Stratford-based fundraising team Nightingale FC have high hopes for 2022
SINCE setting up base at the Arden Garages Stadium last spring, Nightingale FC have gone from strength-to-strength.
And as they prepare for their first fund-raising fixture of 2022 at home to Crewe-based Calm 84 on Sunday (2pm kick-off), the team – named after the Covid-19 overspill hospitals in Birmingham and London – is hoping to repeat or even better the success of 2021.
Having settled in nicely at Knights Lane, the club raised an impressive £10,500 for NHS Charities Together and the Royal Orthopaedic Hospital Charitable Fund in their first season.
Adding in the contributions from the charity teams they played at the Arden Garages Stadium, the figure comes to around £15,600. Furthermore, money pledged from the running of the National Affinity Cup – the first FA sanctioned charity competition for charity supporting teams – brings the overall total to over £20,000.
Team manager Nick Sanders told the Herald that Nightingale will be putting all their efforts this year into raising money for the Royal Orthopaedic Hospitable Charitable Fund and he has high hopes a five-figure sum can be achieved once again.
“We’ve got direct links with the Royal Orthopaedic Hospital in Birmingham, so for 2022 we decided that we wanted to do as much as we possibly could to help them,” he said.
“We’re currently in the process of arranging a game against them so we can raise even more awareness of what they do.
“We’re really looking forward to Sunday because Calm 84 were one of the charity teams we had close links with when we first set up Nightingale.”
Sanders added: “It’s amazing to look back at what we did in our first year. Everyone gets great joy out of playing football, but because I’m not on the pitch, it’s amazing to see the money coming in for the charities we support. It’s overwhelming seeing that support and I don’t think a lot of people realise how much effort goes into this, it’s like a second job.
“It was a whirlwind first 12 months for us, but now we’re relaxed and looking to take things to the next level and if we raise another five-figure sum this year that would be amazing. I’d like to put a call out to the Stratford community to come down to our games. We had some great attendances last year, but we’d like to do even better this time around.”
While Nightingale’s schedule is far from finalised, the club is working hard on arranging a ‘Game of Life’ fixture against Angels United in the summer.
The idea behind the game – which is mooted to take place in August – is to bring people together to celebrate the lives of loved ones who have passed away.
Sanders said the plan is to have as many names as possible read out during the 90 minutes accompanied with a short background of each individual.
“We just want to bring as many people as possible together to celebrate the lives of those closest to us who have passed away,” added Sanders.
