Charity football tournament swells coffers into thousands of pounds
Keen companies including a team from the Oxford Mail has helped a charity football tournament turn three goals into one – with Play 2 Give having already raised £1 500 – with more yet to come!
On Sunday, 25 November, 19-year-old Andrew Baker, from Didcot, held the 6-a-side charity tournament to raise money for Oxford’s new Children’s Hospital, the Help an Oxfordshire Child appeal and Heads Up, funding research to combat head and neck cancers.
It was Andrew’s dream to put on the tournament, which took place at Abingdon’s Tilsley Park, and sponsored by Newbury Building Society and Round & About Publications, Wallingford, as part of his crusade to raise as much money as possible for CHOX – The Oxford Children’s Hospital.
Andrew organised the P2G tournament with three friends including Nathan Ford, 19 and Paul Finch, 16 who all persuaded local businesses to get involved and have fun at the same time. The lads are all football supporters themselves.
Companies including the Oxford Mail, Fox FM, RM and Sophos in Abingdon all turned out to take part, with 20 teams in total having to turn grass-root money into vital funds for the three benefiting charities.
Andrew says: “It was a really amazing event and considering it was the first time we had ever organised it, it went rather well. It was fantastic to see so many competitive and more light-hearted teams take part all to help raise money for such great causes – and to have smashed the target of £1,500 already is absolutely brilliant!
“We had all worked so hard to put the event on, and so many teams enjoyed it, so it was definitely worth it! Hopefully it will return again next year, and will be even better. Well done to all the teams who took part – it was so much fun and a great atmosphere but the real winners were the charities and hopefully we will be able to make £2,000 for them”
The Oxford Children’s Hospital Appeal is Andrew’s quest to muster up as much money as he can to help the state-of-the-art hospital, which opened in January, to be built. So far, the Chox appeal has reached £13.6m and Andrew is determined to carry on his fund-raising to help towards the appeal collecting its final amount.
Raising money for the Chox appeal when it launched in 2002 was Andrew’s way to say ‘thank you’ back to the doctors at the Radcliffe Infirmary in Oxford who treated him saving his life with major surgery to a brain injury. Andrew has already raised £15,000 for Oxford’s Children’s Hospital, with the help of his old schools, and the recent tournament was the latest in the venture to add to the pot of money already raised.