Our work aims to help clubs (any level, men’s or women’s) to grow sustainably: the prosper regardless of what happens on the pitch. Since Ana and I started the business in 2005, we’ve worked across Europe and Asia, from Tallinn to Tilburg and from Llanelli to Yerevan.

Most people know us for our fan experience work, but that’s only one part of the bigger picture. By far and away the most important ingredient is the purpose of the club we’re working with. What are they for? What difference do they make? Why would the local community suffer if they weren’t there? What do they give (back)?

Because, if we know one thing, it is that a club founded on football aspirations alone can only grow if it’s really good at football.

In Moldova, Europe’s poorest country, times were hard before Covid made them almost unbearable. It’s hard enough looking after your own family without worrying for your pets. Animal welfare in many parts of the former Soviet Union is too often an afterthought. Dogs that would light up a home are left to wander. Or worse.

But, just like Zenit St Petersburg, whose players walked onto the field for a recent match each holding dogs from a local shelter to be re-homed, the clubs we’re working with in Moldova are taking positive animal welfare messages into the community. And the community is repaying that work by taking more of an interest in the clubs. Because of this (and many other focused community activities) attendances at these clubs doubled during the pandemic.

Bohemian FC goes a step further. It has re-purposed itself from a football club to a community support hub. Of course, the footie still matters, but what’s more important is that the club defends and supports those who live in that part of north Dublin. This is Phibsborough, where multiple languages are spoken and where people’s opportunities are limited. So, the club – which was taken into supporter ownership in 1890 – is now first and foremost a vehicle for making lives better. It goes way beyond what you’d expect from a club’s community trust.

When the people of Ireland got a chance to change the law to give women the right to choose, Bohs campaigned for a ‘yes’ vote. In this country, we’ve just seen the right to protest quietly criminalised, while distracted by Boris and his colleagues’ Christmas Parties. I don’t see any high-profile football clubs pointing this out.

Over consecutive years Bohs’ third kit has first supported refugee charities (with ‘Refugees are Welcome’ on the shirt) and more recently, it has borne the name of local indie band Fontaines DC, who are helping the club to raise awareness of homelessness and the damage it does to people.

Everything the club does is driven by the needs of its community and that unique purpose, thanks to the power of social media, has meant that people who identify with its cause are more than happy to chip in and buy merch, membership, etc., even if they live in Canada and have no realistic prospect of attending a Bohs game.

I’m an owner at Lewes FC: another club with a higher purpose. In their case it is equality and inclusion. They became the first club in the world to pay its men’s and women’s teams the same. Given that the women’s team is in the second tier of English women’s football and the men’s team is in the seventh, you could argue that the girls should get more, but the point is made.

Just like Bohs, they have followers around the world, each of whom pays £30 to be a member. They have an app so that you can watch games, keep up with their community work and feel part of the club, regardless of where you’re based.

My pal is a director at Bury AFC, the so-called Phoenix Club emerging into the light from the debris left by Steve Dale at Gigg Lane. They too have the higher purpose of making lives better. To grow the club and to support their community, they have updated the old club’s motto and created a set of values to guide the work they do (which extended to being used to recruit former Sunderland player Andy Welsh as manager).

But what’s most interesting is the fact that, in contrast to almost any non-league club I know, they have amassed over 100 enthusiastic volunteers.