Board Profiles

Sue started her career as a teacher in 1971 and worked in education until 1993, at which time she joined The Football Association when it assumed responsibility for Women’s Football, and has worked in football ever since. In 2000 Sue was elected to The FA Council to represent Women’s Football, a position she still holds. While a member of Council she has served on many Committees, most notably as a champion for both Women’s and Disability Football: Sue was initially Chairman of the FA Disability Working Group and has been Chairman of the GBDFA since its inception. In addition to her role on the FA Council Sue is employed as Chief Executive of the Dorset County Football Association Limited. In 2013 she was honoured to receive the MBE for her services to Women’s and Disability Football.

Profile to follow.

For the last 28 years Richard has been involved in the research and development of medical and industrial laser systems, co-founding several successful companies and generating a number of worldwide patents. He established ORAC Ltd in 2001, supplying consumable spare parts to the medical, beauty therapy and industrial laser markets. A sports enthusiast, he has represented Wales in swimming, rugby and athletics, where he was recently the V40 British Javelin champion. Richard is also co-founder and treasurer of the Swansea Visually Impaired Football Team (SCVIFC), and has undertaken coaching qualifications in football, American football and athletics, where he is the primary long jump and sprints coach to his son, James, who is currently ranked UK No.1 long jumper in the visually impaired F12 classification and has represented Great Britain at youth level at the VI World Championships. 

After a successful 16-year career in marketing, Alaina set up and managed a £1.3 million community project in Leamington Spa which was noted by the National Lottery as the most successful project of its type in the UK.  As history was and continues to be one of her passions, she then took up an award-winning heritage project in 2007, which enabled her to develop a number of parallel projects including volunteer development programmes, archives, educational resources for teachers and the publication of two books. Alaina became involved in disability sport as a volunteer advisor to British Blind Sport in 2010, and took up the mantle of Chief Executive Officer when the role became available in early 2011.  She is passionate about making a visible difference through sport, and the charity has grown year on year under her guidance. Outside of her work Alaina loves sport and dance, spending time with her family and walking her beloved nutcase Springer, Stirling.

As a Loughborough graduate with a background in Sports Technology John has been working in the sports industry since 2006. He is a current board member of CP Sport where he also chairs the Engagement and Insight Committee which works to better understand and support the needs of the CP community. John currently works as a Sport Advisor at UK Sport working with NGB Chairs and CEOs to support the development of their organisational health. John also spent 13 years at Sport England most recently heading up the Partner Performance team and working with National Governing Bodies and other system partners to support insight, learning and development in performance and participation. Outside of work John is a keen hockey player representing Loughborough Town in the national league, and spends the summer playing cricket and any other sport that he can fit in.

As a graduate from The University of Birmingham and Sheffield Hallam University in the area of exercise physiology, Catherine has worked in elite  sport for nearly 20 years. Starting at a Sport Science Officer at the Human Performance Lab, I moved into the English Institute of Sport working at Sportcity in Manchester as a physiologist with para swimming and multisports, also managing the performance lab. My work with para-swimming soon became my sole focus and I moved into a position as Head of Sport Science & Sport Medicine with the team, ultimately supporting them through 4 Paralympic cycles. Catherine now works as the Head of Para Performance for The FA, focused on supporting players and staff to be the best they can be whilst developing a truly high performance culture within the programme.

Formerly Chief Executive of the Rugby Football League, Neil has been Principal of Wharton Consulting since 2000. Instrumental in establishing GBDFA first as an unincorporated association, and then in supporting the organisation through the process of incorporation, Neil now serves as Company Secretary. An experienced strategic and management consultant who has worked with over 40 NGBs of sport and six different Sports Councils, Neil also represents the GBDFA on the National Paralympic Committee.