England Futsal Community C.I.C. Welcomes Five New Directors as Governance Strengthens
The new additions will bring energy, dedication and a vast wealth of experience to the C.I.C., from across the community development, financial, legal and sporting sectors as the England Futsal Group continues to enhance its governance.
Image Credit: Becca Taylor (IG - @beccataylor.photography)
England Futsal Community C.I.C. is delighted to welcome five new non-executive directors to its Board, marking an important step forward in strengthening the governance, leadership, and community voice of futsal in England.
Following an open, transparent and thorough recruitment process which spanned 10 weeks and ran into early 2026, the new directors bring a diverse mix of experience across sport, community development, finance, legal, and commercial sectors — united by a shared commitment to growing the game and supporting the people who make it happen. The recruitment process elicited a significant response from the community and beyond, with a strong pool of talent progressing to the interview stage and we were delighted by the quality of applications received.
We are proud to welcome Vicky Birkby, Natalie Strange, David Meli, Chris Bright, and Dan Lichtenstein to the Board. Each has already begun their role, are registered at Companies House, and are already contributing to shaping the future of futsal in England.
Chair of England Futsal Community C.I.C., Stephen Mitchell, said:
“From the very beginning of the England Futsal Group journey in 2022, there has been a shared ambition to have in place a non-profit organisation leading our public facing work with the Football Association and, hopefully, other public bodies distributing or awarding money to deliver (and grow) sport in England. 2025 was the right moment to complete this process, and the appointment of these brilliant individuals as Company Directors reinforces and strengthens this ambition. Bringing energy, wisdom, new networks and professional acumen into any start-up Boardroom is a fantastic way to grow and sustain any business, and these appointments do just that.
Our five new Directors shone through the recruitment process and will provide much needed capacity and guidance for our small Executive team as we move into our fifth season of operation, prioritising and streamlining the work programmes, products and services in play across the Group. We received some standout applications from the breadth of the futsal community and beyond, and have received plaudits for the way in which we approached and executed the recruitment process in an open, transparent and accessible way, not least given the lack of external recruiter support and as our ‘first go’ in running our own process.
We are hugely excited for our International Futsal Festival week in Loughborough at Easter, where the C.I.C. Board will convene officially for the first time and set out our ambitions for the future. We hope members of the Futsal community in England and the broader sport and physical activity sector will welcome the fantastic five, and as a group of founding Directors believe this gives us the necessary fire power to drive the sport forward for years to come.”
A Board Built for the Community
Our Board brings together two important perspectives:
• Community Directors (x3) — representing the futsal community and drawn from our existing commissions. For clarity, these are Vicky (player), Chris (player / coach), and Dan (parent).
• Independent Directors (x2) — bringing external expertise, challenge, and fresh thinking. For clarity, these are David and Natalie.
Together, this balance ensures that decisions are rooted in the lived experience of the game (playing, volunteering, coaching, observing, administering), complemented by each professional background and journey, while being strengthened by independent insight and professional expertise (commercial, finance, marketing, high performance sport, community NGB and sports governance) beyond futsal and outside of sport.
Strengthening Governance for the Future
These appointments form part of the England Futsal Group’s ongoing commitment to strong, transparent, and inclusive governance.
The Group retains its ambition to operate in line with the Code for Sports Governance and is working towards the C.I.C. achieving Tier 2 compliance in 2026, with the ambition to progress towards Tier 3 within the next 15–18 months.
This approach ensures that as futsal grows, it does so with the right structures, accountability, and community voice at its heart.
Meet the Board
The new directors join the existing Board:
• Stephen Mitchell (Independent Chair)
• Beth Jenkinson-Garner (Head of Operations)
• Siôn Kitson (Head of Development & Technical)
Read on below to find out a little more about our latest additions to the England Futsal family or visit Our Board page.
VICKY BIRKBY (COMMUNITY)
Vicky is a strategic and commercially focused executive with experience across high-performing businesses and sports teams. Her career spans strategy and business consulting, and more recently an executive role at a start-up bank, where she helped shape the strategy, drive transformation and support the growth of Vida Bank.
Alongside her professional career, Vicky has been involved in Football and Futsal for over 25 years. She represented Great Britain in Futsal at the World University Games and won both the Women’s National Futsal Tier 1 League and Grand Final with Bloomsbury.
Vicky has joined the England Futsal Community C.I.C. Board bringing unwavering passion to support the growth of Futsal, from grassroots to the elite game.
Vicky is married to Dom and has two young daughters. She hopes they will discover the same love of sport, faith and community that has helped shape her life and the opportunities it brings to build confidence, resilience, and teamwork.
NATALIE STRANGE (INDEPENDENT)
Natalie is a commercial strategist and founder of Strange & Co Advisory. She works with organisations across sport and business to shape commercial strategy, develop partnerships and support sustainable growth.
Natalie spent over two decades in senior leadership roles at the Barclays Group, covering commercial strategy, partnerships, sales leadership and marketing. She built and led large commercial teams, developed new propositions and helped scale solutions for major corporate clients.
Alongside her advisory work, Natalie is passionate about the role sport can play in changing lives. She is particularly committed to improving access to sport and accelerating the growth and visibility of girls and women’s sport.
She brings a combination of corporate commercial experience and entrepreneurial thinking to board roles, helping organisations build strategic partnerships that deliver long-term impact.
Outside work Natalie lives in Manchester with her family. She spends much of her time cheering from the sidelines as her children play every sport under the sun. When she is not playing netball herself or sitting in freezing cold lakes in Wales, she is a self-confessed fair weather tennis player, meaning her racquet remains permanently rusty. She is rarely seen without her sidekick, Tiny Lulu, her miniature dachshund.
CHRIS BRIGHT (COMMUNITY)
Chris has been involved in futsal for over a decade, representing Wales internationally and contributing across the sport as a player, coach, England Futsal Commission Member and advocate. His experience in the game has shaped much of his work, with a particular interest in how sport can support people and communities.
Alongside his futsal background, Chris works for Breakthrough T1D, focusing on improving the lives of people affected by Type 1 Diabetes. Living with the condition himself, he founded The Diabetes Football Community in 2017 to create a space where people with diabetes involved in football and futsal could share experiences, find support, and access practical information. This community interest company, and movement, has since grown into a trusted resource for players, coaches and families around the world.
Chris is also an Honorary Fellow of the University of Worcester, a recognition of his contributions to public engagement, education and health-related work. He continues to collaborate with universities, charities and sporting organisations on projects that link physical activity, well-being and community development, and has played a pivotal role in the development of the first set of guidance on Diabetes for the sports sector, submitted to the UK government in 2026.
Away from work, Chris remains closely connected to grassroots Futsal and Football and still plays and coaches. He values time with family and friends, travelling, and being involved in local community initiatives.
DAVID MELI (INDEPENDENT)
David has held a broad range of roles in public and private sector organisations across his 38 years in the sports industry, after coming to terms with the fact that a paid playing career was unlikely to materialise. From starting out as a sports development officer, through working on the Lucozade Sport sponsorship of the Premier League, to heading up sales and marketing across the four National Sports Centres, and managing the reopening of Stoke Mandeville Stadium, he has gained a wealth of experience and knowledge that he is now keen to give back to grassroots and performance sport.
He was part of the first relationship management team at Sport England, at the time of the London 2012 Olympics, helping to oversee the £480m investment into national governing bodies. David then spent almost seven years as CEO of England Handball, growing a developing sport through engagement with a network of national and local partners, including schools and clubs, that resulted in handball being included in the GCSE curriculum for PE and increasing participation in the sport. Since July 2023, David has been a Sport Advisor for UK Sport, working with the Boards, CEOs and Senior Leadership Teams of a portfolio of funded partners to support the Organisational Health of each organisation in areas such as strategy, governance, finance, culture, stakeholder engagement and international relations.
David is based near York with his wife Stephanie, who runs her own marketing company, and their dog Milo. His daughter Francesca recently graduated from York St John University, whilst son Aiden is currently on a football (the 11-a-side version) scholarship in Oklahoma, USA and, alongside travel, music and watching a wide variety of sports, they all help keep David happy and active outside of the day job.
DAN LICHTENSTEIN (COMMUNITY)
Dan is General Counsel and Company Secretary of Grant Thornton International Ltd (GTIL), the international coordinating entity of the Grant Thornton network of assurance, tax and advisory firms. He has held these positions since 1 January 2013.
His main roles are to protect the "Grant Thornton" brand around the world and to advise the GTIL global executive and board about legal issues and risks and how to mitigate them. This includes handling matters related to governance, policies, intellectual property, litigation, regulation, contracts, insurance and cyber.
Dan holds a Bachelor of Business Administration from the University of Michigan (Ann Arbor) and a joint Juris Doctor/Master of Arts from the University of Illinois (Urbana-Champaign). He also recently completed an Executive Education/Senior Leadership Programme course at the Harvard Business School. He is also a member of the Chartered Institute of Arbitrators.
Dan has served on the boards of various organisations, focused on different areas, including education and sport and is also an England Futsal Commission Member.
He moved from Chicago to London in 2010 with his wife and three (3) children. His favourite quote and one he applies to everyday life is by Ted Lasso – “Be curious, not judgemental”.
