Highly experienced England left back and former manager, Stuart Pearce, recently dropped in on Wingrave JFC to present their FA Charter Standard award.

Wingrave JFC, also known as Wingrave Wasps, is a community club in the Buckinghamshire village and provides facilities for youngsters as young as six access to coaching to enjoy the beautiful game. Recently the club has invested time, effort and resources to gather the necessary experience to satisfy the Football Association’s criteria to join its Charter Standard programme.

The club had to satisfy the following requirements:

• Have an FA-trained Club Welfare Officer
• An FA Level 1 coach for each youth team
• Criminal Record Checks (CRC) for all volunteers involved in youth football teams
• FA Emergency Aid-trained volunteers linked to each team
• Deliver The FA’s Respect programme
• Appropriate administration governance in place – in relation to the club’s size

The Wasps is a proud club that puts inclusivity, community, respect, safety and fun at the core of everything it does, and it’s these values that helped to achieve the FA’s requirements. Each year, the accreditation is reassessed to ensure the club is still being progressive and satisfying the criteria.

The presentation took place at Wingrave Park, the social club for the village. Stuart presented the award to Andy Bailey, the club’s welfare officer who also led the workload for the award. There was then an informative Q&A with the England legend, where parents, supports and players took turns in asking Stuart a question about his career for club and country. With a career as rich as Stuart’s, the Q&A was illuminating to players about how to keep improving and, in reference, to his famous penalty at Euro 96, how to take the best penalty and recover from setbacks. Stuart also had photos and signed autographs. 

Club Chairman, Chris Phillips, commented: “It was a fantastic evening and mirrored the outstanding achievement the club has made in meeting the FA’s Charter Standard programme.  Well done Andy Bailey for leading this for Wingrave Wasps. We were delighted to welcome Stuart to the club and everyone present was thrilled when he walked into the room. Stuart has had a fantastic career – both playing and managing – it was noticeable how his experiences influenced all our younger players, but also coaches and parents. The Q&A was good fun and then all the players had a photo with a bona fide England footballing legend. Having Stuart present our award is a definite highlight for Wingrave JFC and everyone associated with it.”

Stuart can list playing for Wealdstone, Coventry City, Nottingham Forest, West Ham, Newcastle Utd and Manchester City, whilst he has also managed England U21s and the full senior side, whilst he was manager and coach for the UK’s Olympic London 2012 side. Recently, he has coached at West Ham Utd and you can hear him commentate and offer expert opinion on national radio station, TalkSport.

To find out more about Charter Standard and getting your league or club signd up please visit our Charter Standard pages or contact Club and League Development Officer, Lisa Welling via Development@Berks-BucksFA.com or via 01235558450