The Football Association was founded in 1863 as the governing body of the game in England. The FA is responsible for overseeing, promoting and developing English football at all levels, from grassroots through to the professional game. 

Sports

The Football Association (The FA)

Navin Singh is the current Commercial Director at The Football Association and was previously with the United States Golf Association where they served as the Chief Commercial Officer from January 2016 to December 2021. In this role, they were responsible for aligning commercial strategy to maximize and sustain the financial and brand value of the USGA and its key assets. Some of their key areas of responsibility included the negotiation and management of broadcast and digital media rights partnerships across domestic and international markets, management of corporate partnership program, merchandise and licensing, and ticketing and hospitality for championships. 

Navin has a long history in the sports industry, working with some of the biggest names and organizations. Navin has a proven track record in developing and executing successful commercial strategies. Under their leadership, The Football Association has seen a resurgence in popularity and profitability. Navin is a highly respected figure in the industry and is known for their dedication to their work.

Navin Singh graduated with a Bachelor of Commerce from the University of Toronto. Their focus was in management and economics.

Their manager is Mark Bullingham, CEO. They work with Rachel Brace - HR Director, Mark Burrows - COO, and John McDermott - Technical Director.

Navin Singh

Craig joined [The FA](/org/the-fa) in July 2018, and has responsibility for the entire Information Technology estate. 

With degrees in Philosophy and Theology, Craig started his career in IT support for a global software company, gaining his first management role less than eight months later. He has since worked in IT management across many industries including defence, software & hardware manufacturing, and global multi-channel distribution. Most recently Craig spent six years in the aviation industry, firstly managing the entire application estate for [Virgin Atlantic](/org/virgin-atlantic) and subsequently operations & corporate systems for [easyJet](/org/easyjet).

Outside of work, Craig is a keen scuba diver, is passionate about health & fitness and spends many evenings enjoying London’s theatre scene.

Craig Donald

John took over the role in January 2021, following the departure of predecessor Les Reed to who he had acted as assistant to since June 2020.

As a coach, John has worked with many of the brightest young players and coaches in the game across his years of experience with Tottenham Hotspur, Watford and the FA.

In his 15 years at Spurs, he oversaw their academy and helped to bring through future England internationals such as Harry Kane, Danny Rose, Steven Caulker, Andros Townsend, Jake Livermore, Harry Winks and Ryan Mason, as well as a considerable number currently in the Young Lions pipeline.

He has also helped develop the careers of many coaches including Fulham manager Scott Parker and his assistant, Matt Wells, plus Liverpool academy manager Alex Inglethorpe. McDermott has also worked closely with Tim Sherwood, Mauricio Pochettino and then José Mourinho in support of the Spurs first team.

Prior to his work with Tottenham Hotspur and the FA, McDermott began his coaching career with Watford and worked his way up through the ranks to become their academy manager.

John McDermott

Edleen John (FCIPD) was appointed in September 2020. She started her career as an investment banker at Lehman Brothers working in debt capital markets and has held a variety of revenue-generating and support-function permanent roles across the financial services sector including insurance broking at Lloyd's of London, graduate recruitment at [Nomura](/org/nomura), vice president at [Morgan Stanley](/org/morgan-stanley) and as a director and the co-head of inclusion, diversity and social equality at [KPMG](/org/kpmg).

Besides her day job, Edleen is a school governor at a community special school for young people with severe and profound disabilities, a director of tech talent Charter organisation, an international trustee for restless development charity and sits on the DIAL Global advisory board and the advisory board for the McKenzie-Delis. Packer Review.

Edleen has a number of accolades to her name including being a ‘We Are The City’ rising star in HR and recruitment; a Yahoo! Finance EMpower Top 100 ethnic minority future leader; a top ten BAME inspirational leader and a shortlisted National Diversity award winner for a Positive Age Role model.

Edleen John

Kelly Simmons MBE took up the new role of Director of the Women’s Professional Game in September 2018 to help deliver and transform professional women’s football in England. She oversees [The FA](/org/the-fa) Women’s Super League, FA Women’s Championship, FA Women’s National League and the Women’s Pyramid of Football. 

She was previously [The FA](/org/the-fa) Director of Participation and Development, overseeing the implementation of a £200m four year investment programme into children’s and grassroots football. 

Kelly was awarded an MBE in 2002 for Services to Football and received the BT Sports Industry Award for ‘Leadership in Sport’ in 2016.

Kelly Simmons

Mark was named as [The FA](/org/the-fa)’s Chief Executive Officer on 1 August 2019.

Mark joined [The FA](/org/the-fa) in August 2016 and previously led the commercial, marketing, digital and participation functions at the organisation, where under his tenure annual revenue at [The FA](/org/the-fa) rose by over £100m.

He previously held the position of CEO EMEA for Fuse Sports & Entertainment, responsible for running one of the fastest growing businesses in the sector.  The team had grown quickly over five years to 245 across 17 offices with an annual fee income of over €28m.  The client portfolio included ten of the top 30 global brands.

Mark joined Fuse in 2011 from his position as Director of Marketing for the America’s Cup Event Authority in San Francisco, where he helped transform the global event.

Mark has negotiated over $2bn of partnerships across a variety of platforms in sports, arts and music and is a qualified Level One coach involved in grassroots football.

Mark Bullingham

Mark joined the FA on an interim basis in March 2016 before his appointment was made permanent in December.

Prior to joining the FA, Mark held senior finance roles with BSkyB, Virgin Mobile, the Iglo Group and most recently he was the Group CFO for [Virgin Active](/org/virgin-active-limited).  Mark qualified as a chartered accountant with PwC.

Mark Burrows

Louisa is the Director of Communications at The Football Association, overseeing all communications activities including the England Elite, campaigns and media relations teams. She joined from sports marketing and PR agency [Pitch](/org/pitch), where she held the role of Director for more than four years.

Prior to this, Louisa spent over 12 years as Head of Marketing and Communications at BBC Sport, developing and implementing communications strategies for major sporting events which included World Cups, European Championships and London 2012.

Louisa Fyans

Lucy plays a strategic role within our technical directorate at St. George’s Park, with overall responsibility for coach education and our professional development programme with a key objective of growing the number of qualified and appropriately-skilled coaches across the game.

Working at the national football centre, Pearson brings the benefits of a high-achieving career in education coupled with an elite sporting background.

Formerly the Head of Cheadle Hulme School in Cheshire, where she was the first woman to hold that position in its 150-year history, Pearson played cricket for England between 1996 and 2005, and has been a director of the England and Wales Cricket Board since 2016.

Lucy Pearson

James joined [The FA](/org/the-fa) in September 2019. He is responsible for grassroots football which includes our work in developing the game across male, female and disability football; harnessing the club network and facility infrastructure across the country; working closely with the County FA’s to support delivery of football in their county’s; and ensuring [The FA](/org/the-fa)’s digital ecosystem is developed to provide for the administrative needs of the game.

James has spent nearly 25 years in the sports industry working in a number of senior strategy and commercial roles. Prior to joining [The FA](/org/the-fa), he worked in two stints for Portas Consulting, a global management consultancy dedicated to sport and physical activity, where he was the Partner responsible for its London office and European business. During this time he led multiple projects for International Federations, National Governing Bodies and corporate businesses - principally around participation and social impact - including for [The FA](/org/the-fa) and UEFA.

Between his times at Portas, he was Commercial Director at Harlequins Rugby Club and has previously worked for BSkyB, [Volvo Cars](/org/volvo) and the Volvo Ocean Race.

James Kendall

Polly first joined [The FA](/org/the-fa) in 2014 as head of legal, a role in which she worked for two years before being appointed to her current position as director of legal and governance in October 2016. Previously, Polly had experience in the sporting world during her role as deputy head of legal for the RFU, where she spent three years working at Twickenham.

Polly Handford

Sue was appointed Head of Women’s Football with The Football Association in March 2016, and became Director of Women’s Football in January 2018.

Among many honours, Sue has received 11 honorary doctorates and in June 2003, Sue was awarded a Commander of the British Empire for her services to sport. 

In April 2005 she was appointed as Chair for UK Sport, following 18 months as the Reform Chair.  Sue held this position for two terms until April 2013, where she presided over [Team GB](/org/team-gb) and Paralympic GB’s incredible performance at the London 2012 games. 

In December 2008 Sue was appointed to the House of Lords as an independent Crossbench Peer. Sue was awarded the Lifetime Achievement Award at the 2012 Sunday Times Sportswomen of the Year Awards.

Baroness Campbell

Rachel joined [The FA](/org/the-fa) from England Rugby 2015, the tournament organisers for World Cup.

She was one of the early members of the team responsible for building and mobilising a workforce of over 6000 people and prior to that she was the head of HR operations for the London 2012 Olympic and Paralympic Games.

She joined that team in 2007 and was a key player in the organisation’s journey from small-to-big and transforming itself from an HQ in London to a multi-venue world-class sporting event.

The first half of Rachel’s career was spent in retail, namely [Marks and Spencer](/org/marks-and-spencer), where she gained some very valuable skills and experience through the changing times of another national institution, particularly in her last role as head of HR for the clothing division.

Rachel Brace

Andy joined [The FA](/org/the-fa) in the autumn of 2016, following a nine-year spell as chief executive at Millwall Football Club.

He took up newly-created strategic role to strengthen relationships with the professional game in line with its four-year strategic vision to provide trusted regulation and efficient administration.

A key focus for Andy is to develop positive engagement and collaborative working across the Premier League, English Football League and their clubs, as well as those organisations representing players, managers and supporters.

Andy previously spent time at Fulham, and also served on the Football League board.

Andy Ambler

The Football Association (The FA)'s CEO and Executive Team includes Mark Burrows and 2 others.

CEO and Executive Team

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Other teams at The Football Association (The FA)

Leadership Team

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