THE end-of-season Suffolk FA Grassroots Festival 2024 will be hosted by Felixstowe & Walton United FC.  

The two-day festival will take place at Eastward Ho in Felixstowe on Saturday, May 18th and Sunday, May 19th 2024. 

This year’s event will be the twelfth annual festival and the first to be held outside of Ipswich. 

The festival will be open to teams aged from under-7 to under-15 and open age disability adults. 

Teams will be able to sign up for this year’s festival via the Suffolk FA website from 5pm on March 1st 2024, with the window being open until 5pm on Friday, April 5th 2024. 

Suffolk FA Football Development Officer (Retention) James Morley, who is organising the festival, said: “We are really looking forward to bringing the festival to another new venue and moving outside of Ipswich for the first time since the creation of the event. 

“Moving the festival to a new location will bring its own challenges which we are looking forward to working through.

“We are looking forward to working with East Suffolk Council and Felixstowe & Walton United FC to put on this event and make it the biggest and best festival yet.   

“The Suffolk FA Grassroots Festival is the largest event we run in this county and being able to welcome teams to Felixstowe is an exciting proposition. 

“Please be ready for March 1st when entries go live to sign up – it will be first come, first served and clubs will only be able to sign up online and there will be a fee of £25 per team. There will be reminders in the build up to this, but please be ready.” 

Felixstowe & Walton United’s Vice Chair Scott Dunne said: “The club is immensely proud and very much looking forward in joining Suffolk FA and the Local Councils to host the Grassroots Festival this year at Felixstowe for the very first time.

“We are confident we can continue the great tradition in offering a fun packed weekend of Junior football for all age groups from across the county.” 

The schedule for the festival will be announced next month. 

Players from Felixstowe & Walton United U13 Reds, Under-15 Whites and Under-16 Reds are pictured with (left to right) coaches Scott Dunne, Rick Ward and Tamlyn Ward and Suffolk FA Football Development Officer James Morley.