The Footie Fun Begins

[caption id="attachment_4807" align="aligncenter" width="640"] Group Shot - with beer![/caption]

Saturday 3rd March at 11am saw Smiths News' first charity football match of the season, with Worcester MSC & Instore taking on Rowan House. All Saints Academy, Cheltenham was the chosen venue, thus ensuring both teams played an away game.

[caption id="attachment_4808" align="alignleft" width="300"] Jack Champ takes the winning penalty![/caption]

Commenting on the game afterwards, Ross Hall-Galley from Worcester said: 

‘’The score was 5-5 after 90 minutes, with Swindon winning 4-2 on penalties, The game was played in good spirit, and was 2-2 at half time, after Worcester twice came back from a goal behind.

The first 20 minutes of the second half was all Swindon, and they scored 3 quick goals to make it 5-2. However Worcester were not to be beaten, and fought back to bring the scores level.’’

Laura Morris from Rowan House who was there to watch and said:

‘’The guys couldn’t stop talking about Humphrey’s dirty tackle on one of the MSC’s players – not only was he the youngest player at 18, he was also the ref’s son!’’

Worcester's two nominated charities,  Acorns Children's Hospice and the Critical Care Unit at The Queen Elizabeth II Hospital Birmingham, will benefit from the epic battle to the tune of £125.

Robson's 5 Meet Their Goal

[caption id="attachment_3618" align="aligncenter" width="570"] Steven Adams,Craig Berry, Graham Eccleston, Chris Etherington, Scott Hunter, Phil Lennox, Stephen Robson, Jordan Veal and Derek Watt[/caption]

Chris Etherington, Returns Supervisor at Newcastle House has news of a 5-a-side football tournament he and 8 other colleagues played in on July 1st at Soccerworld, Newcastle.

The team raised £105 in aid of the Sir Bobby Robson Foundation. Sir Bobby was a Local Hero in Newcastle, hence the name Robson's 5 for the team. Chris adds:

The highlight of the afternoon was Phil (Wobbly Legs) Lennox in goal saving penalties to get the team into the semi-final - Joe Hart eat your heart out!!

The team finished in third place - out of twenty-six teams. Absolutely brilliant!

Return Match Nets the Same Result

[caption id="attachment_3597" align="alignleft" width="300"] Game on![/caption]

Not content with arranging last year's football tournament, Nottingham House's Joanne Wiltshire ensured there was a repeat performance this year. On Thursday 14th June, 10 teams from the Northern Region's Houses gathered at the Stockport Power League ground to see if the cup could be wrested out of last year's winners' - Stockport - hands.

Each team consisted of a mixture of departments, which were:

[caption id="attachment_3598" align="alignright" width="300"] Wednesbury vs Nottingham[/caption]

• Wednesbury – 2 Teams


• Stoke – 1 Team


• Nottingham – 1 Team


• Bolton – 1 Team


• Warrington – 1 Team


• Liverpool – 2 Teams


• Stockport – 1 Team, plus a challenge from the...


• Management Team

Each house puts their £10 per person or £25 management donation towards their chosen charity and around £755 was raised between the 10 houses.



[caption id="attachment_3607" align="alignleft" width="300"] The Final[/caption]Around 68 people took part, with the inclusion of 2 lady players this year for Bolton. The men didn’t want to be shown up by the women :) [NB this is as written on the Publicity Form submitted - Ed;)]

Stockport again made the final….

... would Wednesbury 1 avenge Nottingham B's defeat in the final last year and run out as the winners?

No, it just wasn't to be - Stockport house won again!! That's 2 years running now. They are the team to beat next year!

Looks like you have a regular event on your hands Joanne!

[caption id="attachment_3610" align="aligncenter" width="640"] The winning team and collecting their winner's trophy[/caption]

Game On!

[caption id="attachment_2581" align="aligncenter" width="640"] Spot the Ball! [/caption]

Chris Hulme and the day pack issued the challenge..., returns guys readily accepted..., Mel Howes booked the pitch at Brickfields Community/Activity Centre.

Thus the scene was set for the Day pack v Returns scanners 7 a side football game, ably managed by Pete Hockley and Mandy Wickham-Lawrence. One team had seven players; one team had only six, due to last minute illness, but they played on in the name of charity. Oh and they won!!

The game may have been on April 1st, but Plymouth House showed they were no fools, by raising £99.74 * for Macmillan. There's a local Macmillan unit within Derriford Hospital in Plymouth which deals with a number of projects within the local community.

[caption id="attachment_2582" align="aligncenter" width="640"] Presentation time & proud banner display: Vitalius, Ryan, Malcolm, Jason, Chris, Aaron, Tony, Jason, Nathan, Scott, Tom, Referee Glen, winning Manager Mandy and 2 nephews (Simon Hobbs gone to hospital)[/caption]

Our reporter says:

Stunning sunny day - a bit cold for the spectators but ideal for the players. 5 minutes into the game Si Hobbs was injured and had to go to hospital. 

Mandy provided enough food to feed everyone and all the half time drinks for the teams. Final score was 12 – 5, it was a good clean game, staff and managers brought their families to watch giving it a real family atmosphere. 

There has been talk that the Nights Boys want to challenge so there may be more footy on the way!   Roll on the next event!

* = this came from each team member paying £5 to play and spectators donating a minimum of £1 to watch. Pitch was donated free of charge and there were around 25 spectators and children :)

Jaimie's and BLS' Legacy is...

Many of you will have seen Jaimie Dorward's moving piece in March's paper version of Dispatches and the recent post on here about her son Aaron's fun penalty shoot-out held in Bradford.

In her ambassador role, Jaimie is running in a 5k Legacy event for the National Autistic Society (NAS) in Blackpool on 29^th April. You can add your donation on Jaimie's Just Giving page  or with a free text message TEXT RUNJ49 £2/£5/£10 to 70070 [Link and text no longer available - Ed]

Mark Charlton is joining Jaimie in raising money for NAS via his participation in this year's From S to N flagship fundraiser and has been adopted as an honorary team member of BLS' Community Week campaign as a result.

BLS have a number of fundraising initiatives already underway and are using this neat thermometer to chart how they're progressing towards their  fundraising target of £7,000. [Click on the picture to enlarge it if you want a closer look - Ed]

They've also set up the BLS Community Week Challenge Team Page on Just Giving to make donating just that bit easier for everyone. On there you'll find links to all their fundraising activities - including Mark's and Neil Barker's rides in From S to N (Neil is riding for the Jane Tomlinson Appeal), as well as Jaimie's penalty shoot-out, Gemma McGowan's Sport Relief Mile and Mark Silver's 'stroll' around Kirklees previously featured on Dispatches. There's also Julie Barnett's weekly raffle in aid of Yorkshire Cancer Research,  Adrian Warner's 10 mile Walk for Life in aid of the Terrence Higgins Trust, plus Siobhan Hay's promotional sale for NAS :)

As Jaimie says:

Lots of wonderful charities in need of support, we ask for your donations and your support by circulating this to your teams.

Jaimie was also keen to tell me how BLS and the NAC are working together on their fundraising initiatives for Community Week:

...we share the same building as the NAC and although we are classed as 2 separate sites for community week – they have a community week committee too and we have two representatives who are on the committee, so both sites can share ideas and support each other’s activities. I think it would be nice to mention that as a site we are also coming together to help each other’s teams raise funds where we can.

It's great to hear how Community Week is fostering such good team work :)

Are you working with another site, department or other part of the Group on your Community Week fundraising? Maybe BLS' thermometer or their Just Giving team page is just the thing for you to adapt for your Community Week contributions? Or perhaps you have another great idea to share, which others could use. It would be good to hear all about it and let everyone know via Dispatches! 

Goaaaaaal! For BLS

[caption id="attachment_2199" align="alignleft" width="300" caption="Post shoot out fun with Billy Bantam, the Bradford City FC mascot"][/caption]

Flying footballs were the order of the day when Bradford Disability Football Club held a penalty shoot out with Bradford City's mascot, Billy Bantam in goal.

BLS Commercial team's Jaimie Dorward ensured her and son Aaron's efforts didn't go unrewarded by raising sponsorship to the tune of £111.

They and the other children had to shoot at Billy Bantam and try to score 4 goals. Sponsorship was either a fixed amount or per penalty.

Jaimie explains:

The team is a pan disability team for all with junior and senior teams. They run regular coaching sessions twice per week all year round. The coaches are qualified FA standard coaches with experiences of working and guiding players of all levels and abilities.

They participate in tournaments and games with other clubs throughout the UK. Most recently we went to Chelsea on a weekend trip to London, Bradford City beat Chelsea 2 nil (never thought I’d hear that). In march they will play Manchester United and get a tour of the ground and some free pizza.

As well as offering an excellent environment for the children it also offers some respite for carers and allows them to meet and support each other.

It looks like the children have a lot of fun!

This isn't the last we'll be hearing from BLS by a long shot. Stayed tuned for updates in future posts planned for Dispatches.

Wembley Winners

To kick-off the post-Christmas slump, here's a tale of sporting achievement from October's Dispatches...

[caption id="attachment_1339" align="aligncenter" width="640" caption="Steve (far right) and the team celebrate their success"][/caption]

Steve Edwards, House Manager at Lancing, fulfilled a lifelong dream by leading a team to victory at Wembley* in the recent Newstraid (Key Group) 5-a-side football tournament. The victory was a family affair as the line-up included three of Steve’s sons, Sam, 21, Jake, 19, and Callam, 15.

To be honest, I didn’t kick a ball, said Steve, I am no way skilful enough. I just gave
instructions from the sidelines!

The Lancing side had to win seven games to win the tournament and beat Comag 1-0 in the final. Most importantly, the team’s efforts raised £150 for charity.

* = A sports centre somewhere in Wembley, admitted Steve, not the Wembley Stadium. ;)

A fantastic total - it would be great to know which charity benefitted from all your efforts, Steve. If anyone reading this knows, please leave a comment below.

Liverpool's running total...

Liverpool House have been literally running around raising money for Community Week, in particular for cancer charities.

[caption id="attachment_1107" align="alignleft" width="124"] Brian Murphy after his marathon run[/caption]

Brian Murphy ran a half marathon and raised £542 for three charities: Zoe's Place, Macmillan and a local charity called Cry.

Louise Broadhurst, Liverpool transport manager, who lost her mum to cancer in January, raised £255 by running the Cancer Research Race for Life.

Night staff and NRS staff joined in with Nottingham House in the inter house football tournament and raised £140 which went to Clatterbridge Cancer Hospital.

[caption id="attachment_1108" align="aligncenter" width="519"] Race for LIfe ladies[/caption]

And Matt Tyrer held a charity night in honour of his dad Monty Tyrer whom he lost to cancer in April - raising £740 for Clatterbridge Cancer Hospital.

What an amazing amount of money raised altogether - well done Liverpool!

Slough's turn for the footie

[caption id="attachment_1081" align="aligncenter" width="500" caption="Kamran heading for a goal, to bring his Day Pack team back in the game"][/caption]

Well done to Slough House who held a charity football match for Community Week,  and raised £90 on the day.
 
They had two teams of 5, Day Pack team Vs Twilight.  The final score was 7-7, but Twilight clinched the game on penalties. 

[caption id="attachment_1082" align="aligncenter" width="500" caption="The winning Twilight team, with Alan Bowen, Slough House Manager"][/caption]

Notts on form with footie

Last month David Hammond and Joanne Wiltshire of Nottingham House organised a 5-a-side football tournament for all the Northern Region Houses. Thanks to everyone's efforts they raised an amazing £800! Houses taking part included Nottingham, Stoke, Stockport, Liverpool, Wednesbury, Leicester, Warrington and they also had a challenge from a Management Team.

Everyone paid to take part on the day and the proceeds have been split across all the charities the various houses support. Over 70 members of staff were there on the day, a great turnout.

And Stockport beat Nottingham B-side in the final, 2-1.

Worcester goes wild

[caption id="attachment_808" align="alignleft" width="200" caption="Blinded by the BBQ!"][/caption]

Reports on Worcester's fundraising activities for Community Week are flooding in thick and fast.

On 20 May they held a BBQ at Worcester Country Park, with games of football and cricket, lots of food and drink, and a sponsored beard shave!

They raised a total of £294 between the MSC and Instore, with ah further £202 to come in from Stuart Birch's sponsored beard shave.





[caption id="attachment_809" align="alignleft" width="225" caption="An unusual cake..."][/caption]

They also held a tea party, where staff made cakes and brought them in to work to sell.  Gavin Spares, who is doing the A-B Bike Ride, sold the cakes with tea and raised another £92.

All money is going towards Acorn's Children's Hospice.

Plymouth Playoffs

[caption id="attachment_707" align="alignleft" width="280" caption="Chris Hulme, team captain, raising the cup, with Dave Murphy, Exeter Manager and ref for the day to the left."][/caption]

Passionate footie fans in the Plymouth Group were on the ball recently with their fundraising activities for Community Week.  They held a five-a-side football tournament which went down a storm, and raised over £150 for local charities St Luke's Hospice and Children's Hospice South West.

All staff pitched in to help organise the tournament, and 30 people took part in the competition, divided into six teams.  It took place at the Mayflower Centre and was well attended.  Teams included representatives from Twilight, Days, Agency and Managers, so good participation all round.

Sue Lamming, Community Champion for the Group said:

“This event whipped up a frenzy amongst staff, worse than when the landlord calls last orders at the pub!!!  The pre match game had the air positively electric with friendly banter.  The guys all took it very seriously and two teams had t-shirts printed especially for the tournament.

A lot of staff brought their families on the day to witness the event .  The Managers team lost 0-13 in a 20 minute match! One game had to be decided by penalties and each game was fought till the last whistle.  In the end, after some fierce competition, it was the Day Pack team who were the ones who walked away with the trophy, donated by local company Trophy Man. 

There were a number of sore joints and aching bones post-match, with the oldest goalie (Malcolm) having a bruise the length of his arm. However he was part of the winning team and stopped enough goals to help the lads win. 

It was a good fun day that can be highly recommended.   The next day the guys were still buzzing - nothing like a good sporting activity to build a bond with the staff.”

Plymouth have also been busily holding cake sales every Friday – with a ‘breakfast sale’ thrown in one Friday for a change of pace.  These cake sales have been so popular that they’ve started to take pre-orders!  There is also a car boot sale and a pool tournament on the horizon, so we look forward to hearing how those go.

Scott Luscombe in goal with Malcolm McCormack taking a penalty

Coventry for the cup

First bowling, now football - Coventry House are an active group of people! They recently held a football match in aid of charity and judging by the photographs they had a lot of fun...  Kevin Davies, SAP HR Manager, gives us a run-down on how the event went:

“Our challenge match took place on Sunday 20 March.  We had Managers (with a special guest appearance from Tom Sheehy and some of the night staff) VS Twilight Staff (who also had a couple of night staff on board).

Twilight got off to a bad start, with their goalie getting injured during the warm-up. This meant the rest of the team had to take it in turns to play in goal. While Twilight were still figuring themselves out Managers went ahead after just 3 minutes.

Twilight responded with a few breaks down the pitch, but were unable to force their way through the formidable centre back pairing of the opposition.  Managers rallied again with a great first half, and by half time the score was 5-0 to Managers.

Things didn’t improve much for Twilight in the second half, with Managers pulling away to a 10-0 advantage with just 15 minutes to go.  But the effort was getting to Managers, and they seemed to tire – Twilight were suddenly all over the field (having 13 players on the pitch for the last few minutes certainly helped!) and managed to score 2 goals before Management knocked in another one just before the whistle blew.

Suffice to say the game was played in great spirits and apart from the Twilight goalie nobody was injured.  Unless of course you count pride – some players were a bit sore on that count.

The leading goal scorer was Moh Hanif (Night Manager), who scored 4 goals.  For some reason he spent a lot of the game closer to the Twilight team’s goal line than the halfway line.

After the game a raffle was held, with several prizes donated by local companies, newsagents etc.

The total raised on the day for the Raffle and Football Match was £308, so well worthwhile. The main organiser of the event was Ray George, Twilight Shift Manager, who went round local businesses drumming up raffle prizes.  The losers are talking about a re-match at a later stage in the year…”



 

 

 

 

 

 

Final Score:   Managers 11 Twilight 2

One for the footie fans

[caption id="attachment_392" align="alignleft" width="300" caption="Paul Beare and Steve Hancock in their football shirts"][/caption]

Southampton have managed to raise an amazing £414 with their ‘Red & White Appeal’.  A lot of people paid good money to see Steve Hancock and Paul Beare wearing rival football shirts!  Steve is a strong Portsmouth FC supporter and was convinced to wear a Southampton FC shirt for a day. Meanwhile Paul, who is a Southampton FC fan wore a Portsmouth FC shirt.  The things we do for a good cause – in this case for Southampton Hospital’s charity. The money raised will go towards a specialist outpatient day unit for patients with leukaemia and other blood cancers.  Well done Steve and Paul – I bet the shirts were stripped off pretty quickly once the challenge was over…

And action!

Reports are flooding in from various houses and offices around the country, of the exciting events and activities planned as part of the Community Week initiative.

[caption id="attachment_263" align="alignright" width="250" caption="Are you selling cakes on Red Nose Day?"][/caption]

Newcastle are holding some kind of fundraising event every week between now and June 27, including a night at the Greyhound Races in April and a Trip Down the Tyne in June.  Instore are getting active and organising a sponsored walk.  Borehamwood, Harlow and Stevenage are kicking off their fundraising with a Cake Sale for Red Nose Day. 

Reading have planned a 5-a-side football competition for June as well as a host of other events – they’re also asking visitors to the house to make a donation when they use the tea and coffee-making facilities.  Plymouth are also holding a 5-a-side football tournament and there are rumours of a rock-climbing or abseiling event too!

[caption id="attachment_262" align="alignleft" width="250" caption="Fancy a bit of footie?"][/caption]

Football certainly seems to be a popular event and a good way to raise money – in just 2 hours Plymouth raised £140 from staff keen to be part of the competition.