Glasgow City welcome donation by James Anderson to help women’s game

The donation, to the Scottish Football Partnership Trust, is part of an overall £3 million package which the Edinburgh philanthropist and fund manager is giving to Scottish football.

And City club manager Laura Montgomery said: “As with all clubs, we have suffered from not having any of our usual income streams available to us since lockdown. Added to this the challenges of meeting the stringent protocols for return to training and playing, most notably testing, adds an even greater financial challenge on how we even get restarted.

“We are obviously in a unique situation where we need to return to training much sooner than our SWPL 1 counterparts, due to our Champions League fixtures, so not returning because of the financial implications is not really an option for us, we must somehow find a way.

“The distribution of income from Mr Anderson’s donation to the SWF and clubs is incredibly generous and very welcome in these challenging financial times for everyone.”

Meanwhile the Petershill-based club have been told their Champions League quarter-final with German champions Wolfsburg will take place in Spain on either August 21 or 22.

UEFA have announced that all of the final matches of the competition will be played between two venues in Spain’s Basque Country, the iconic San Mamés Stadium in Bilbao and the Anoeta Stadium in nearby San Sebastian.

The matches, originally scheduled to be played over two legs, will also be one-off games, most likely behind completely closed doors.

The final date and location of Glasgow City’s match will be confirmed when the four quarter-final ties are pulled out of the hat at a UEFA scheduled draw in Nyon on June 26.

The Frauen Bundesliga has fully returned to competitive action and Wolfsburg have just clinched their fourth successive League title.

And with City yet to resume training after Covid-19 derailed all training and competition in Scotland in March, Montgomery is eager for the team to get back.

She said: “The announcement from UEFA now gives us a clear focus.

“We know, given the stringent protocols required for the resumption of training and playing in Scotland, it is most likely going to delay the commencement of our League.”

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