{"id":25202,"date":"2026-01-30T00:10:13","date_gmt":"2026-01-30T00:10:13","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/news.godj.com\/sport\/can-a-former-premier-league-star-and-local-businessman-resurrect-a-football-club-bbc-sport\/"},"modified":"2026-01-30T00:10:13","modified_gmt":"2026-01-30T00:10:13","slug":"can-a-former-premier-league-star-and-local-businessman-resurrect-a-football-club-bbc-sport","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/news.godj.com\/sport\/can-a-former-premier-league-star-and-local-businessman-resurrect-a-football-club-bbc-sport\/","title":{"rendered":"Can a former Premier League star and local businessman resurrect a football club? | BBC Sport"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><iframe  width=\"580\" height=\"385\" src=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/embed\/93PzVY-ex4o?autoplay=1\" frameborder=\"0\" allowfullscreen><\/iframe><br \/>\n<br \/>Robbie Savage: Making Macclesfield FC (Episode 1) was originally broadcast on 5th November 2021.<\/p>\n<p>After Macclesfield Town Football Club is wound up in September 2020, former Premier League star-turned-pundit Robbie Savage and local businessman Rob Smethurst attempt to build a new club from the ashes &#8211; Macclesfield FC. With no players, no staff, no league to play in and a rundown old ground, can Robbie and Rob turn Macclesfield FC into a competitive football club which the community can be proud &#8211; in the space of nine months?<\/p>\n<p>Episode 2, Robbie Savage: Managing Macclesfield, is available here: https:\/\/youtu.be\/cn899VE2flM<\/p>\n<p>Chapters<\/p>\n<p>00:00 Introduction and the challenge<br \/>\n00:16 Macclesfield Town liquidated<br \/>\n01:17 Buying the club and forming a plan<br \/>\n03:10 Robbie Savage joins the project<br \/>\n04:06 Ground in ruins and renovation begins<br \/>\n07:24 Why the club matters to the community<br \/>\n09:52 Massive renovation and pitch problems<br \/>\n13:18 Building the team and backroom staff<br \/>\n20:26 Budget battles and first trials<br \/>\n25:03 Transformation complete and new facilities<br \/>\n28:05 Rob\u2019s journey and risk taking<br \/>\n30:58 League placement and first signings<br \/>\n33:10 Stress, finances and fan criticism<br \/>\n38:13 Opening day first game of the season<br \/>\n44:21 Early challenges and lower league reality<br \/>\n49:39 Climbing the table and big derby clash<br \/>\n52:58 Crowd trouble and consequences<br \/>\n56:02 One year on reflection and profit<\/p>\n<p>=============<\/p>\n<p>SUBSCRIBE so you never miss out on our best videos<br \/>\n\u27a1\ufe0f\u27a1\ufe0fhttp:\/\/bit.ly\/1sFodyu <\/p>\n<p>=============<\/p>\n<p>Find us here: <\/p>\n<p>BBC Sport: http:\/\/www.bbc.co.uk\/sport<br \/>\nFacebook: https:\/\/www.facebook.com\/BBCSport\/<br \/>\nX: https:\/\/www.x.com\/BBCSport\/<br \/>\nInstagram: https:\/\/www.instagram.com\/bbcsport\/<br \/>\nTikTok: https:\/\/www.tiktok.com\/@bbcsport<\/p>\n<p>#bbcsport #football<br \/>\n<br \/><a href=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/watch?v=93PzVY-ex4o\">source<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Robbie Savage: Making Macclesfield FC (Episode 1) was originally broadcast on 5th November 2021. After Macclesfield Town Football Club is wound up in September 2020, former Premier League star-turned-pundit Robbie Savage and local businessman Rob Smethurst attempt to build a new club from the ashes &#8211; Macclesfield FC. With no players, no staff, no league [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":25203,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"video","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[8],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-25202","post","type-post","status-publish","format-video","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-video","post_format-post-format-video"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/news.godj.com\/sport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/25202","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/news.godj.com\/sport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/news.godj.com\/sport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/news.godj.com\/sport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/news.godj.com\/sport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=25202"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/news.godj.com\/sport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/25202\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":25204,"href":"https:\/\/news.godj.com\/sport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/25202\/revisions\/25204"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/news.godj.com\/sport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/25203"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/news.godj.com\/sport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=25202"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/news.godj.com\/sport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=25202"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/news.godj.com\/sport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=25202"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}