On 26th September at St George's Park, Youth Sport Trust hosted the Barclays Football Girls’ Football School Partnerships by England Football #LetGirlsPlay Strategic Lead Awards. The awards celebrate the work of Strategic Leads to ensure every girl has equal access to football and Liam Dart was highly commended for 'Outstanding Strategic Use of Programmes, Competitions or Events to Engage Young People'. 

Unfortunately, Liam couldn't attend the awards evening as he and his wife welcomed twin boys Noah and Archie into the world on the same day! 

Liam from LJD Coaching Limited works as the Aspire partnership strategic lead for Girls Football in Schools and has supported a number of Aspire Academies through CPDL, engaging school staff in PE curriculum delivery, providing before school/lunch time and after-school clubs, as well as running the successful summer football festivals. This focus has also seen a number of girls transition onto FA Weetabix Wildcats sessions and grassroots football clubs.

Aspire/LJD Coaching is one of 12 partnerships across the country which engages all of its schools in some way in the programme. The recent equal access survey has provided valuable data for schools in the partnership and the next step is to get all schools providing equal access to the PE curriculum, and providing extra-curricular girl's football - whether that be girls-only clubs or mixed, by July 2024.