Megan Buckley from Wrexham AFC Foundation on how young people are benefiting from Premier League disability football programmes

Throughout the year, the Premier League Foundation and the clubs we support help to make football a game for all by breaking down barriers for those with disabilities.

Our programmes, Premier League Kicks, Premier League Inspires and Premier League Primary Stars, provide opportunities and experiences for young people to fulfill their potential.

Pan-disability sessions cater for footballers with a wide range of disabilities and as part of this provision, a series of summer disability football festivals are held across the country to give participants the opportunity to come together, compete and celebrate their achievements.

And to mark last week’s International Day of Persons with Disabilities, we hear from people taking part in one of these festivals run by Everton in the Community to find out how disability football is making an impact on them and those they work with.

Wrexham AFC Foundation

Standing pitchside at this summer’s Premier League Football Festival on Merseyside, project officer Megan Buckley proudly watched on as participants from Wrexham AFC Foundation‘s Premier League Kicks programme challenged themselves and showcased their abilities against other teams from the north west.

“It was probably the first competitive tournament they had ever been to,” she said. “They did so well.

“Confidence is so low for some of the players. I’ve got one lad who loves football but would never play for a team because he doesn’t think he’s good enough. But he’s one of our best players. He’s got the biggest heart and he won’t give up.

“He got a couple of goals and his face after scoring each one, you could see it turning in his head that, ‘I can do this, I can represent Wrexham.'”

Wrexham joined the likes of Bolton Wanderers, Leeds United, Huddersfield Town and Liverpool at the festival, where alongside playing in a pan-disability tournament, young people took part in a variety of activities, games and workshops.

As well as providing the participants with a day to remember, Megan believes that the festivals will have a long-lasting impact on the participants.

“Being able to play in the first-team kit, for some of them it’s the first time outside of Wrexham, to be able to play on a pitch like that with all these big club badges, our participants are really going to benefit from it,” Megan says.

“It will raise their aspirations. A lot of these kids are from one of the most deprived parts of Wrexham and being able to come here and realise they can leave Wrexham, come out of that environment, and be positive – it’s incredible.

“Events like this are amazing for disability football. For children with disabilities who don’t play for football teams, can’t thrive in grassroots or Academy environments, they can come here and enjoy it. It opens doors. Without these events, I guarantee some of these kids would get lost.”

Megan has been part of Wrexham for the last seven years, first as a player and now as a coach with the Wrexham FC Foundation, overseeing its Premier League Kicks and girls football programmes.

She has seen at first hand the meteoric rise of the Wrexham through its Hollywood owners Ryan Reynolds and Rob Mac, who have helped guide the club from non-league to the Championship in the space of five years.

This growth has had a knock-on effect on the Wrexham AFC Foundation with the club’s raised profile increasing opportunities for the Foundation to make a positive impact in their local community.

“What the club has done has helped out the Foundation massively,” Megan says. “It opens so many more doors for us to the Premier League, to the funding and to events like this.

“To be a part of this is amazing. For Wrexham, it’s a bit mind blowing to be invited to Everton, never mind by the Premier League. You’ve only got to look around and see the smiles on our kids’ faces.

“Watching the participants at the festival, my mind went back to the sessions we run every week. Some of them don’t have much but I know how much football means to them and they’re stood here in a Wrexham kit, a team they love.

“We’re Wrexham and we’ve come up from the National League so if we can play football against teams that are in the Premier League, it shows our young people that as long as they put their minds to it, they’re confident and they’re willing to do things, they can achieve what they want to.”

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