Liverpool Homeless Football Club win the Community Group Award at this year’s Echo Pride of Merseyside Awards.
The annual event, sponsored by SE Group, was held this year at the prestigious Hilton Hotel in Liverpool One. The awards evening was organised by the Liverpool Echo and brought together the great and the good from across the region.
Alaistair Machray, Editor of the Liverpool Echo, opened the evening by explaining that “Tonight is a wonderful opportunity to recognise the extraordinary achievements of people & organisations who, day after day, hour after hour, put others ahead of themselves.”
Machray handed over to local favourites Liz McClarnon (Atomic Kitten) & Andrew Lancel (Coronation STreet & The Bill) who took enormous pleasure in introducing 9 different awards. The categories included:
Education Award Friend Award
Merseyside Community Award
Arts Award
Fat Gary Sports Sporting Achievement Award
Community Group Award
Charity Organisation Award
Pride of Merseyside Award
Liz and Andrew were joined by a host of local celebrities in announcing the winners of each category. It had to be said that all the nominations were truly remarkable and listening to their achievements was a humbling experience for all. The judges really had their work cut out to select the winner in each category.
Perhaps unsurprisingly, the loudest cheer of the night came when LHFC were announced as the winners of the Community Group Award. Hollyoaks star Alex Fletcher revealed that the winners “consistently helped some of the most marginalised members of our society to turn their lives around”.
Chairman John Finnigan (pictured above right next to Vice Chair Mervyn Lynch) was over the moon. “This award is fantastic recognition for all the hard work that has been put in by everyone associated with LHFC. Thank you so much”.
As well as the volunteer staff of LHFC, three players were also present at the evening event; Steve Williamson, Aaron Flaherty (both pictured above) & James Buckley were there representing the hundreds of homeless people that have been helped by LHFC. Aaron revealed “Winning this award tonight means more to me that when I won my recent player of the season award”.
James Buckley claimed that “This award is perfect, and LHFC deserve it. They have done so much and it’s just the beginning.” Steve Barton (Club Secretary) and Mervyn Lynch were of a similar opinion discussing how this award can help to catapult us where we want to be.
Ben Carpenter who is now working as a project officer for LHFC summed it up when he said “Winning the award is the icing on the cake for what has been a great week for the club”.
Watch this space for more information.