Mark Spalding (football coach)

Mark Spalding (born 26 July 1985) is a football coach who is currently Head of Intermediate Academy at Rangers. He has previously held posts at Dumbarton, Stirling University, Falkirk, St Mirren, and the Scottish FA.
Spalding is presently studying the UEFA Pro Licence having completed the UEFA A Licence in 2014.
Coach career
Spalding started coaching within the professional game as an age specific Head Coach within the Academy at Falkirk in summer of 2006 during the clubs spell in the Scottish Premier League. During this time Spalding worked closely with Academy Director Eddie May who he would be reunited with later at Stirling University.
With the introduction of Football Scholarships to University of Stirling in 2008, Spalding was appointed to High Performance Head Coach Michael Jolley's staff as 2nd XI Head Coach. During his season in charge the team won BUCS Scottish Conference 4A and reach the final of the BUCS Scottish Conference Cup.
In 2009 Spalding was appointed by the Scottish FA as Football Development Officer for West-Dunbartonshire, a post he held for until 2013. During this time Spalding completed his UEFA B Licence in addition to starting his UEFA A Licence.
From 2009-2012 during his time with the Scottish FA Spalding worked as Head Coach with his local amateur team Milton FC in Stirling Scotland.
It was during the summer 2012 that former Falkirk manager Eddie May was appointed as High Performance Head Coach at Stirling University and Spalding was appointed as Assistant High Performance Head Coach. This was a spell of many firsts for the University with the team competing firstly in the Scottish Cup in 2012-2013 and in 2013 with the club successfully gaining entry into the Lowland Football League. The team were enjoyed success during this period both in and out of University Competition winning the Lowland League Cup in 2014 and Scottish Student Sport Queens Park Shield in 2013.
The largest success was the fantastic 'treble' of 2014 when the club won the BUCS Northern Premier Football League, Scottish Sport Queen's Park Shield and the BUCS British Football Championship completing the clean sweep of honours within British University Football and becoming the first team in Stirling's football history to win the BUCS British Football Championship. This achievement was so highly thought of it was mentioned in parliament as the team became the first Scottish team to achieve this.
In June 2014 it was announced that Spalding was to join Ian Murray's backroom staff at Dumbarton becoming First Team Coach. He left the club in May 2015, following Murray to join St Mirren as assistant manager.
In November 2015, Spalding left St Mirren by mutual consent, following a run of poor results.
Spalding then worked for a short period at a youth coach at Rangers before being announced at the Technical Director of US Club Global Premier Soccer in March 2016.
In January 2020 Spalding returned to Rangers to be part of the Academy's Senior Management Team as the Head of Intermediate Academy.

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