Finn Harps have welcomed another Finn Harps to Ballybofey for the weekend!
A party of volunteers, parents and players from the Finn Harps Liverpool Junior Football Club arrived in Ballybofey last night.
The Liverpudians who will be guests of our League of Ireland Premier Division Finn Harps F.C. will play a friendly fixture against an Academy team on this Saturday morning.
Liverpool Finn Harps was setup up 40 years ago as a result of the large Irish population on Merseyside.
History of Liverpool Finn Harps:”Why we took the name Finn Harps?”
There was a Finn Harps adult’s football team formed in 1977 from the Liverpool Irish Centre, from 1st and 2nd generation members, Sean Loughran – Snr (Armagh) and our first chairman, Donegal native, Sean Murphy from Killybegs, who suggested the name.
We hosted Finn Harps at the Irish Centre after the match, when they came over to play Everton in the UEFA cup in 1978.
Sean Loughran Jnr played for the Liverpool Finn Harps for 25 years and when we were looking for a name for our junior club, we thought it would be a good idea to carry on the name for 3rd generation Loughran (Tom).
Finn Harps Juniors were formed in 2001 by Sean Loughran, Ray Jackson and John Quinlan (RIP) who wanted to give children in the West Derby area a chance to enjoy playing regular football, regardless of ability.
At the first session eight children turned up, but word soon spread and the club soon had enough players to form 2 teams, an under 9’s and under 11’s.
The creation of Finn Harps Juniors had filled a void in the area and it became evident that people had been waiting for a club which allowed children to play football in a safe and supervised manner.
Since first launching in 2001, the club has gone on to form new teams every year at every age group. We also sent more parents on Level 1 coaching courses and grew into one of the biggest clubs in the area.
Very early on, we decided if we were going to run a club, then we would do it to the best of our ability and so we formed a committee, adopted a child protection policy, a code of conduct for parents and players and in 2004 we were awarded Charter Standard status.
In 2010 we won FA Charter Standard Club of the year in the North West region at the Community Football Awards. In 2011 we had 11 junior football teams, 14 Level 1 coaches, 6 qualified referees and approximately 160 children.
Current Position
Finn Harps junior football club continues a kids community club based around the West Derby area of Liverpool.
The club is still an FA charter standard club which runs 8 different age groups between U6 up to U18. We have squads in the following age group’s:
Development group for 4&5 year olds, U6, U7, U8, U9, U10, U11, U13 & U18.
Although our aim is to create a friendly relaxed environment for children to enjoy developing we are also lucky enough to also be competitive at every age group. We as a club try to ensure every group is managed/coached by qualified coaches/teachers which helps us to sustain this fun and competitive environment in the right manor.
Also Finn Harps JFC are represented in some of the strongest leagues across the north west but at the same time we ensure the level is relevant to the team and its current development to ensure enjoyment and development is still a priority.
Finn Harps (Donegal) are delighted to welcome our friend from Merseyside and look forward to their visit this weekend.
