, £2,133 in year 3 and 4 and £1,067 in year 5 and 6. More details can be found in the FAQs.

Grant limits

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Supplier & document requirements

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Suppliers

The Foundation doesn't currently have a preferred contractors list. Applicants should source quotes for the works from a reputable local contractor.

Documents required

To ensure your application is processed, you'll need the following:

  • PitchPower Assessment Report (specifically the Report ID) - The numbers before the first “/” are needed for the application form. This number could be one digit or numerous digits.
  • Evidence of security of tenure, which should be in the name of the organisation applying for funding, via either:
     - Freehold
    - Uninterruptible lease for the next ten years
    - Licence agreement in place for the next ten years 
    - A lease or license with 12+ months to run, along with a 'Landlord and Tenant' form
    - A signed Grass Pitch Maintenance Agreement pro forma (if don't have a sufficient lease or licence)
  • Evidence of partnership funding

 

Once your application and supporting documentation has been submitted, you’ll receive a confirmation email. Your application will be assessed by our Grant Management Team who’ll contact you to discuss your application if they have any queries.

Providing all the necessary information has been submitted, assessment of your application will typically take around two weeks for grants of less than £50,000. For grants in excess of £50,000 the timescales will be four weeks. You'll then receive an email that your decision letter (and any associated T&Cs) is available for download from your Foundation account.

FAQs

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Ready to apply? Click the button below

Looking to apply for both grass pitch machinery and the Grass Pitch Maintenance Fund?

Please be sure to submit two separate application forms – one for the Grass Pitch Maintenance Fund and a separate one for Maintenance Machinery & Equipment. This’ll speed up the assessment process and allow us to provide you with a decision sooner. Submitting one application form for both types of grants will result in your application needing to be withdrawn and one of the team will be in contact to ask you to re-apply.