Premier League & BT Disability Football Festival 2019

On the 17th July, a group of students from Osborne School, were asked to represent Southampton Football Club at the annual Disability Football Festival. The event was held at Tottenham Hotspur’s state-of-the-art training ground in Enfield.

Participants from across England and Wales came together to celebrate the work of the Premier League and BT Disability Programme.

The event featured teams representing 28 clubs. These included: Crystal Palace, Bournemouth, Watford, Aston Villa, Norwich, West Ham United, Newcastle United, Liverpool, Manchester United, Manchester City, Sunderland, Cardiff City, Swansea City and many more.

Participants were able to take part in a number of different disability football activities in the morning session, such as amputee and blind football, passing and teamwork. To round off the day, the players were able to show off their football skills in a pan-disability football tournament.

Southampton FC were placed in a group with West Bromwich Albion FC, Sunderland FC and Manchester United. In our 1st game against West Brom, it was a tight affair and we drew the game 0-0. We then played Sunderland and won the game 3-0, with Anthony Watson scoring a Hat-Trick. In the final game, it was a winner-takes-all match against Manchester United. After a hard fought game, unfortunately we lost 2-0 and came runners-up in the group. All of the pupils thoroughly enjoyed the day and represented the school and Southampton FC brilliantly.

 We would like to thank Southampton FC’s Saintsability programme for inviting us to represent them in the Festival.

Marc Bernard, Deputy Headteacher