FC United of Manchester FC United of Manchester FC United of Manchester Badge FC United of Manchester Pitch In

Cheetham Hill Community Project

FC United’s community team hosted a group of 23 young people and their carers from Cheetham Hill at the game against Whitby Town. The young people were awarded medals and trophies from local housing association Guinness Northern Counties on Saturday 30th August for their participation and achievements in an exciting summer sports activities programme.

The awards ceremony was the grand finale to a month-long action-packed programme called Street Box Strikers, organised by the housing association.

The young people, all aged between 5 and 15 years, benefited from free professional training in boxing, street dancing and football.

TV street dancing hit ’Flava’, semi-finalists from ’Britain’s Got Talent’, travelled up from Cornwall to Guinness Northern Counties’ head office at Bower House, Hollinwood, Oldham to present each of the 23 young participants with a medal and certificate. ’Flava’ also presented 12 of the young people with trophies for Coach’s Choice, Most Improved and Best Performer across the three activities.

The young people and their families were then whisked away to watch the FC United match at Gigg Lane. FC United provided the football training for the programme along with visits to the ground and match tickets. All of the children then had the chance to meet the players at the end of Saturday’s match.

Three of the children were named Street Box Strikers Champions and were presented with trophies and signed footballs by FC United team members on the pitch at half time. They were Josephine Ryan aged 12, Harry O’Hagan aged 8 and Lee Hindmarsh aged 11. Josephine said: "I am absolutely over the moon with the award, I really can’t believe what an amazing day I have had"??.

Claire Roberts Wheeler, Housing Officer for Guinness Northern Counties helped organise the ’Street Box Strikers’ along with her colleague Hazel Booth. Claire said: "It’s been a fantastic end to a really brilliant programme of activities. The young people from the Cheetham area have really excelled in their chosen sports and proved what they’re capable of, given the right opportunity and encouragement.

"We’d like to thank all the young people and their families who took part, as well as our brilliant coaches and our special guests from FC United and Flava for making the awards event so special.

"We’d also like to thank Manchester City Council’s Youth Contact Team, Tung Sing Housing Association, Manchester City Council, Northwards Housing, Ashiana Housing Association and all the other agencies who helped support the project."??


First Posted ~ 17:42 Thu 4 Sep 2008
News ID ~ 1801
Last Updated ~ 01:52 Tue 16 Feb 2021