English National Opera is seeking out classical music enthusiasts among local football teams to drum up support in its first move after moving to Manchester.

The company was embroiled in a funding row in 2022 when faced with a total cut in its £12 million Arts Council grant unless it relocated from London.

ENO eventually chose Manchester as its regional base, and has pledged to work with local football teams in its first move since moving north.

The ensemble will work with “community groups and local football teams in the city-region” when its new programme launches in 2025.

ENO has not confirmed which of the many local teams will be involved in the project, entitled Perfect Pitch, which will “explore the impact that mass singing has on team performance and spectator experience”.

Jenny Mollica, ENO’s chief executive, said that the project and others “mark the first wave of our developing partnership with Greater Manchester”.

She added: “Working together over the last year, we could not be more clear that Greater Manchester is the right place to put down roots, a place where we can develop, expand and innovate.

“Where, building on the region’s legendary reputation as the heart of music making in this country, we can make a difference to audiences and communities, help invest in the next generation of talent and break new ground … locally, nationally and internally.”

The company will move its main activities to Manchester, using venues such as Aviva Studios and The Lowry Theatre in Salford, in a phased relocation to be completed by 2029.

ENO, which was promised Arts Council backing on the condition that it left London, will have to build an audience for opera in the North West, according to experts who previously voiced concern over the move.

Lord Sumption, a board member quit, in 2023 over the “philistine” relocation, which he feared would leave the ensemble financially unviable because a regional base would lack the paying opera audience present in London.

ENO musicians threatened to strike over plans to downsize the ensemble and rehire players on part-time contracts to accommodate the relocation.

To settle into its new home, ENO is to tap into the musical reputation of Manchester, the home of The Smiths and Oasis, and has set out plans “to develop new operatic work that reflects Greater Manchester’s communities, drawing on the region’s diverse musical traditions”.

It plans to stage Philip Glass and Robert Wilson’s opera Einstein on the Beach, and Benjamin Britten’s classic comic opera Albert Herring.

There are also plans to create a Greater Manchester Youth Opera Company, and to expand ENO Breathe, a breathing and well-being programme for people recovering from the effects of Covid.