How to get match funding

Sports sponsorship schemes Sports Match and the National Sports
Foundation are currently on the look out for more projects from grassroots sport and business.

SportsMatch
Designed to encourage new or additional
sponsorship investment from businesses, trusts and private individuals,
SportsMatch, funded by Sport England, offers pound for pound matched
funding to sporting stakeholders for projects that encourage sports
participation at grass roots level.

The scheme’s awards criteria have been amended to provide greater
flexibility for applicants. Partnership funding from trusts and private
individuals is eligible for match funding in addition to monies from
companies. The minimum award is £1,000 and the maximum is £50,000. If
you are a school the minimum award is £500 (the maximum is still
£50,000) and your project may be a revenue scheme or, in limited cases,
a capital project. Sponsorship may be in cash or in-kind.

All projects applying in 2008/09 will need to ensure that their
project is able to spend and deliver their entire grant funding by 31st
March 2009. Private investment may be used to sustain projects after
this date; however the private investment funding will need to be in
the applicants’ bank account from the beginning of the project.

Please go to the Sportsmatch website: www.sportsmatch.co.uk in the
first instance, where you can also apply on-line. Alternatively please
contact Sport England on 08458 508 508 for all other Sportsmatch
queries.

National Sports Foundation Funding Opportunities
The
National Sports Foundation can match, pound for pound, commercial
business sponsorship or funding from trusts / private donors for a
sporting project that aims to increase participation and/or improve
performance at grassroots level, funding projects over £50,000 .
Projects may be a revenue scheme, a capital project or a mixture of
both. Sponsorship may be in cash or in-kind.

The NSF has three priority funding themes:

• Fit for Sport – projects to improve both physical and human
  infrastructure for community clubs. This will include investing in
  clubs, coaches and volunteers in local communities
• 2012 Kids – building on the success of the Olympics, projects to encourage children and young people to take up sport; and
• Women into Sport – projects to increase female participation in sport, including providing coaching and support for female teams

In addition to this the National Sports Foundation will only
consider match funding projects which deliver one or more of the
following outcomes:

• Increased participation in sporting activity
• Increased club membership
• Increased numbers of qualified and active coaches delivering instruction in sport
• Increased numbers of active volunteers supporting community sport

Applications should aim to demonstrate how they impact on Sport
England’s ‘Grow, Sustain and Excel’ outcomes as outlined in Sport
England’s 2008-2011 Strategy. The strategy can be downloaded from Sport
England’s website: www.sportengland.org.