Pompey fans are being asked to play a vital role in moving the community club forward as manager Andy Awford unveils a campaign backed by Gianluca Vialli to raise funds to provide the Academy with two permanent pitches at the new training ground.

And in fewer than 24 hours after the campaign went live more than £10,000 was raised by Pompey fans towards the target of £250,000.

The club officially launched a fan funding campaign to raise the money by the start of the season to install two additional pitches at the club’s new Roko facility in Copnor for the Portsmouth FC Academy to use.

The campaign is being delivered through Tifosy, a London-based technology start up endorsed by former Chelsea striker and manager Vialli.

Fans now have the opportunity to contribute set amounts ranging from £10 to £10,000 in exchange for exclusive rewards. Over the duration of the campaign there will be spot prizes and surprises for fans who contribute which will range from one-off experiences to meeting Portsmouth luminaries.

Awford said: “Pompey have never had their own training facilities and fans are making that happen. We’ve never had permanent pitches for our youth academy, and we now have the chance to secure that.

“We now have the opportunity to develop a permanent facility for the Academy on the same campus as the first team squad. The benefits of this would be massive.”

Club Engagement Manager Micah Hall said: “The campaign is, we believe, the largest fan funding project run by a Football League club in the UK. We have chosen this route for two reasons: firstly because it enshrines fan engagement which is what Portsmouth Community Football Club is all about; and secondly because a significant proportion of fans surveyed recently suggested fan funding as an inclusive method of funding specific projects.

“There are many fans who cannot afford a £1000 community share issued by the Pompey Supporters’ Trust in their own right, so this is a way of allowing all our fans to contribute to the future of the club.”

Club Chief Executive Mark Catlin said: “An improved Academy is essential to the future of the club going forward. We had longer term plans to bring it onto the campus at Roko, but this fanfunding campaign could mean that this can happen by the summer of 2015. This would be a fantastic achievement, and the fans can make it happen.”

Tifosy’s ‘ambassador’ Vialli, a highly respected figure throughout world football, said: “Portsmouth are developing a blueprint for how clubs outside of the top tiers in leagues across the globe can survive with fans running their own clubs. Tifosy’s fanfunding platform is set to be a vitally important part not only of the Portsmouth story but in the development of the fan ownership model for clubs everywhere.”

Anyone wishing to support the campaign can contribute via http://www.tifosy.com/pompey