Media release: Football tournament raises thousands for homeless youngsters

The tournament held at the Goals centre in Wembley was organised by EAT in partnership with Centrepoint, the UK’s leading charity for homeless young people, to help raise vital funds for Centrepoint in the fight against youth homelessness.

The day saw eighteen 5-aside teams battle it out against each other, including two teams of young people receiving support from Centrepoint, in a nail biting series of matches. Teams ranged from EAT and Pret-a-Manger through to Ludlow Thompson and Anglo American and each donated £1,000 to Centrepoint to enter.

Seyi Obakin, acting Chief Executive at Centrepoint said:

“75,000 young people in the UK are at risk of homelessness. At Centrepoint we work to provide a safe place for these young people to call home, offering support to develop firm foundations for independent living and a brighter future. Events such as this make such a valuable difference to the work that we do at Centrepoint and the numbers of people that we can support. Our thanks go to EAT for their continued support.”

Ed Godwin, HR Director at EAT said:

“We wanted to arrange an event that our staff could be a part of, to see for themselves the brilliant work that Centrepoint does. It was wonderful to watch the teams working so well together, and getting stuck into the matches, enjoying themselves and raising quite a lot of money at the same time. I would like to think this is something that we can do each year and I look forward to working with Centrepoint in the future”.

One of the coaches, training the young people from Centrepoint, Artan, who has been receiving support from Centrepoint for nearly two years, said:

“It’s been a brilliant day. Our training went well but we narrowly missed out on the semi finals. At least we managed to beat the Centrepoint staff team! Well done to the winners, Ludlowthompson, they were quite a formidable team.”

ENDS

For more information about Centrepoint, or for pictures and interviews please contact Alex Bolton at Centrepoint on Tel: 020 7423 6887 or email a.bolton@centrepoint.org

Picture includes:

The two 5-aside teams of young people from Centrepoint with two staff members.

Notes to editors:

•  The two teams of young people from Centrepoint were sponsored by King Sturge and Core Recruitment.

About Centrepoint:

• Centrepoint is the national charity working to improve the lives of socially excluded homeless young people aged 16-25.
• It provides a range of accommodation based services, including emergency night shelters and short stay hostels, specialist projects for care leavers, ex-offenders, young single parents, foyers and supported flats and floating support services. These accommodation services provide the foundations from which young people can start tackling the issues that lead to them becoming homeless, and developing the skills they need for a sustainable future 
• Centrepoint is a leading national charity that successfully prevents and tackles youth homelessness
• HRH Prince William became Centrepoint’s patron in 2005
• Since 1969 Centrepoint has helped more than 70,000 young people
• At any one time Centrepoint works with over 800 young people.
• For further information about the work of Centrepoint, see www.centrepoint.org.uk

About EAT:

• Eat was founded 11 years ago with the ambition of providing the best food, soup and coffee in London….. at reasonable prices.
• Today with almost 100 shops we continue to strive for the highest possible quality of food, service and standards – exactly what we did at the beginning.
• The secret of our success is our kitchen.  We don’t buy a single mass-produced sandwich, soup or salad from any factory.  We make them all ourselves by hand in our own kitchen, with one day shelf life for maximum freshness and quality.
• EAT have been supporting Centrepoint since 2006.