A look back at UCFB’s Entrepreneur Award winners

With UCFB launching the Sports Entrepreneur Competition, we take a look back at some previous winners of UCFB’s annual Entrepreneurship Award.

The brand new UCFB Sports Entrepreneur Competition marks ten years of UCFB being based in Manchester, and has a prize fund of £50,000 for the winning Manchester-based sports industry-related business idea.

Find out more about the groundbreaking competition and eligibility criteria.

Since 2019, UCFB has hosted its annual Entrepreneurship Award at our other campus, UCFB Wembley, awarding students £5,000 to progress their business idea relating to football and sports.

The 2025 winner was BA (Hons) Sports Business and Sports Broadcasting student Ben Blake and his partner Liam, for their organisation, BM Productions.

“We noticed a severe lack of coverage of smaller sports with lesser budgets,” Ben said.

“There’s so much in the mainstream about men’s football and such, but there’s a lot of stories which never get shared from sports such as cycling and horse racing.

“We’d love to plug that gap and share those stories.”

Ben’s win followed the 2024 victory of BA (Hons) Multimedia Sports Journalism student Redford Elton, for his content creation platform, The Fans Perspective.

“I am absolutely buzzing. The £5,000 is going to go a long way. I’m speechless, to be fair,” Redford said about his win.

“The one quote which I always live by is David Goggin’s ‘Comparison is the thief of joy.’

“If you ever want to go into anything to do with entrepreneurship, even if it’s through the UCFB programme which I 100 per cent suggest you do, do not compare yourself to people at the very very top of their game.

“You should be comparing yourself to others in the same field as yourself and pushing yourself to be better. Everyone started from somewhere.

“Even if you’re thinking it might not be the best at the minute, as long as you’re enjoying it, keep pushing yourself.

“I was at the same point as you one day, and I’ve done pretty well today, so there you go.”

Other winners of the competition have included AI-focused data and performance analysis companies, golf event societies and a boxing glove cleaning service.

Find out more about UCFB’s wide range of undergraduate degree courses, all tailored to the sports industry, to start the journey towards your dream career in sport.

You can also view a UCFB prospectus, and take the first step towards your dream career in the football and wider sport industry.