Key ideas discussed

• Why women’s football represents a clean slate for building sustainable clubs
• The importance of strong financial discipline in football ownership
• Developing Welsh talent through a clear pathway to professional football
• Using Gwalia United as a platform to strengthen Welsh women’s football
• A long-term vision connected to the 2035 Women’s World Cup

I thought I’d share a bit more about why I got involved with Gwalia United, and the opportunity and vision I see for growing the women’s game.

Women’s football is still largely in its infancy. It’s obviously very different to the men’s game, where the depth of professional leagues is much greater.

But what we really have in women’s football is a clean slate — an opportunity to rethink some of the things that exist in the men’s game that can sometimes become quite toxic or stressful for fans.

A large part of that comes down to ownership structures, how clubs are run, how finances are managed, and ultimately how clubs end up in situations where they enter administration or owners abandon them.

Often this happens because clubs adopt a model of pumping in as much money as possible in the hope of generating short-term success. When that doesn’t work, owners cut their losses and walk away, leaving the club in a worse position than when they arrived.

Women’s football gives us an opportunity to change that model.

It allows us to introduce strong financial discipline and the kinds of financial practices you would expect to see in any well-run organisation. There’s no reason those principles shouldn’t exist in sport.

The opportunity I saw with Gwalia United was the ability to put many of the principles I’ve applied in my role as a CFO into practice within a football club.

That means having a clear handle on finances, building a playbook for how the organisation operates, and deciding deliberately where you want to invest resources.

It means focusing on areas that can drive sustainable, organic growth rather than relying on capital-intensive approaches.

It also means recognising that fans are effectively the club’s customers. They are the people who live and breathe the club. So the question becomes: how do we grow that customer base? How do we increase engagement organically and sustainably? And how do we ensure fans are proud of the club they support?

It’s a long road to achieve that.

There are still a league or two to go before we can really unlock the full commercial opportunities. But even then, we want to be thoughtful about how money is spent.

We want to make sure revenue is allocated responsibly across players, staff and operations, and that we don’t fall into the trap of unlocking commercial revenue only to spend two or three times that amount on player salaries.

One of the ways we hope to achieve this is by developing local Welsh talent.

We want to create a clear pathway for girls starting in the sport — from school and amateur levels, through junior development programmes, and ultimately into the senior team.

That pathway allows us to retain talent in Wales and develop players who can eventually become Gwalia United’s next major signing. Instead of relying on expensive transfers, we can cultivate talent internally.

This talent development approach is one of the cornerstone elements of our project.

It’s a long-term strategy. Identifying talent, nurturing that talent, creating tailored development plans and seeing those plans translate into progress on the pitch happens over multiple seasons. It doesn’t happen overnight.

To support that development, we’ve also brought in experienced players who live and breathe the club.

They effectively play the role of senior leaders within the squad — similar to managers within an organisation — helping younger players realise their potential and stay on track with their development.

That’s the same philosophy you would apply in any organisation. If you’re running a team, you want the people within that team to grow and progress alongside the organisation itself.

When that happens, everyone benefits — the individuals, the team, and the organisation as a whole.

Our vision for the club is actually tied to something much bigger than the club itself.

It’s tied to the success of Welsh football.

We want to build something that has a lasting and enduring impact.

For us, that vision translates into helping the Welsh Women’s National Team reach at least the semi-finals of the 2035 Women’s World Cup, which will be hosted in the UK.

That is our North Star.

The question becomes: how do we get there?

Our answer is through a long-term talent development programme that keeps the best Welsh players playing and developing in Wales before progressing to the national team.

If Gwalia United has strong representation in that World Cup squad, it will be a clear reflection that the strategy has worked.

Another unique aspect of Gwalia United is that we are currently the only Welsh women’s team competing in the English football system.

That gives us an incredible opportunity to galvanise the nation of Wales behind the club.

Every match effectively becomes Wales versus England.

Our potential fan base is essentially the entire country of Wales, and we want the whole country to get behind the team and the project.

Ultimately, what we are trying to build is something different.

We want to create a sustainable financial playbook for running a football club — one that prioritises transparency, responsible investment, and long-term impact.

And if we do that successfully, we believe we can help make Wales a genuine force in women’s football.