Earlier this summer, the Premier League announced the continuation of a pilot project that aims to forge stronger relationships between professional football clubs and police forces across England and Wales.
Called the Premier League Kicks Police Partnerships Pilot, the initiative builds on the work of the Premier League Kicks programme, using football as a tool to build community bonds and to engage and support referred young people, helping to reduce the risk of offending and anti-social behaviour in the process.
The pilot involves a total of 26 clubs. Nine of these clubs are from Lancashire, including Premier League side Burnley and National League North side AFC Fylde, working in collaboration with the Lancashire Police and Crime Commissioner, Lancashire Police and Lancashire Violence Reduction Network, to support young people aged between eight-and-18 who are at risk of serious youth violence and exploitation.
The nine club charities will deliver targeted one-to-one mentoring and police-led workshops in addition to their core Premier League Kicks delivery.
To help celebrate the pilot's continuation, a special event was held at Burnley in the Community's Leisure Box and had Premier League Kicks teams from Burnley and Preston North End playing in a friendly competition.
We spoke to some of those involved to find out what impact the Police Partnerships Pilot will have on young people across the county.
Helen Gurman, chief executive officer, Burnley in the Community
"This programme and this funding will change lives. The key thing for us is that it will allow us to reach more young people. It's about making a real difference to as many young people as we can.
"We've been running our targeted intervention work and youth crime reduction work alongside our Premier League Kicks programme for a number of years and we have found that the power of the badge really attracts young people to work with us.
"They are then inspired to talk to our mentors and take part in things they wouldn't normally have taken part in. It gives them a safe space to come and have dedicated mentoring sessions to help them achieve their potential.
"The work we do in partnership with others is absolutely crucial. We can't do what we do alone.
"It's really important for us to be able to make those connections between the police and our young people. It helps to break down barriers.
"A lot of the young people we work with maybe have had a negative interaction with people in authority. For us to be able to put on an event where we've had a police officer play football with our young people today, that builds relationships. The young people can see that the police do want to help.
"Every single police officer I have spoken to wants to see young people thrive and I think they see the real value of working with football clubs, working with football club charities, to help those young people get on the right path.
"The potential is unlimited... it can reach so many more young people and hopefully it can spread throughout the country. There is also the potential for us as clubs to work together more closely on other projects that can then go on to support young people even more for the future."
Sulaimaan Mullah, community engagement officer, Preston North End Community and Education Trust
"I have been working with Premier League Kicks for nearly four years. It's a fantastic opportunity for us to go out in the community, engage with young people that could be going down the wrong path and get them to do something more productive. We can also work on their physical, mental and emotional wellbeing.
"The group we have here in Burnley live on the outskirts of Preston and opportunities for young people are very hard to come by. It's massive for us to be able to provide Premier League Kicks to them in their area. They always turn up, whether it's sunshine, snow, rain, whatever. They're always there, ready to play.
"For me, Premier League Kicks means having as many opportunities as possible without any barriers. It gives young people the ability to communicate, make friends and have a great time without the worry that they are being judged. They can play with equality, freedom and they can let their individual qualities shine.
"To have the police involved in the programme is huge for our local community. Sometimes the police can have a negative reputation and young people don't really want to speak to them.
"But this pilot provides the opportunity to have the police speak with young people and be a familiar face. It will also help young people know that they can go to the police for anything, whether it's about personal issues or just have a chat with them. It's huge.
"With all the nine clubs working together, we can build a big group of young people to become future leaders and role models, empowering them and building that confidence that they can work with the police rather than against them."
Sergeant Carl McCoy, Lancashire Police Prosper Partnership team
"My role is to lead an operation with a small team trying to make the areas of Nelson and Brierfield much safer and build stronger, more resilient communities.
"The police cannot do it on their own, without a partner such as Burnley in the Community, we wouldn't be able to tackle these kind of things because they take a lot of pressure off us.
"They do a lot of work with the community, they engage with young people and take them into an environment that's controlled and where they can be directed away from crime and anti-social behaviour.
"There has been a real distrust in the police. There's community barriers, cultural barriers, divides within the community, so this team is about building relations and breaking down those barriers and what better opportunity to do that than by working with Burnley and the Premier League Kicks programme. It's superb.
"In the areas my team work in, there is not a lot for young people to do. So when they finish school, they can be involved in things they shouldn't be.
"Having the Burnley and the Premier League badge is massive. The badge attracts young people to this facility. It gives them something to do and look forward to, and gives them a bit of enjoyment and happiness.
"We have a lot of engagement with Burnley and coming down to places such as the Leisure Box helps us get to know the young people, helps us build relations and try to change that mentality. With the support of Burnley and the coaches, we try to point the young people in the right direction.
"It's really important work and without this partnership, it would be more difficult for us
"I'm just a human being and that stigma of the police only being around because something's wrong has to change. We're here to help and support these young people.
"I have no doubt that the pilot will reduce anti-social behaviour and criminality.
"I can't explain how good Premier League Kicks is. Being here at the Leisure Box, I feel happiness. This is why I joined the job, to try to make communities better. You can see the smiles on the young people's faces when they are playing sport, they are developing their own characters and getting that confidence to shine."
Clive Grunshaw, Police and Crime Commissioner for Lancashire
"There's nothing better than football to engage young people. Once you get young people involved, you can build up their fitness, discipline, social skills and aspirations.
"It's a far more positive way for the police to interact with young people and vice versa. From our perspective, it's about diverting young people away from crime and anti-social behaviour, but it's far more than that. It's about widening their outlook.
"The fact that so many clubs want to be involved demonstrates how successful it is. We've got every club in Lancashire signed up to it and so that means that we can try to replicate that success across the whole of the county.
"What we want to do is prevent young people getting on the wrong path in the first place. We want to stop them getting involved in criminal behaviour, stop them getting involved in anti-social behaviour, and you can only do that by breaking down barriers.
"That is the value of Premier League Kicks because it enables us to work with those young people.
"The programme offers young people a different path. It doesn't matter about your skill level or ability. The thing about Premier League Kicks is that it's for boys, girls, any background, any experience - it's for everyone."