FLEMMING AND HARTLEY CROWNED PFA COMMUNITY CHAMPIONS!

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Pair receive award ahead of Community Day at Turf Moor

2025-04-11T12:00:00.000Z

FLEMMING AND HARTLEY CROWNED PFA COMMUNITY CHAMPIONS!

Pair receive award ahead of Community Day at Turf Moor

2025-04-11T12:00:00.000Z

Pair receive award ahead of Community Day at Turf Moor

Burnley FC in the Community and Burnley Football Club have named Zian Flemming and Naomi Hartley as their PFA Community Champions for the 2024/2025 campaign.

This season, both Zian and Naomi have visited a variety of community projects, from local primary schools to Walking Football parties.

Last month, Zian and Manuel Benson visited Turf Moor to surprise Les Newcombe with his Premier League Community Captain Award. In return, Les was invited to surprise Zian with his own award!

“It’s been a nice surprise,” said Zian.

“We do the appearances every few weeks and when we’re out I just try to bring a smile to people’s faces and make it a good day.

“The community visits are about the personal contact with the fans. It’s also been good for me to see how much Burnley does in the community through all the different appearances. It just reminds you of how big an impact the Club has on people’s lives.”

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And on Les being the person to hand over his award Zian added: “That was nice, it’s something I didn’t know was happening! It’s funny because one of my appearances was surprising Les at Turf Moor and handing him his community award. It was a remarkable day for him, you could see he even got emotional. It was an honour to do that and now he’s kind of returned the favour by surprising me. So yes, it’s been good to see him again.”

The charity also invited Hattie from a local primary school, whose love for football has grown dramatically since she attended a women’s football workshop with Naomi. She has been attending Burnley FC Women’s matches ever since and was honoured to come down, thank Naomi personally, and hand over her award.

Naomi said: “It’s amazing. I’m a local girl so it’s quite nice to feel like I’m inspiring those around me. I just want to lead by example and hopefully give them something to aspire to be like.

“I’ve loved going to the schools, meeting all the individuals who are coming to watch us play. It’s been nice to have that one-to-one contact because you don’t really see that when you’re playing. It’s been good to connect with the community off the pitch.

“Hattie was at one of the school’s I went to, she took part in the session, and I remember speaking to her a little bit then. She came and watched us the week after. For her to give me the award has been really special.”

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Helen Gurman, Chief Executive Officer of Burnley FC in the Community added: “We’ve had another incredible season with player engagement, but Zian and Naomi have really stood out to us for going the extra mile. When they come to our sessions, they really connect with our participants. They want to know their stories and journeys, and nothing has ever been too much for them. Both Zian and Naomi have been truly inspirational to the young people they’ve met, and I know we’ve got a lot of future footballers who look up to them.”

Club celebrate Community Day at Norwich City fixture!

This year’s Community Day focuses on the charity’s STEM programme, ‘All Systems Go’, which launched at the start of last season. The programme aims to provide primary school children with early access to STEM, raise their ambitions, and teach them about the opportunities available to them.

The STEM programme is supported by four brilliant businesses: ReStart Consultancy, Safran Nacelles, Michael Bailey Associates, and Gener8.

To show support the players will be warming up in branded BFCitC t-shirts, there will be a bucket collection and foodbank donation collection at the stadium, and in the Rapidz Fan Zone supporters can experience the charity's brand-new 'The Stem Den', an immersive classroom kindly donated to the charity by local business Gener8, which will change the way we teach STEM in Burnley completely!

Do check out the activities if you can and any donation you can make will be greatly appreciated by the charity.