KEIGHLEY COUGARS managing director Kaue Garcia has taken on the same role with the non-league football team owned by the Rugby League club and freshly rebranded as Keighley Town.

Garcia and husband Ryan O’Neill, who bought the Cougars in 2019, saving them from potentially folding, took control of Bradford football side Eccleshill United last year and moved them to Keighley, ten miles away.

The Eccleshill name has now been replaced by Keighley Town, with the team building towards another season in the Northern Counties East League Premier Division, the ninth level of the football pyramid.

The aim is for both clubs to flourish at an improved Cougar Park, with plans to redevelop the existing main stand having been given the green light by Bradford Council, with work ongoing regarding financial due diligence to advance a £1.9 million project which would be supported by the Keighley Towns Fund, part of a Government-backed national regeneration programme. An artificial pitch is also in the offing.

Prominent Keighley-based businessman Charles Wysocki, who as a long involvement with local football, has become the new Keighley Town chair.

Garcia, 39, said: “It is our intention to have the people of Keighley proud to be associated with Keighley Town as we continue to promote inclusion and diversity, which has been a main driver for the Rugby League club.

“The town has so much potential to develop different sports and occasions at Cougar Park.

“It is our plan to install a state-of-the-art 3G artificial surface to allow rugby, football and community sports to be played on the pitch without it causing the obvious issues.”

O’Neill, 47, is the son of Mick O’Neill, a key figure in the Rugby League club’s transformative Cougarmania boom period of the 1990s.