Copyright 2019 © Luton Town FC Community Trust | Kenilworth Stadium, 1 Maple Road, LUTON LU4 8AW | 01582 561622

@ltfc.communitytrust LTFC_Community email: community@lutontown.co.uk | Childline: 0800 11 11

ISSUE 9 March-April 2019 SPORT | EDUCATION | HEALTH | INCLUSION

Registered Charity | Charity No. 1123078

COMMUNITYTRUST

What a fantastic ‘day of action’ we all had at Ely Way at the end of March as first team boss Mick Harford, and first teamers James Shea and Sonny Bradley joined us for our #everyplayercounts adult disability tournament.

The EFL Day Of Action was a nationwide showcase of all EFL Club Community Trusts, who form the largest network of sporting charities in the UK, to demonstrate the impact football has across the country. Funded by the EFL Trust and the Wembley National Stadium Trust, our ‘every player counts’ is a multi-sports project for adults and children with learning disabilities that delivers a programme of 3 weekly adult daytime sports sessions and 2 weekly after school multi sports activity clubs for school children.

Adults particularly with learning disabilities are more likely to experience common social characteristics of unemployment, social isolation and discrimination and our inclusive multi-sports programme provides a

range of exciting sports opportunities for a range of learning disabilities focusing on issues around social isolation, health, physical inactivity and diet.

‘Big Mick’ kicked off the morning with a pep talk to all of the participants about the importance of teamwork and playing as part of a team and with two pitches in full swing it was then up to James Shea and Sonny Bradley to liven up the action and join in the fun with James Shea’s team on the day lifting the #everyplayercounts Trophy in front of BBC and Sky TV cameras who had turned up to broadcast all of the fun - and to sing a little bit about the work the Club and Trust puts into the local community!

A very special EFL Day of Action!

Hatters Trust celebrate'EFL Day of Action' with #everyplayercountsdisability tournament

2

Trust's Schools Heritage project begins collecting

Hatters memories

A big well done to the Year 8 girls football team from Ashcroft high school in Luton who made it through to the regional finals of the EFL Girls cup to represent the Hatters against their counter part schools from all over east Anglia representing Peterborough Utd, Wycombe , Ipswich Town and Norwich City.After progressing through to the quarter finals they qere narrowley beaten and eliminated by Wycombe Wanderers, the eventual runners-up who themselves lost narrowly on penalties in the final.The girls should be extremely proud of their efforts and the manner in which they conducted themselves - a credit to both school and Club!

EFL Trust Girls Cup - Ashcroft High School success

lots of them present and future Hatters fans we hope!

It’s then down to the serious business of the competition itself and that is when our academy recruitment staff perk up and show an interest! Yes the hatters Cup is a great community event for everyone but it is also a great recruitment tool for the academy especially with the younger age groups. Of course u6 , u7 and u8 age groups are non-competitive (try telling that to a seven year old!) and so results are not

recorded but everyone goes home with a medal while the u9’s to u12’s play to a knock-out quarter �nal then semi �nal before we arrive at our �nal with a tournament winner.

A fabulous two days involving around 4,000 locals that brings a feeling of 'place' to lots of local youngsters and spectators who might not ordinarily visit Kenilworth Road during the season but who all leave with a smile and a positive image of the 'Town'.

What memories do you have of your first Luton Town match? Where were you when Luton won the Littlewoods Cup? Did you see George Best play at the Kenny? Do you remember when Mick Harford was Luton’s number nine?These were the questions we were asking of our ‘older’ supporters at the recent home game with blackpool as we seek to record the thousands and thousands of memories the people of Bedfordshire have of the Hatters through the years. As part of our Heritage Lottery grant aided schools heritage project we are now collecting and recording supporters memories of the Hatters through the years and taking these memories into the classroom to bring alive the Club’s 130 year history to the next generation of young supporters.It’s a great project that is generating lots of interest in local schools - interested? then why not come along to one of our

free volunteer oral history workshops and learn the skills needed to help us collect and celebrate memories of Luton and the Football Club.

Our first ‘listening events’ at Kenilworth Road to gather and preserve supporter's stories took place at the stadium before the Blackpool game following our volunteer workshop where step by step interview skills learned were put into action. We’re sure everyone saw our article when Linda Ainsworth stood in her Mum’s footsteps at the Kenny 83 years after she played at the Kenny and we are now on the look out for as many of the other hundreds of hidden stories as we can to record for history and share with future generations our proud history and connection with the Town.

3

Day 2 of our stadium community event saw the start of our biggest event of the year with our very popular two day annual youth tournament. It involves all of the community trust staff who run the tournament , man the car parks and turnstiles as well as catering who run the food outlets and stewards who patrol the stadium and our ground and stadium mainte-nance staff. Over 50 staff members in total all make a contribution in making the week-end a huge success for everyone.

Most of important of all, of course are the 1,500 local boys and girls who take part with everyone entering the pitch down the famous tunnel before their lap of honour around the stadium to great applause from proud and excited family members – this year over 2,500 spectators attended over the week-end. It creates a great atmosphere and it’s fantastic to see so many local children on the pitch with massive smiles –

Our Kicks/StreetLeague projects aims to use football as a hook to engage and target young people and attempt to divert them away from crime and ant-social behaviour by providing training, employment and volunteering opportunities.

What a great presentation we held at our last home game as our Hatters over 50’s walking footballers sprung a surprise presentation on Captain Arthur Mason who after the last 4 years running and playing for the team has decided to hang up his boots to ‘take a role upstairs!’. We had no idea when we started 4 years ago that the walking football 'journey' would turn out to be not only very popular but also very successful on the competition front with the boys regularly making both regional and national finals tournaments – pulling on that shirt and fulfilling a life-long dream to play for the

Arthur finally hangs up his 'walking football' boots.

'PL KICKS' & 'STREET LEAGUE' LINK UP TO TAKE ON THE ARSENAL & THE ORIENT

During February half term as well as the games everyone involved took part in workshops delivered by Bedfordshire Police Cohesion team on the dangers and consequences of knife crime. Last month Arsenal FC visited Marsh Farm for a competitive U18 fixture while our U16 boys and girls travelled down to Leyton Orient. All of the Luton teams were made up from boys and girls right across Town uniting under the Club badge. Hatters Trust Community Operations Officer Daniel Douglas commented "Kicks & Luton Street league are fantastic projects that encourages young people of all ages and abilities from across Town to come together and enjoy football.’

Hatters. Well done Arthur – without you this project would not have been the success it has been and will be in the future under your managerial watch.On top of this success we will soon be announcing several new venues across the County promoting the many benefits of walking football – not just the benefit of regular physical exercise but the mental health benefits of being involved in regular activity with like minded people enjoying the social side as much as the competitive side of football. To get involved in our over 50’s activities call the community office on 01582 561622 or drop us an email at community@lutontown.co.uk

4

FACEBOOK.COM/LTFC.COMMUNITYTRUST

TWITTER.COM/LTFC_COMMUNITY

LUTONTOWNCOMMUNITY.CO.UK

We’ve had a lot of interest in our social cohesion projects lately with our Football for Peace ambassadors meeting the Duke of Cambridge last year and our Trust selected as a finalist in Best Community Trust section at the prestigious Football Business awards. Now Community Operations Manager Daniel Douglas has been recognised in the Bedfordshire Police Cohesion awards evening as the very prestigious overall Community Champion of 2019 in the whole County.

The interest in our cohesion projects has grown in the light of the big increase in knife crime locally and nationally as well as an increase

Premier League Primary Stars reaches over 1,000 kids each week

The PL Primary Stars programme is designed to provide primary schools with support in improving the provision of PE and sport during curriculum and extra-curriculum time. The aim is to provide higher quality, positive experiences for the pupils, enabling positive teaching and learning, alongside increased participation opportunities and importantly for the club increased player pathways through talent identification. Our support to schools includes teacher mentoring, PE curriculum lessons, enrichment sessions, through to breakfast clubs, lunch-time activities and after-school clubs.

School Sport Development Officer, James Hatch, who oversees the project commented 'We always have a great response from local schools who ask us to come in and help with all kinds of requests from running lunch time clubs to coaching the schools’ football teams. With the PLCF funding we will be able to engage with more schools than ever each week and also promote the Club to the next generation of supporters while lending valuable support to PE delivery staff locally who's first subject may not be PE. For any schools interested in our PL Primary Stars offer you

Recognition of Trusts Cohesion work in LutonCohesion Champion 2019 & National Crimebeat Award

can contact James Hatch at the Community Trust on 01582 561622

in racial incidents in football stadiums as well as a recognition of football's ability to tackle these problems through sports cohesion projects such as our Street League and PL Kicks schemes for young people in Luton.Further recognition of our work also came from a National Crimebeat Award presented by Julian Polhill, High Sherrif of Bedfordshire recognising our succesful Football for Peace initiative last year as an innovative and succesful crime prevention project.Well done to our cohesion team ,further deserved recognition of their dedication and hard work.