Building on the Club’s community impact in Manchester, City provided training, funding and networking opportunities around the world to empower healthier lives through football.
Young Leaders training continued to be a key pillar of City’s global community impact. The training is delivered by City in the Community coaches and enables the Club to support, develop and invest in the next generation of community football coaches.
Building on the success of in-person training from previous years, this season saw City in the Community coaches upskill 1014 young leaders and coaches across 28 cities. Young Leaders Summits were also held in New Delhi, in partnership with Etihad, and in Atlanta, connecting 16 Young Leaders from Los Angeles, New York, Chicago and Atlanta.
The 4-In-A-Row Trophy Tour offered a unique opportunity to expand outreach and connect with legacy projects, training Young Leaders in Tokyo, New Delhi, São Paulo, Toronto and Chicago. The Club World Cup also enabled engagement with Young Leaders from communities in Philadelphia and Orlando, offering them the chance to upskill and refresh their community football coaching.
An impressive 95% of participants rated the Young Leaders training as good or very good, agreeing that after the training they felt like they could use football to make a positive difference in their city.
The season also saw Manchester City and Xylem unveil a new direction for their global community football and water initiative. They launched the ‘Water Champions Project’ (WCP), harnessing the power of volunteering to promote positive change. The WCP supported football and safe water projects across ten cities globally, inspiring meaningful water action. As part of the project, Young Leaders were encouraged to submit their plans for a volunteer event to mark World Water Day 2025, for the chance to earn a special visit from a Manchester City legend.
The competition and related campaign, which ran from January to April, engaged 2696 volunteers in water action initiatives, including clean-ups, educational days, creative campaigns and football workshops.
Tacloban City’s project was ultimately selected as this year’s winning project, earning a special visit from Manchester City legend Joleon Lescott, who joined a coastal clean-up and planted coastal mangroves to provide a protective barrier against extreme weather.
Supporting young leaders around the world to uplift the health of City youth through the power of football
Source: Manchester City
Youth-led projects in 28 cities around the world
Source: Manchester City
