We’re back on the pitch! It’s already been a busy 4 weeks which has included welcoming our new student-athletes into the programme, getting stuck into pre-season and preparing for our first competitive fixture on Friday 23rd September 2022.
Ahead of this competitive fixture, we wanted to share important information regarding live-streaming and other ways in which you can support RIASA throughout the season.
Firstly, we would like to extend a massive welcome to the parents of our new student intake. Returning students and their family and friends may already know this information, but with a heavy intense schedule and a larger cohort size, we wanted to clarify the ways in which you can support your son or daughter during their time in the UK.
Over the last 4 weeks, our coaches have been watching closely to determine which squad each student will be placed in.
We have multiple RIASA squads so we can ensure that every student is playing competitively. It’s also a great opportunity to see player development – no squad is permanent and there will be constant movement throughout the season.
The 3 squad names are RIASA Bradford, RIASA Helsinki and RIASA Leeds.
This season we have RIASA Bradford and RIASA Helsinki competing in the West Riding County Development U23 League West.
RIASA Leeds will be competing in the West Riding County Development U23 League East.
These leagues are highly competitive, we finished second last season in the west league, in which RIASA played against other pro and semi pro clubs across Yorkshire. The winner of these two leagues will compete against each other in a final showdown.
Links for tables:
West Riding County Development U23 League West
West Riding County Development U23 League East
We also have 2 squads in the Men’s Northern Tier 6 BUCS league. This league is more flexible and most players will compete in this.
Our female student-athletes will be competing for Bradford City Women, who have a total of 3 teams.
The women’s first team compete in the FA Women’s National League Division North, the U23 team play in the FA Women’s National Reserve Northern Division and finally the U19 team compete in the Education Football Alliance League.
Our female students have the opportunity to compete in any of these teams as they progress and develop throughout the season. Alongside training sessions with the Bradford City’s women’s teams and additional small group RIASA training sessions, each individual will have the opportunity to reach their full potential and gain a prestigious spot on Bradford City’s first team.
During the season, we will cover and live-stream selected women’s matches, and we will announce the coverage of these games on our women’s Instagram account.
Social media is powerful and here at RIASA we love sharing content which highlights the best bits from training and games. We post mainly on Instagram and Facebook, however, we also use Twitter and TickTok.
You’ll notice on social media we post daily, sometimes numerous times a day, with content that happens throughout the week, including interviews, images, videos from training and important announcements regarding fixtures. We do try to make sure we cover as many students as possible within our content.
Please follow RIASA on Instagram and Facebook to see daily updates.
‘Inside training’ is very popular amongst our students and their families. This is simply a full edited video from inside a particular training session in which we film and release content.
As a guide, during any given week we would put out 2-4 inside training sessions. Again, this will differ from week-to-week as we start to compete in games. All students will be covered in one of these videos unless they are injured.
Subscribe to our YouTube for inside training and other RIASA related videos such as behind the scenes, interviews with players and coaches and full recorded games.
The section that you have all been waiting for, here we are going to provide detailed information about how you can watch live games and how we plan on managing the schedule during the season. We will use two platforms to live-stream our fixtures during the season, they are as follows: YouTube and VEO.
YouTube
We have been live-streaming our games on YouTube for several years now, and we will continue to do this for selected games this season. Subscribe to our YouTube channel, and you will be able to preview any scheduled games that are planned to be broadcast on a weekly basis.
YouTube is great because it allows smart TV integration, and you can also watch live from any smart device such as phone or laptop. If you subscribe to your app, you should receive notifications regarding live-streams.
VEO
We recently announced on social media that we have invested in VEO’s latest camera (VEO 2) which enables intelligent game recording and the newly featured live-streaming capability. As an academy, we are excited to be using this revolutionary equipment to help our players develop further and showcase our games across the world.
VEO is different to YouTube and is app based, so you will need to go onto your app or android store and download VEO Live. Once this app is downloaded, you will need to create an account to access the live stream.
Once you have signed up, you will then need to search for ‘RIASA’ and follow our club. By doing this, you should receive push notifications when we go live.
If you have downloaded the VEO Live app this link should take you to our club.
When the game is live through the app, there is also a share option in which you can copy the link to share with other people (ideal for people who may not be tech-savvy). You can also post this link across your social media to generate more watchers.
We have listed the VEO and YouTube live links in our Link tree, which can be found on our Instagram and Facebook. Click these to see the latest live-streamed games.
Watch the below video for further information about VEO and how to watch a live-stream.
As mentioned, we have a busy games schedule over the next 9 months. We want to try and live stream a minimum of 2-3 games per week, covering each squad where possible.
We will plan 1 week in advance and release the game coverage on Instagram and Facebook between Friday-Sunday. This will include all the fixtures coming up, and we will highlight which ones are live, so you know when to watch.
From time-to-time, fixtures may be cancelled due to inclement weather or other factors beyond our control. We will always post announcements across social media as soon as we are made aware.
Every game that we live-stream is also recorded in full HD and later available to watch on our YouTube channel. We know that our students like to watch back the full game and some of them use these videos to create highlights – we will continue to do this throughout the season.
Connection drop-outs and signal issues
Streaming outside, sometimes on remote pitches, there is potential for connection issues or signal losses. We know this is frustrating, and we will try our absolute best to resolve these immediately.
Kitlocker have now updated the RIASA store with that latest training and match wear ranges. Purchase replica kit and support RIASA on the road!
Finally…
We would like to thank everyone for their support. We can’t wait to see each and every student develop on and off the field. WE ARE RIASA!