New state-of-the-art football facility at North East Lincolnshire’s Clee Fields has welcomed over 70 young people to a free football tournament.
Teams from organisations across the borough participated, including Cleethorpes Trinity Centre, Fusion Community Hub, YMCA, Centre4, West Marsh Community Centre, Immingham Oasis, Toll Bar Academy and Grimsby Town Foundation.
Each organisation delivers weekly sessions with tournaments held on a bi-monthly basis as part of the Fair Play Football initiative.
The scheme is open to boys and girls age 12 to 19 and is delivered by North East Lincolnshire Council and its partners.
It aims to provide a cost-free opportunity for the younger generation who are signposted via their local schools, the Youth Justice System and the Young People’s Support Service.
In Friday’s tournament, the teams were divided into two leagues with Cleethorpes Trinity Centre being declared eventual winners in a tense final against Fusion Boxing.
CEO of The Trin Centre, Andy Cox, said: “I attended the Fair Play event held at the new YMCA Clee Fields facility on Friday. It was great to see so many teams take part representing youth groups from across North East Lincolnshire.
“This was the fourth event that The Trin have been invited to and this was bar far the biggest and best yet. The standard of football was really high too which is a credit to each of the organisation’s being represented and their coaches.
“I believe that the Fair Play provision is of great value to our community as football is a great engagement activity. For us personally, we run our sessions on a Friday night to provide our young people with access to free football which runs alongside our open access Youth Club.
“Using data from our local policing team we have managed to demonstrate the positive impact that these sessions are having on anti-social behaviour statistics in our area. This data along with case studies that we have been collecting, allow us to evidence that the work associated with the Fair Play programme is working.”
The first Fair Play Tournament of the school year was funded by the Police and Crime Commissioner, on behalf of Humber Violence Prevention Partnership, was held at Clee Fields on Ladysmith Road on Friday, 6th September.
