The board of FC United of Manchester is pleased to announce the appointment of Natalie Atkinson as the club’s new Chief Operating Officer who will work alongside Neil Reynolds who becomes Chief Executive Officer. Click to read on
The board of FC United of Manchester is pleased to announce the appointment of Natalie Atkinson as the club’s new Chief Operating Officer who will work alongside Neil Reynolds who becomes Chief Executive Officer.
Natalie has a wealth of experience in football and a prominent local and national profile and her name may already be familiar to many FC United supporters as the former Chief Executive at Curzon Ashton and Southport and, more recently, as Managing Director at Oldham Athletic. She will replace Paul Smith who left the club in December.
Meanwhile, in a significant strengthening of the leadership team, Neil Reynolds will become the club’s Chief Executive Officer, a recognition of the strong leadership he has brought to FC United during his time here which merits him, in the board’s opinion, being in overall charge of the club. The change in Neil’s job title to CEO makes this clear both internally and externally.
As Chief Operating Officer at FC United, Natalie will have responsibility for all areas of the club apart from football and the Academy which will remain Neil’s responsibility and she is keen to work together with Neil and use her senior leadership skills to drive performance across the club and enable us to deliver our five year vision. Neil, in turn, will become the club’s Chief Executive Officer with responsibility for football and the Academy.
The board unanimously agreed to appoint Natalie as Chief Operating Officer feeling that she possesses a skillset, including people and project management, that is much required by the club and offers visible leadership and a breadth of experience that will be an invaluable addition to our senior management team as we look to implement our five year vision.
Prior to joining Curzon in 2016 Natalie was the Football Development Manager for the Manchester Football Association where she led the implementation of the National Game Strategy and raised the profile of the FA in the development of grassroots football.
It was this experience that Natalie took into her first football club role at the Tameside Stadium where, as chief executive of Curzon Ashton, she led a number of key initiatives such as successfully applying for National League Trust funding to establish a community programme and securing substantial grant funding from the Football Foundation to install a new 3G pitch. Natalie was also instrumental in driving a significant increase in the club’s revenue through additional commercial and sponsorship income and higher crowds.
Natalie then joined Southport in 2018 where she helped raise the profile of the club and implemented a number of important initiatives including overseeing the complete rebuilding of one of the ground’s stands, securing grant funding for pitch renovation, creating a professional off-field management team and leading a successful season ticket marketing campaign that boosted sales by 75 per cent on the previous season.
Not surprisingly, given her success at Curzon and Southport, it wasn’t long before a Football League club showed interest in Natalie and she joined Oldham Athletic in 2019 as managing director and successfully guided the League Two club through the first few months of the Covid pandemic.
Since leaving the Latics in September 2020 Natalie has taken a break from football and has been lecturing on strategy and governance on the English Academy Manager programme (a professional development course for football academy leaders) and she also completed the ‘CEO of a Sports Organisation’ qualification at the University Campus of Football Business, part of an education programme developed for ‘elite sports industry professionals’. Natalie is also Director of Engagement at Fair Game, a collection of clubs committed to improve the governance of football, and a director at Her Game Too, a not-for-profit organisation founded in 2021 to champion women in football and campaign against sexism. Both of these directorships are voluntary roles.
Speaking about her appointment Natalie said “I’m delighted to be appointed as Chief Operating Officer of FC United to lead and work collaboratively with the board, Chief Executive Officer, staff and co-owners as we strive to deliver the club’s ambitious long term vision. This is an exciting time for the club and I’m really looking forward to harnessing our tremendous collective strength to drive the club and its community forward through the newly established committee structure. I’d like to thank the board for appointing me and the confidence that they’ve shown in me to deliver this”.
Club chair Adrian Seddon said “we now have an exceptional leadership team with Neil as overall head of the organisation and Chief Executive Officer and Natalie delivering across the span of operations and commercial as Chief Operating Officer. This will allow Neil to focus fully on football and the Academy with the club’s operation in the hands of an experienced administrator. On behalf of everyone at FC United I would like to offer Natalie a very warm welcome to our club and congratulate Neil on becoming CEO which is richly deserved”.
And Neil Reynolds added “I’m proud to have the opportunity to serve as Chief Executive Officer of FC United at this important time for the club as we embark on the next phase of our evolution with ambitious growth plans. I’d like to congratulate Natalie on her appointment as the new Chief Operating Officer and look forward to working alongside her - she brings a wealth of leadership experience and has the capability to oversee all non-football business functions, which will enable me to focus more of my time on football matters and the Academy. I would like to thank the board, staff and co-owners for your encouragement and support and assure you all that I will do my utmost to provide the leadership and drive to ensure we win together on and off the pitch”.
Natalie will commence her new role on 21st February. I’m sure you’ll join us in welcoming her to the club and congratulating Neil on becoming CEO.
Further information on this appointment can be viewed by the club’s co-owners on the members’ forum. Any press enquiries should be addressed to press@fc-utd.uk.