Rebuilding relevance

Football isn’t just a sport in England — it’s part of the national fabric. It lives in parks, schools, pubs, and stadiums. It connects generations.But the organisation entrusted to lead the game — The FA — was losing ground. Participation was flatlining. Trust was fading. And the digital experience was fragmented, making it difficult for players, coaches, officials, volunteers, and fans to feel connected — or even seen. We were asked a simple but enormous question:

How do you make The FA relevant again — to everyone in the game?

A system reboot

The answer wasn’t a campaign. It wasn’t a single product launch. It was a complete system reboot. Over 24 months, we delivered twelve connected products — each designed to unlock value for users while rebuilding trust in the organisation. The ambition wasn’t incremental improvement. It was structural change.

We started where it matters most: people.

Every squad ran deep research — interviews, workshops, and field studies — to understand the lived experience of grassroots players, referees, coaches, volunteers, and professionals. We mapped frustrations, habits, motivations, and moments of drop-off. Strategy and design flowed directly from those insights.

Instead of building isolated tools, we created a modular ecosystem. A shared core platform powered by microservices enabled teams to move fast without breaking alignment. Twelve cross-functional squads ran in parallel, connected by shared standards and a unified design language. Research loops and rapid prototyping were embedded into every sprint. Progress wasn’t built around big reveals. It was shaped by continuous refinement.

What changed

Just Play brought 90,000 people together for casual football in parks across the country, lowering the barrier to participation and reconnecting people with the joy of the game.

Wildcats helped over 60,000 girls take their first steps into football, expanding access and building the future pipeline of players.

Matchday reached 68,000 weekly users and doubled its player payment targets, turning administration into a seamless experience.

Full Time signed up 2.2 million users and increased traffic by 17% year-on-year, strengthening engagement across leagues and communities.

Supporters Club delivered a 25% increase in youth registrations, translating digital engagement into real-world participation.

Each product was validated with the people who would rely on it. Pilots were run locally before scaling nationally. Nothing was launched without evidence it worked in the real world.

Orchestrating complexity

Behind the scenes, this was a constellation of agile squads moving at speed, anchored by centralised standards and shared infrastructure. Energy was decentralised. Alignment was not. As project lead, I guided delivery from day one — ensuring strategic clarity, managing interdependencies, and maintaining momentum across the ecosystem. In an organisation as complex and politically layered as The FA, alignment is never accidental. It requires constant communication, clear priorities, and visible progress.