(Above) The National Football Museum has been based at Deepdale in Preston for seven years. Picture courtesy National Football Museum
Council chiefs in Preston are battling to keep the National Football Museum in the city after organisers at the Deepdale site entered negotiations to move to Manchester's Urbis centre to stave off a serious funding shortfall.
The popular Museum, which attracts more than 100,000 visitors a year, can only afford to operate in Preston until the end of 2009, having lost major revenue from the Football Stadium Improvement Fund in March.
Urbis parent company The Millennium Quarter Trust has backed the proposal by Manchester City Council to shift the NFM to the contemporary central arts venue.
"The National Football Museum is an important attraction for Preston and we desperately want the museum to stay in the city," said Councillor Ken Hudson, Leader of Preston City Council.
"We have an urgent meeting with museum representatives on Monday (September 14), when we will discuss the future of the museum."
The museum is popular with families and football fans. National Football Museum
Paul Dermody, Chair of Trustees at the Museum, said the move would allow the NFM to reach a wider audience. "While the Museum has gone from success to success in Preston since it opened in 2001, the funding of the Museum has always been a concern," he conceded.
"With the backing of Manchester City Council, the Department for Culture, Media and Sport and the football family its future will be secured and the Museum's success will continue to expand, as the collections and the community work it undertakes will be exposed to a significantly greater audience than at present."
Manchester City Council described the talks as "very positive". "Manchester is renowned around the world for its footballing heritage and attracts more visitors than any English city outside London," said Council Leader Sir Richard Leese, who admitted talks had started two months ago on his official blog.
Exhibits include shirts worn by the likes of Pele and Bobby Moore. National Football Museum
"Having a nationally significant football destination here would make perfect sense, so when the National Football Museum approached us we were naturally keen to explore this exciting idea.
"We did have some reservations, not least because Urbis has established a very successful series of exhibitions exploring popular culture, excellent education programmes and a successful bar and restaurant.
"The work we did showed that we could accommodate the Museum without losing the valuable things going on, and that although the Museum would need significant investment to bring it up to scratch, it has the potential to attract four times as many visitors in a city centre location as it does currently.
"It would be good for Manchester to have the Museum but I'd like this to be seen as saving the Museum for the North-West, not a competition between Manchester and Preston."
David Moutrey, Chairman of the Millennium Quarter Trust Board, said there were "obvious synergies" between the Museum and Urbis. "Both deal with elements of popular culture that have been vital to the history and reputation of the city," he said.
"We are happy to use our experience to work with a museum that hosts such an important collection and archive."
In April the DCMS agreed to provide £105,000 in annual funding for the Museum. It is currently halfway through a year of partnership support from businesses in the North-West after winning the £20,000 Lever Prize.
Last December Director Kevin Moore told Culture24 the Museum was based in Preston "for very good reasons of heritage and history", responding to remarks by Football League Chairman Brian Mawhinney suggesting a move to Wembley would attract more visitors.
