Crusaders FC are pleased that Communities Minister Gordon today fulfilled his commitment to deliver the above fund and went further by advancing projects to the value of £82m.
Crusaders FC are delighted for all the clubs who have been advanced and recognise the real change that it will bring to each of the clubs involved in particular and to the Football Family generally.
Crusaders FC are naturally disappointed not to be advanced.
Crusaders FC submitted our application in the belief that it was an open process and that the best scoring bids would receive funding based purely on score, in line with the same scoring matrix for all three strands and the guidance notes.
Nowhere within the documentation or the guidance notes was there mention of a weighting towards any tier over another.
Neither was there mention that bids with significantly lower scores would be advanced ahead of bids with much higher scores.
Bids were scored in April 2025.
The decision to prefer Tier 1 ( five advanced ) and Tier 2 bids ( thirteen advanced ) over the two Tier 3 bids announced today has the effect that at least two Tier 3 bids (outside of the two bids advanced) , including our bid, considerably outscoring the vast majority of Tier 1 and Tier 2 bids which were advanced.
We believe this decision made AFTER the bids were submitted and scored has bastardised the process in favour of Tier 1 and Tier 2 bids.
We have requested an urgent meeting with the department to raise these concerns.
We will update our members further as soon as we have the relevant feedback.