This morning our Club was awarded the maximum award under the Sports Capital Programme of €150,000 towards our new clubhouse project.

This project started in May 2017 when we threw Rory our Head Coach and Sinead our Children’s Officer out of a plane to raise money!

In 2018 a small committee lead by Hazel Martin along with Richard Bruton, Brian Cooling, and Joe Murphy was put together to manage the Design and Planning stage with our appointed architects McKevittt & King. These people turned our idea into a reality.

This group was supported all the way by the executive committee of the time and we would like to recognise former committee members Phil Darcy, Louise O’Hanlon, Anne McGuire, Barbara Byrne, Sinead Rowe, Nicola Bedford and Anto Goff for their enthusiasm towards the project.

Our current committee of Graham Campbell, Rory Kerr, Neil McAvinia, Lauren McGinn, Damian Scott, Karl White and Kian Maguire were tasked with putting all the pieces together and the daunting task of actually applying for the grant.

A huge amount of thanks to all the volunteers who have and still work on all our community projects including Late Night Leagues, our Intercultural Programme with Mosney, our Girls Football Programme with Marymount Primary School, and our current Homeless Football project. These programmes have not only made our special club something to be proud of, but also helped us make the strongest application possible. Our girls section itself, formed in 2017 also played a huge part in our goals to become the most inclusive football club in Louth.

One further group of people to thank is You. All our Coaches, all our players and their families for your support, patience and continued generosity when we need it.

So are we there yet?

With today’s award added to the funds in our development account we are just 35k under our target amount, but we have already secured a community finance offer of from Clann Credo which brings us over our target and allows us to move to the building tender stage.

We will now put together a small subcommittee to work closely with our architects to manage the tender and the process of drawing down the capital grant.

We will also be making small changes to the original plans to allow for extra showers.

Is that all?

Of course not!

Work is already ongoing with Drogheda United as part of our ongoing merger and a phased plan to drastically transform Marley’s Lane is coming together. Shortly we will be applying for planning permission for Phase 2 (first astro) while work continues on the Masterplan which includes Phases 3 (2nd Astro) and Phase 4 (expansion of new clubhouse and hybrid grass pitch) all Phases also have measures included to improve the security of the property.

We will keep everyone informed of the many changes ahead for our new club but for today, we’d like to thank everyone for unwavering support and hope everyone is excited about their new home!