Santrokofi Football Academy (Ghana) is a partnership between a group of Ghanaians living and working in the UK, led by Gabriel Sikanku, and the Cottingham Rangers football club, through Matthew Hornshaw and his company MGH Educonsult. The group has been working on developing the football academy over the past two years and has succeeded in sending football jerseys, footballs, training equipment and training manuals to the academy in Ghana. Tremendous support has already been provided by the East Riding County Football Association and their County Development Manager.

The original plan was to assemble an academy in order to provide football training alongside structured formal education for players and to develop individuals as footballers and people. We believe that our academy structure will bring major all-round benefits and is not necessarily about producing the best players; not all of our academy players will go on to play in the first team and we will therefore provide additional formal education and support to help them take up various roles in delivering success in the game. With this aim, coach training and development is essential to ensure that players are coached in the right way and have chance to show their potential.

Cottingham Rangers has already shown commitment to the project by providing valuable advice and guidance along with practical elements such as training equipment and football kits. The club has also pledged support in terms of coach and player training exchange programmes to aid in the development of the project and provide long-term success.

There are plans to finalise the acquisition of land to develop a higher standard football pitch for the academy and also provide shipping containers to be modelled to serve as changing rooms and storage. To this end the partnership will be approaching a number of private and public sector groups to investigate possible financial, and non-financial, input.

We will keep you updated with our progress!