Trust Membership 2025/26 now open.

Trust membership renewal is now open for the 2025/26 season.

You can rejoin/join the trust for the 2025/26 season HERE

Or at the Trust Desk in the DALE Bar before any home game.

Adults/Exiles remain at just £7.50 with juniors 16 and under free.

Running from July 1st through to July 2026, we have kept the membership subscription the same as last year: £7.50 for adults 17 and over, and it remains free for juniors 16 and under.

We warmly invite you to rejoin the Trust for the upcoming season. July marks the start of our renewal scheme for 2025/26, and we sincerely hope that our valued 2024/25 members will choose to renew and continue their journey with us. While we cherish our current members, we’re also excited to welcome new members into the Trust family.

For the Trust board, it has been a busy and at times hard season, but we all look forward to sharing another interesting season together, with you.

In this renewal note, we aim to outline our target initiatives for 2025/26 while also reflecting on some of the achievements in delivering a service to members and the community at large during the last season.

At the time of writing, and without any advertising, it’s truly pleasing to see that we now have over 350 members, with many new people joining; their confidence in us is appreciated.

It’s been a busy year for the Trust! Our main goal is to support our members constantly, 52 weeks a year. We’re proud to be member-led, transparent, and democratic, as shown by recent polls.

You can join the trust for the 2025/26 season HERE

or at the Trust Desk in the DALE Bar before any home game

Looking Back On 2024/25 and what Does 2025/26 hold for us.

This past year has been exciting for us as we welcomed new members to the Trust board, including young faces such as Ruby, James, Jake, and Harry, all under the age of 25. They are eager to connect with young people and enhance our communication channels. We were also pleased to have Kieron Babington, known as “Mr. Livewire,” join us, bringing his enthusiasm for football and support for the “Her Game Too” initiative. These new members bring fresh ideas that energise our community.

We’re looking forward to featuring Kieron in a separate future article.” Why? Well, the Trust was asked by our younger fans if we would buy them a new drum to keep the rhythm of enthusiasm going strong and raise the atmosphere at the game..We were more than happy to do so, and Trust board member Kieron Babington is now the proud custodian of a top-of-the-range instrument, which we hope will serve as an acceptable replacement for the previously worn-out drum.

 

Photos on the left,  from left to right, Kieron, Jake, Ruby and Harry.

We also warmly welcomed Emma Loynd as our Travel Co-ordinator and Vince Ashall as our Compliance and Statistician Officer, both of whom bring valuable experience to our team. Additionally, Matt Cullen, a dedicated local teacher and passionate fan, is a father to a youngster (we are assured is a Dale Fan) who recently joined us, offering a fan’s perspective and bolstering our community efforts in fan involvement.

 

Seen here on the left

Matt Cullen, Vince Ashall and Emma Loynd.

 

 

Leanne Connolly, the new Her Game Too ambassador, is due to join the board in July. She will serve as a liaison for the new HGT initiative, bringing a fresh dynamic to our overall work. Leanne, along with Charlotte Cromarty, will be leading the new “Reset of Her Game Too” initiative, which the Trust is sponsoring.

 

HGT team with club announcer David Dockerty, Charlotte is the one with the fetching cap with Leanne taking the left position.or right as we look at the picture.

 

With a heavy workload, our focus remains fan-led. The Trust Desk at all home games in the Dale bar will continue to operate, always busy. It’s a place where fans can meet, discuss, ask questions, and express their concerns. Staffed by Trust Board members, fans receive quick responses, and if we cannot provide answers immediately, we will follow up and communicate any answers we receive. The desk will be joined by HGT representatives and the Andymans Club staff.

 

 

 

 

The Trust Board, as you can now see from above, has undergone significant changes over the recent years, particularly this year. With an expanded and diverse board membership, we now operate very much as a cooperative, which, being from Rochdale, has a pioneering approach to Trust management.

By cooperative, we mean that the board members all tend to lead on various individual subjects that we as a group regard as vital. Gone are the days of tedious rhetoric once a month at meetings with little or no ownership of ideas, as we have adopted the Cavanagh model of individual responsibility for work areas, where Trust board meetings lead, encourage, and support each other’s work. The results of this can be seen in our activities and involvement over the recent season, and we have not been shy about sharing what we do; remember, transparency. Well, here is a statistic that Vince gave us the other day.

From January 7, 2024, to June 30, 2025, we published 294 posts on our website; since then, that number has grown as our work continues into the new season

These posts aimed to inform and engage members, remaining inclusive by being shared on the trust’s social media platforms such as Facebook, Instagram, X, and other fan sites like Rochdale Notice Board, Rochdale Borough Wide Notice Board, and all other Fan Facebook pages, which, when we looked again feature nearly a thousand posts across the board this last year

We have sent out over 20 regular monthly newsletters and updates, excluding personalised mailings for our exiles, many of whom are located in Great Britain, as well as a significant number from overseas. Our surveys on various topics continue to yield valuable data, and both the popular Player of the Month vote and the end-of-year Player of the Year voting have experienced a significant increase in participation from fans and members.

 

The Trust Malta contingent is large enough to run its independent Maltese club, which we are proud to support. We now have links to them on the main Trust website, and we regularly seek to work with more local groups of Daleys.

The contributions of our Exile Coordinator, Ian Goodwin, are invaluable. With a dedicated WhatsApp service, a regular Exile newsletter, and special hospitality days, our exiles remain connected to the Trust and hopefully feel fully included.

It’s also worth remembering that our other website, the Former Players Association site, run by board member Keith Hicks, is constantly updated, along with its associated Facebook site. The Trust’s Former Players Association is highly active, and articles posted on the FPA website form the basis for that area of our work.

You can join the trust for the 2025-2026 season by clicking HERE.

Looking back, here are just some of the things we have been involved with, initiatives we have driven, and activities we have supported. Our aim is to provide the very best we can for our members. Through initiatives and support for existing members, we hope to attract new fans to the COA.

• Constantly available for all members to take forward concerns, queries and act on their behalf on any topic that is important to them, and we are available every day.
• Provided a comprehensive welfare service to all members in need or who feel that life may be leaving them behind. This service is confidential.
• We provide a staffed Trust desk at every home game throughout the season. The workload varies depending on the day the team plays, but we regularly have a large number of visitors.
• We work in an agreed-upon supportive partnership with Andymans Club, the men’s mental health CIS. We facilitate their accommodation at Saturday home games and provide help, advice, and assistance in promoting and supporting them where possible.
• We have participated at the Club board level by providing a Trust Board Director, which has been invaluable. As the holder of the “Golden Share,” we at the Trust view this position as vital for the future and it will continue. Although we currently have benign ownership, who knows what may happen when the Ogden partnership ends? For members to be able to sanction any changes affecting aspects of our historical heritage is seen as vital by the Trust.
• We have funded seven new roller blotters to assist the groundstaff in maintaining the playing surface during wet and unexpectedly inclement weather. These rollers have been purchased and are expected to arrive in time for the new season.
• 
• For those that may have missed our post then you can read about them here and the picture on the left shows you what we mean
• We have instigated and developed a nationally agreed relationship with “Her Game Too,” whose mantra we passionately support and have the endorsement of the FSA (Football Supporters Association)
• We regularly meet with club officials and management regarding issues that affect fans. Our focus groups have provided insights on kit design, stadium improvements, and club commercial activities, particularly where fans are directly impacted.
• We have run the 2024/25 Coach travel, independent of the club, supported by a generous donation from the Ogden Family. We will continue this for the 2025/26 season.
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• We appointed a person, Emma, to assist with organising our Travel activities. That role has developed into a full-board participating role and has given us a firm and clear management structure for our Travel Organisation.
• We now have dedicated board members responsible for youth involvement and increasing inclusivity among parents and families, which we hope will attract more visitors to the Crown COA.
• We have raised over £4,000 for cancer research and the Joey T appeal, with Trust Board director Keith Hicks’s family’s fundraising supplementing this figure to nearly £7,000.
• We actively canvassed for the shadow board as proposed in government white papers, which was realised by the club with the formation of the CAB advisory board by Jamie Willoughby, bringing more of the local, diverse community into the “Team Dale” fold. We feel passionately about this, and currently, we have two delegates on the CAB. As representatives of the Trust membership, we have established excellent relationships with fellow members and look forward to building on these for the benefit of the club in the future, working together as a team to achieve positive outcomes.
• We have developed, through negotiations, informal talks, and seeking opinions from other members, a new and exciting initiative. This was approved at the national level by the organisers of “Her GAME Too”, aiming to include women and enable them to enjoy the football experience in what is still regarded as a men’s game. Breaking down barriers is the aim of both groups; bringing the HGT message is vital.
• We have entered a partnership with Birmingham City Ladies Football Support Group, a meeting facilitated at the FSA and a relationship where we can share ideas, meet with other likeminded groups to build on ladies’ football, to develop Rochdale Ladies Grassroots football and to increase fan participation, especially women, to increase attendances at our senior games at the COA and to assist our colleagues elsewhere with reciprocal initiatives.
• We have established strong relationships with the senior management team at the club, the ownership group, and other key personnel, all of which are a direct result of the involvement of the Ogden family. The ability to build on this trust has given us access to key individuals. While the relationships we have developed enable us to seek answers quickly, we also recognise that our time is limited. Therefore, we aim to structure our joint work in a way that benefits the club and, ultimately, our members and fans.
• Our Youth coordinators, working under our banner of “Youth Matters”, developed a competition for our younger members where a chance to develop their reporting skills was given, with the winners of the competition interviewing three key players from the squad.
• We proudly support our sister organisation, DALE 1907 (formerly BOGS). While they now maintain their own identity, the Trust supports them in making the COA a special place for fans by providing administrative assistance. We will continue to promote their fundraising efforts, achievements, and current projects on our social media, and in aid of this, we made a donation to their recent Flag initiative.
• We have re-engaged with the Football Supporters Association (FSA). The Trust is an affiliated member with full voting rights, which we exercise on behalf of our members. Our involvement with the FSA has taken on a new meaning as we focus on increasing fan diversity and promoting FSA initiatives aimed at attracting more fans to the game. Since June, we have been invited to FSA diversity meetings and fan involvement meetings. Our aim is to ensure best practice while bringing expertise to the Trust, where we can represent every member in a full way.
• Our event, “Curry On Up The Dale,” raised significant funds for future initiatives and was one of the funniest curry evenings we’ve had. We also hosted successful quiz nights at the Flying Horse and other events, which our members and fans attended well. Further socials, fund raisers and auctions are planned for 2025/26.

You can join the trust for the 2025-2026 season by clicking HERE.

The list can go on, and a look back at our web and social media gives a fuller picture, but for now, we are content with the topics above, which flavour our work.

Excited for the 2025/26 Season Ahead!

Congratulations on reaching this point—we appreciate your dedication to understanding our efforts. Now, let’s clearly outline our work and insights as we move confidently into the upcoming season.

1. We will be consolidating all that we have mentioned above. We hope to strengthen our ties with the FSA, with our colleagues at Birmingham, and other fan groups to ensure that best practice elsewhere is adopted here at Rochdale, to ensure that members and fans are at the forefront of what we do, and hopefully the club, to be “Fan Centric” has to be a ongoing priority.
2. We will always prioritise our members’ needs. Their concerns, queries, and worries will always be our top priority. We will consistently keep them at the forefront of our thinking, whether we are at the CAB, meeting with club officials, including the ownership group, or collaborating with our sister fan organisations (Dale 1907 etc), with whom we have positive and cooperative relationships.
3. We are excited to build upon our emerging relationship with the 10 women’s teams in the AFC under-14 group. Our goal is to actively promote women’s football and make a positive contribution to grassroots efforts in the game. We have been engaging in productive conversations with team organisers, and, similar to our collaboration with “Her Game Too,” we look forward to welcoming a women’s football representative to the Trust Board. This addition will not only enhance our initiatives but also introduce a vibrant new perspective to our Trust meetings and overall efforts.
4. We will be underpinning our national agreement with “Her Game Too” by building on the relationship we have been developing with the Rochdale Ambassadors from HGT. Our role will be to assist, provide tangible help and support, and facilitate the new “Her Game Too” reset here at Rochdale, as mentioned in social media. We will not be taking any lead but will remain supportive. With this in mind, the Trust will donate to HGT to facilitate the training of new HGT advocates and to provide materials to raise the HGT profile both on and off the ground. Through the HGT associate who will be joining the Trust board, we hope to further the HGT mantra, increase the number of women attending the COA, and indeed assist in integrating grassroots involvement into the Team Rochdale family.
5. We will be donating funds to the club for the purchase of seven water blotter machines. These machines will be used to remove excess water from the new water covers and will also be available for games when heavy downpours threaten to disrupt play. Our goal is to assist the club in minimizing the number of canceled games and to provide the best possible playing surface. We hope this will reduce stress, fatigue, and disruption to the training routines of the first team. (At the time of writing, this initiative is already in progress.
6.  It is the Trust’s aim to continue fundraising for its health charity, which, as mentioned, raised considerable funds for cancer research. This year, we hope to have a very specific objective. Discussions are currently underway, and we hope to have this initiative in place by August.

These six points, along with our existing work, is all possible with the support of our members and volunteers. If you made it down to the end of the article, then we thank you.

We hope you feel that you can continue your Trust membership for 2025/26, and indeed, if you are not yet a member, then please consider joining. Your contribution is vital to what we do and want to continue doing.

 

If you’d like to learn more about what we do, come along and meet us at any of our home games. Our desk is situated in the Dale Bar and we would live to discuss what we do with you.

 

You can join the trust for the 2025-2026 season by clicking HERE.