Everton treat young people to fantastic time

Everton is a club steeped in community values; Everton in the Community and the Free School strive to ensure that the club plays a full role in promoting inclusivity, helping those who need its help, and young people in particular are reaping the benefits.

The caring and nurturing ethos is not limited to the immediate area - it stretches far and wide, embracing not only those who are born to be Blue, but all people who love football, and even those who don’t.

Goodison Park, the Grand Old Lady, opened her arms and welcomed a group of young people from Northern Ireland for the fixture against Fulham.

In this theatre of football one senses the presence of the ghosts of many of the game’s greatest exponents whose skills have delighted fans since 1878; Dixie Dean, whose statue proudly stands outside the stadium, Alan Ball, Alex Young (The Golden Vision), Tommy Lawton, Ray Wilson and so many others. Many other greats are still, thankfully, alive, and walking the old stone corridors. Dead or alive, all of them have in some way made Everton the great club that it is today.

When I first began supporting Everton, it boasted the majestic midfield trio of Ball, Harvey and Kendall. Today, others tread in their legendary footsteps - Fellaini, Osman and Gibson. Darron Gibson, like Shane Duffy, hails from our hometown - known for the purposes of UK Capital of Culture as Derry-Londonderry.

Sadly, this isn’t a city so good they named it twice, rather it’s a divided city, a traumatised city, but a city trying to heal the wounds of its deeply troubled past.

On Saturday, 36 young people involved in the Teenage Kickz project, headed by former Derry City captain Peter Hutton, were treated to a trip to Goodison Park where the Everton in the Community charity arranged for them to carry large banners bearing the club’s name around the pitch, before forming a guard of honour as the teams of Everton and Fulham emerged from the players’ tunnel to the strains of the Z Cars theme tune.

The 36-strong group of boys and girls, Protestants and Catholics, bearers of British passports and Irish passports, from either side of the border, shared one thing - they came from disadvantaged areas that, were it not for schemes like Teenage Kickz, might otherwise never have met.

Among the youngsters hailing from deprived areas like Lincoln Courts, Brandywell, Bogside, Top of the Hill, as well as Glengad and Castlefinn, in Co Donegal were some who had never enjoyed a break before, and some who had never flown. Yet here they were, under the gaze of around 38,000 fans, forming a guard of honour in one of football’s most historic stadiums, sharing the same space as tens of millions of pounds worth of talent. It was an example of inclusivity at its most dramatic.

Eamon Baker works with the various groups involved, by facilitating prejudice reduction programmes.

Recalling a comment he heard recently, he repeated it to describe the potential of a trip such as this: “You can count how many pips are in an apple; but you can’t count how many apples may be in the pips. Who knows what might grow from this?”

On Saturday, the coach brought the party to Goodison Park early, where they were met by Everton staff who told them where to stand to get autographs as the players arrived.

All of the young people, who supported rival teams, instantly recognized the Everton stars as they drove into the car park area reserved for them.

Among those players were homegrown talents Darron Gibson, who sadly failed a late fitness test, Shane Duffy and Co Donegal man, Seamus Coleman, who appeared to be leaving the area when a security guard pointed out the group from Donegal. The Killybegs man quickly turned and crossed the car park to answer the requests for his autograph.

Shane Duffy was visibly startled as he emerged from his car to a chorus of accents from home calling him over to sign the white Teenage Kickz T-shirts that had been specially designed for the occasion.

“Whoa, what’s going on here?” he asked, widening his eyes and throwing his head back in mock shock. “Why are there so many people from Derry here?”

As one player after another arrived in different parts of the car park, there was a mad scramble to head them off and get their signatures.

“Even the older boys who are ‘too cool for school’ as it were, were running about in the car parks trying to get autographs,” laughed Peter Hutton later.

All of the youngsters, as well as their guardians were given free tickets to the match, and ten of the boys were selected to take part in a kick-about on the pitch at half-time. Two lucky boys, Rhys Adair from Lincoln Courts and Connor McCourt from the Bogside, were given an extra treat when they were selected as ball boys.

Edel Pritchard, from Pilot’s Row, who was married on Manchester United’s Old Trafford turf, accompanied the youngsters with the banners and afterwards declared without prompting: “That was amazing.”

“Young people from this area would dream of doing what our young people have done,” observed Peter Hutton. “A security guard in the stadium told me he’d have given his right arm to do that. He told me how as a child he and his mates would try to run on just to grab a blade of grass.”

Billy Hutchman, from Lincoln Courts said the eight young people in his group had enjoyed one of their best ever weekends.

“Some would never have met Catholics before; I think projects like this are really important.”

A group of young people from Top of the Hill, when asked how they would describe their experience, somehow managed to say in unison: “Fantastic”, though Connolly Deeney was looking forward to getting a good night’s sleep.

“It’ll be good to get into bed without worrying about getting woken up by a chocolate éclair in the face,” he added.

Rhys Adair thought it was “a brilliant weekend”, and was delighted that he was chosen as a ball boy.

“The ball came to me five times,” he recalled.

Both ball boys got the chance to meet players inside the tunnel and get pictures taken.

“Darron Gibson didn’t speak to me,” said Connor McCourt who now seemed to be on nickname terms with one of the Everton stars. “But Seamy (Coleman) spoke to me.”

His friend, Danny Carlin said his highlight was meeting the players and carrying the banner, but added: “I nearly went to sleep during the match.”

The overall consensus was that the visit to Goodison Park had been memorable, though the football match itself was instantly forgettable.

Fulham didn’t appear interested in making it a contest, and brought only four fans with them. As a result the atmosphere in the ground was flat.

The groups involved are already talking about working together in the future and with Peter Hutton committed to developing the scheme further and Everton in the Community confirming that they want to continue the partnership with Teenage Kickz, starting with coaches being sent to Londonderry in the summer, hopes are high that this scheme is capable of becoming something special.

Delegations of young people from deprived areas of Liverpool may now also be given the chance to further broaden their horizons through reciprocal visits, while further trips to Goodison Park look likely.

There now exists a real opportunity for Londonderry to develop close links with the charitable arm of one of the Premier League’s most historic clubs and who can tell where that will eventually lead?

As the tired visitors, who had packed a lot into two days, left John Lennon airport, Eamon Baker again used the apple and pips analogy to explain the opportunities that now potentially exist through this project.

However, another analogy might be even more apt, given the city’s association with that mightiest of trees that springs from a small seed and gave the city its original Gaelic name, Doire, which means oak grove: From small acorns, mighty oak trees grow.