🔗 Share this article

Midweek, the Bay Collective group revealed the appointment of Anja van Ginhoven, the English national team's general manager working with Sarina Wiegman, as their global women's football operations director. The new multi-club ownership body, which includes San Francisco’s Bay FC as the first club in its portfolio, has prior experience in bringing in talent from the English FA.

The appointment this year of Cossington, the prominent previous technical director at the Football Association, as top executive served as a demonstration of ambition from Bay Collective. She knows female football inside out and now she has assembled an executive team that possesses extensive knowledge of the evolution of the women's game and packed with professional background.

She marks the third core member of Wiegman's coaching team to exit in the current year, following the chief executive departing before the Euros and assistant coach, Veurink, leaving to assume the position of head coach of the Dutch national team, but her decision arrived more quickly.

Leaving has been a shock to the system, yet “I’d taken my decision to leave the FA quite a long time ago”, Van Ginhoven says. “I had a contract covering four years, just as Arjan and Sarina had. When they renewed, I had expressed I wasn't sure about renewing myself. I had accepted the thought that following the tournament my time with England would end.”

The tournament became an emotional competition due to that. “It's sharp in my memory, having a conversation with Wiegman in which I informed her regarding my plans and we then remarked: ‘We share a single dream, what a triumph it would represent that we win the Euros?’ In life, it's rare that hopes materialize frequently however, absolutely incredibly, this one did.”

Sitting in an orange T-shirt, she has divided loyalties post her tenure in England, where she was part of winning back-to-back European titles and was a part of Wiegman’s staff when the Netherlands won at Euro 2017.

“England will forever have a special place in my heart. Therefore, it will be challenging, especially with the knowledge that the players will be arriving for the international camp shortly,” she notes. “When England plays the Netherlands, where do my loyalties lie? Today I have on orange, but tomorrow it’s white.”

In a speedboat, you can pivot and accelerate swiftly. In a lean group like this one, that’s easily done.

Bay FC was not initially considered when the management specialist concluded that it was time for a change, however everything aligned perfectly. Cossington initiated the recruitment and common principles were crucial.

“Almost from the very first moment we connected we had that click moment,” says Van Ginhoven. “We were instantly aligned. We've discussed extensively about different things concerning growing the sport and our shared vision for the right approach.”

Cossington and Van Ginhoven are not the only figures to relocate from well-known positions in Europe's football scene for a fresh start in the US. The Spanish club's technical director for women's football, Patricia González, has been unveiled as the organization's global sporting director.

“I was very attracted in the deep faith of the power within the female sport,” she says. “I have known Kay Cossington for a long time; back when I was with Fifa, she held the technical director role for England, and decisions like this come naturally when you are aware you will have around you colleagues who drive you.”

The extensive expertise within their group sets them apart, says Van Ginhoven, for the collective one of several recent multi-team projects to launch over the past few years. “That’s one of our unique selling points. It’s OK that people do things in different ways, but we definitely believe in having that football knowledge on board,” she says. “Each of us have progressed in women’s football, throughout our careers.”

As outlined on their site, the ambition for the collective is to support and lead an advanced and lasting environment for women's football clubs, built on proven methods to meet the varied requirements of women. Succeeding in this, with collective agreement, without having to justify actions for specific initiatives, is hugely liberating.

“I compare it with moving from a large ship to a fast boat,” states Van Ginhoven. “You're journeying in uncharted waters – that’s a Dutch saying, I don’t know if it translates – and you just need to rely on your personal insight and skills to choose wisely. Adjusting course and speeding up is possible using a speedboat. In a lean group like this, that’s easily done.”

González adds: “In this role, we begin with a clean canvas to work from. Personally, what we do focuses on impacting football on a wider scale and that white paper allows you to do whatever you want, adhering to football's guidelines. That’s the beauty of what we are building together.”

The ambition is high, the executives are voicing opinions players and fans are eager to hear and it will be fascinating to follow the development of this organization, the club and any clubs added to the portfolio.

As a preview of upcoming developments, what factors are essential of a high-performance environment? “{It all starts and ends with|Everything begins and concludes with|The foundation and culmination involve