Dave Challinor verdict on Hartlepool United's National Lottery funding boost - and why some clubs won't be happy
Earlier this month, it was confirmed that fifth and sixth tier clubs would receive £10million of funding over the next three months thanks to a support grant from the National Lottery fund.
The funding was granted to help clubs combat the financial shortfall of supporters not being allowed to attend matches. The £10million will be divided between all 67 National League member clubs with the first installment to be paid this week.
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Hide AdFunding allocations have been based loosely on clubs’ 2019-20 average home attendances with Hartlepool United one of the seven clubs set to receive the maximum funding allocation of £95,000 per month – a total of £285,000 over the three month period.
The remaining 16 fifth tier clubs will be granted £84,000 per month while clubs in the National League North and South will receive significantly less.
Challinor has welcomed the funding, which relieves some of the pressure on owner Raj Singh.
But the Pools boss concedes some clubs won’t be happy with the way the money has been divided.
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Hide AdOn the funding boost, Challinor said: “It’s strange, in all scenarios there are going to be people who are unhappy.
"You’ll have to ask the powers that be to ask how they’ve came up with the structure of it because if I’m sat in York or Chester’s position, I’d be thinking I’m not sure how this works when our club has 2,500 fans every week yet we get £36,000 while clubs in the National League with crowds of under a thousand get £84,000.
"Even with that, you’d want some transparency which I don’t think there’s been but for us the big issue is about surviving and the money that we will get will allow us to survive and what happens further down the line come January, we’ll have to wait and see but it’s a welcome release for the chairman and those responsible for running the club from the financial side of things.”