Football

High level coaching

The Football programme is led by coaches who were previously working in pro game academies; their experience and expertise is inspirational. As with all other sports at School, there is an individual focus on development, supporting each student to be their best whilst also striving to create successful, competitive teams.

Students have the opportunity to train and play regularly with teams across the age groups entered into County, Regional and National competitions.

Format

Football is offered during games lessons throughout both the Michaelmas and Lent Terms and is available to boys and girls. Matches are generally played afterschool so as not to clash with the other main winter sports which allows students to play more than one focus sport each term. Alongside this, practices are also offered at lunchtime and afterschool.

Competitions

All teams will have a variety of friendly matches that are designed to provide opportunities to challenge and develop, more process than outcome driven. There are then the following structured competitions:

• East Region Independent Schools Football League (ERISFL) U13, U15 and U18
• Suffolk County Schools Football Association Cup (SCSFA) U12, U13, U14, U15 and U18
• English Schools Football Association Cup U12, U13, U14, U15 and U18
• Independent Schools Football Association Cup U13, U15 and U18

Rules of the competitions differ, some allowing combination of age groups, whilst ESFA forbid it, hence why the same age group can have quite different teams.

Representative achievements

Two of our boys are in pro game academies whilst in 2023 one of our girls was also selected to be part of the ITFC Women’s pathway. In the future we also look forward to nominating students for the Suffolk Schools teams, both girls and boys.

Connections

We are delighted to have forged links with Framlingham Town and Woodbridge Woodpeckers and are excited to see these relationships grow and develop over the years.