AGM and Supporters' Summit

The first Annual General Meeting of Supporters Direct Scotland was held at Oriam, Scotland’s National Sports Performance Centre, on Saturday the 22nd of June. The AGM reviewed the first year of our activities as a locally incorporated Scottish organisation, and culminated in the election of our board – visit our website to learn more about your elected representatives:

• Morag McHaffie (chair)
• Andrew Millar
• Dougie McMahon
• Ian Baird
• Jennifer Aitchison
• Louise Strutt
• Maureen Kirkwood
• Graeme Baxter (ATAC representative)
• Jon Keen (co-opted board member)

AGM attendees were joined after lunch by presenters and attendees at our annual supporters' summit, with "Scottish fan culture" as this year's theme – looking at what makes Scottish football distinctive, celebrating the good things, and also exploring some areas where our game receives unwelcome attention. The programme included sessions on the recent policing review, supporter misconduct, the role of alcohol consumption in football cultures, responsible gambling, the Tartan Army Sunshine Appeal, and progress being made at their club by the Killie Trust.

Read Scott Johnston's review of the summit here and watch Youth Football Scotland's video highlights package over on YouTube.

The Gooner lives to fight another season with a little help from FansBet

At the beginning of the year the Gooner was on the brink of extinction but thanks to FansBet’s unique commitment to giving back the Arsenal fanzine is preparing for yet another season in circulation.

The Gooner, written purely by Arsenal supporters without any editorial influence from the club, has been published for more than 30 years since its debut issue in the autumn of 1987 and was voted FSF Fanzine of the Year 2018

A mix of opinion and retro content, along with match reports and exclusive interviews with Arsenal players past and present, the mag is a combined effort from a team of passionate writers as well as being the starting point for journalist Amy Lawrence and author Jon Spurling.

But as recently as March its future looked pretty bleak due to a combination of rising printing costs at a time where football opinion is now dominated by online media such as websites, podcasts and video content.

In order to safeguard the immediate future of one of the UK’s oldest independent football publications Editor Kevin Whitcher launched an appeal earlier this year to get to 1,000 new subscribers which would generate the all-important funds the keep the magazine on the streets of Islington and beyond.

And thanks to the intervention of FansBet, The Gooner lives to fight another day (or season) as we have snapped up the final 50 subscriptions needed to get them past the magical 1,000 figure which we have offered to customers using the promo code: GOONER when they deposited £10 into their account on a, first come, first served basis.

If you are a member of a supporters organisation and would like more information on how to join as a Fan Partner, please get in touch with FansBet via email at: loyalty@fansbet.com.

Scottish Football Supporters Survey 2019/20

This season's national supporters survey will open at the end of this month.

Watch out for announcements by each club, by the SFA and SPFL, and through the Scottish Supporters Network and don't miss your chance to record your views. The survey is used by the football clubs, the league and the football association to drive improvement in three areas – Value For Money, Fan Engagement, and the Supporter Experience – and is at the heart of a three-year benchmarking study to track progress against these three themes.

This year we will be adding some specific questions about club initiatives you most admire, and we look forward to publishing these findings later in the year and working across the whole of Scottish football to act on your views.

Read summaries of our previous surveys at http://www.scottishsupporters.net/survey/

Gambling with Sponsorship: How Does the Scottish Football Fan See It?

Gordon King, an MSc Sports Management student at the University of Stirling, is conducting a survey looking into the relationship between exposure to gambling sponsorship and the impact of video gaming habits on gambling activity.

To contribute to this research, please take 10 minutes to complete Gordon's survey at https://forms.gle/vxkRgNUwTCUG9dFz5

And finally...

Articles, podcasts and videos from the archive

As part of our objective to better connect fans, share best practice within Scottish sport, to promote supporter dialogue and promote sport clubs through which positive societal change can occur, here we share some relevant stories from the past month.

1. Scotland Fans Should Be Excited About The English Premier League
2. 12 Scottish Premiership Players I’m Looking Forward To Seeing In 2019/20
3. Are Scottish Football Strips Going Through A Renaissance?
4. Scottish Football Should Be Pushing For More LGBT Equality
5. Fingers Crossed For Killie!
6. Looking At The 2019 Supporters’ Summit
7. Motherwell Win Big On David Turnbull Transfer Deal

You can also check out our back catalogue of podcast episodes and subscribe to Behind The Goals using your favoured ‘podcatcher’ here.

Following excellent feedback from Summit attendees on the session led by Superintendent John McBride on Football Policing we met again to hear more of his perspectives on policing priorities.

In the latest of our series of videos shedding light on the excellent work happening at all levels of Scottish sport, we paid a visit to Glasgow on the Ball, a club competing in the Glasgow Community and Cooperative League, set up to raise funds for Scottish charity Africa on the Ball.

Subscribe to our YouTube channel to see more!

Want to have your say? Contact us at info@supporters-direct.scot