Clayton Park is located in East Manchester; a stone’s throw away from the new Manchester City Women training facility.
The pitch has been regenerated as part of City in the Community’s (CITC’s) Healthy Goals campaign which aims to uplift the physical and mental health of young people by creating and regenerating community football spaces across Greater Manchester.
The latest openings mean CITC has now invested £1.25million into spaces to play through Healthy Goals, alongside supporters of the initiative.
The pitch design celebrates the success of Manchester City Women last season, with CITC working in collaboration with the team to regenerate the space, inspired by their 2025/2026 WSL title win.
Commenting on the pitch and opening event, Kerstin said: “To see a space dedicated to our title win last season, it just means so much and I hope we can inspire a lot of young women, but also young men to play football and to watch women’s sports.
“To be able to inspire young women now myself is something I’ve always wanted to do.”
Similar to previous years, young people were asked to help design the centre circle for the new pitch. This year, students from The East Manchester Academy were given the task basing their designs on the WSL win.
The participants designs were then shortlisted and taken to Manchester City Women’s Team, who made their own contributions to the final design, using the participants drawings as inspiration.
Commenting on Clayton Park’s design inspiration Head of Communication and Engagement, Rachel Clarkson said: “With the women’s team having their double trophy winning season last year we really felt the champions and let’s do it together ethos that Healthy Goals brings with people coming to play at the parks really connects well with the amazing squad and the team they had, so we really wanted to join those things together and draw on that inspiration.”
Healthy Goals was first launched in May 2023 and has since transformed community football spaces across Greater Manchester, with previous sites including Scotland Hall Road, Ladybarn Park, Ravensbury Community School, St Wilfrid’s C.E. Primary School, Ashbury Meadow Community Primary School, Southern Cross School, Holy Name RC Primary School and Bradford Park.
City in the Community exists to empower healthier lives with city youth through football.
For more information about City in the Community, visit mancity.com/CITC or follow @citcmancity on social media.
