Darlington's revolutionary US academy plan as new ground at standstill

However, in a tumultuous week that has seen the departure of Steve Watson with the club in the National League North relegation zone, chairman David Johnston has admitted that hopes of an imminent move into a new ground are effectively at a standstill with Quakers reliant on council support.

While Darlington currently have an academy in operation, it operates at a relatively low-level and has struggled to produce players for the first team in recent seasons. It has not been a major revenue stream for the club, leading directors to look at a complete overhaul that would see the youth set-up transformed.

Under the proposed new model, Darlington would have a scouting and recruitment operation based in the US that would identify potential players who might be interested in paying up to £16,000-a-year to move to England and join the new academy. For that, they would receive expert coaching provided by the football club while also benefiting from a tie-up with two different educational establishments who could provide education for A-levels, vocational qualifications or degrees.

“We’ve got memorandums of understanding signed with two educational establishments,” said Johnston. “They are at quite an advanced stage. What we’re now sorting out in the next three to four weeks are the recruitment routes.

“We’re going to initially start with the American marketplace, so it’s about setting up the right relationships, links and contracts with the soccer schools and individuals who are going to do the recruitment out there.

“There are two different areas. One is looking at kids in the academy who can play up to the Under-17s league, and then there’s another institution which will look at 19-21-year-olds.

“When these academies are up and running, I’d love to have 100 students coming in every year, and when they’re paying between £14-16,000 to have that privilege of playing in the academy, it’s a significant revenue stream that comes into the football club. At the moment, we are establishing how we fund the recruitment set-up in the United States. That will need some funds, but we don’t want to affect the playing budget.”

Transforming the academy is one way in which Darlington could grow their revenue, with their status as a part-time club in a league comprised largely of full-time clubs making it increasingly difficult for them to compete at the top end of National League North.

Given that the club do not own their own stadium and are long-term tenants of Darlington Rugby Club at Blackwell Meadows, moving into a new home ground would also have the potential to significantly boost their financial position.

It is now more than four years since Darlington announced ambitious plans to leave Blackwell Meadows and relocate to a purpose-built site elsewhere in the town, but the plans which included additional sports, retail and hospitality facilities, are yet to come to fruition.

Last year, Conservative councillors called on Darlington Borough Council to support the club’s attempts to build a new home, but Johnston has effectively conceded that things are still at a standstill.

“We are still in discussion with various stakeholders, including the council being the main one, around what can happen,” he said, in an interview on Darlington’s YouTube channel. “They are looking to try to deliver outcomes for the benefit of all the sporting clubs in Darlington.

“We are at the table, we’re discussing it, but some of this is not our gift to grant. We are relying on others because we don’t have any assets ourselves, but there are discussions ongoing.

“It’s very hard work, but there are variations of plans being discussed, and when we get any traction or any further on that, we’ll advise. But it is very hard work. We can’t just say we want to do x,y or z, we are reliant on others in terms of the plans and that’s the difficulty we have.”

In the short term, Johnston is helping to lead the search for a new manager following Watson’s departure by mutual consent in the wake of last weekend’s defeat at AFC Telford.

“It’s been a very difficult week for the club,” he said. “It’s not been a great start to the season. It’s not what any of us would have wanted, to be sitting where we are. That was felt by everyone at the club, and none more so than Steve and Terry [Mitchell].

“We’d been discussing what we could do for some weeks, and following the game at the weekend, Steve and I had a chat and reflection around what we could do. We don’t want to be in this position, we want to get out of this position, and we came to the mutual decision that it might be best to have a different voice.

“It was with deep regret that we decided that Steve would leave the club. He’d been thinking about it for a few weeks, and I think the results were starting to have an effect on everybody.”

Mitchell will be in caretaker charge when Darlington host local rivals Spennymoor Town – the only team currently below them in the table – on Saturday, with the former number two having expressed a desire to take over on a permanent basis.

Darlington have advertised the position to external candidates, but Mitchell has an immediate opportunity to stake his claim, with Johnston hoping that results make it all-but-impossible not to appoint him permanently.

“Terry’s very happy to stay on,” he said. “He’s obviously talked to Steve, but he loves the football club and the job he’s doing. He’s expressed an interest in trying to take the job full-time, so good luck to him. It’s a results game, so let’s see where we get to with that.

“Obviously, we are casting the net wider, which Terry understands. He’s been in football for a long time, but at the moment the job’s his and he’ll take charge on Saturday. He’s very committed to Darlington Football Club.”