Magpies in the Community
This week, I caught up with Nevin Saroya from Magpies in the Community – a registered charity and spin-off of Maidenhead United FC, providing coaching and a host of other events to help encourage participation in sport and in the community...
Tell me about Magpies in the Community... what's involved?
Magpies in the Community was started by the Maidenhead United FC chairman Peter Griffin and his family. He has been chairman of the club for many years and wanted to start something to involve the local community. It began by building a 3G small artificial pitch under a roof here at the club, which enabled Magpies in the Community to begin offering coaching to the local community.
There are a number of people behind the scenes who have worked tirelessly to help get it off the ground and, just over a year ago, Mark Nisbet, who was a 1st team player at the time, joined as Operations Manager and has helped take the community side of things to a new level.
Things have snowballed and we as a registered charity now provide football development centres, Saturday morning clubs, autism-friendly football sessions, PAN disability sessions, mini magpie sessions, as well as after school clubs within local schools, as well as free coaching in some schools. We are working hard to become sustainable so the community is served for many years.
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Who are you, Nev? Tell me about you/your family...
I, personally, am a former player of Maidenhead United FC. I used to play alongside Mark Nisbet, and remained good friends. He would tell me about what was going on and eventually asked me to come down and provide some coaching to the children. It was something I could not refuse and feel really strongly about – we owe it to children to provide good coaching to allow all kids to enjoy sports as well as feel good about themselves and gain confidence. I run a small payroll company from home and have recently become a full-time employee as Development Officer of the Community due to the vision of Mark and the club to try to continue our growth and reach out to more and more families.
I am happily married to my beautiful wife and we have a five-year-old daughter. I am a very lucky man and appreciate what I have, and hope by joining Magpies I can help enrich others too.
​How do people get involved?
We have a course that can be booked online via our website, www.magpiesinthecommunity.org, but I must state that we do free taster sessions for anyone on their first visit as we want the participant to enjoy themselves and not feel pressured to return. We are expanding and currently trying to promote more girls to participate and have girl-only sessions on Tuesdays and Thursdays. We have just started dads football, but is open to anyone that wishes to come along on a Friday evening. We are working on more and more things that we can provide to help reach out to more of the community.
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Anything else we especially need to know about?
We run a different course every day of the week. When it is half term, we also run soccer camps throughout the week, for the kids enjoyment but also to help those working parents that just cannot get the time off that they wish for.
