This is Shaun O'Neill. Shaun's a secondary school teacher living in manchester, originally from a village called Clady, near Portglenone, Co. Antrim. He recently started playing football with me at Chorlton Irish FC, signing up as a full back before being swiftly converted into a goalkeeper when our regular 'keeper got injured. See what happens when you tell a group of English lads you play GAA, Shaun?
Despite not knowing Shaun for a long time before setting off on the aforementioned tour, he was a great help in the organisation of it &, as he has previous experience in fundraising for various causes & was already a big supporter of the Oscar Knox Appeal, we lost an entire Sunday in the clubhouse,after a game, planning a fundraising event in Manchester (amidst a flurry of Guinness, it should be said) to take place after our return. We hope to finalise the details of this event before the end of the week, so we can get moving forward with promoting it, & I will, of course, announce it via this blog. The object of Oscar's Flag is to use football, a shared passion for so many people throughout England, to spread the story of Oscar Knox around the country & help raise the money to give him a fighting chance, as well as helping other children all over the UK having to deal with neuroblastoma. Therefore, any fundraising events will be heavily football based.
As you will know, the flag continued going to various grounds upon our return, & we had set little targets along the way, such as getting to 50 games before the end of the season, or being televised at every Premier League ground before then also, but games fell by the wayside thanks to overzealous stewards, underzealous PR men, one member being whisked away on a surprise romantic holiday (& subsequently missing the game) & the flag going AWOL in the British postal system (I believe the flag may have been in Marrakech when it was due to go to Man Utd v Liverpool!) All of this led to missed opportunities, which saw us lose all momentum & getting to every Prem ground seemed doomed. Until Shaun stepped in, having put together a plan to CYCLE to every ground in the Premier League in a 14 day period. Shaun will spend his Easter holidays cycling all over England to raise as much money for Oscar Knox as possible. To put it into perspective, he will be cycling somewhere between 1400 - 1600 miles in his bid to visit every Premier League stadium.
Starting off in Newcastle, the scene of the flag's first TV appearance, on Saturday 30th March, he will cycle to each and every one of the twenty Premier League Football stadiums before finally finishing up at Norwich. The aim is to get the 'Team Oscar' Flag signed at each Stadium by a famous face affiliated with each club, and the flag will be auctioned at the fundraiser, once the season has ended
A car will be following Shaun around the Country with various members of Team Oscar in it at different stages to keep him motivated and to document the whole story. They will also be promoting the event and raising as much noise as they can for the Oscar Knox story.
The itinerary, as it stands, is as follows:
1 - St James Park, Newcastle
2 - Stadium of Light, Sunderland
3 - Eithad Stadium, Manchester
4 - Old Trafford, Manchester
5 - DW Stadium, Wigan
6 - Anfield, Liverpool
7 - Goodison Park, Liverpool
8 - Britannia Stadium, Stoke
9 - Hawthorns Stadium, West Bromwich
10 - Villa Park, Birmingham
11 - Liberty Stadium, Swansea
12 - St Mary's Stadium, Southampton
13 - Madejski Stadium, Reading
14 - Upton Park, London
15 - Emirates Stadium, London
16 - Loftus Road, London
17 - Craven Cottage, London
18 - White Hart Lane, London
19 - Stamford Bridge, London
20 - Carrow Road, Norwich
The flag will continue in the meantime to be flown at football grounds, so keep looking out for it. We have arranged for it to go to some very big games, so eyes peeled when watching the football &/or Match Of The Day.
We will be updating this blog with more stories from the flag's travels to Europe's top stadia & Shaun will hopefully keep us informed of how he's shaping up for it all. Although our main aim is still to raise awareness for the Oscar Knox Appeal, fundraising is now also a massive part of what we're doing. Our JustGiving link for the 7ma7ches7coun7ries7days tour is still live (https://www.justgiving.com/7ma7ches7coun7ries7days/) so please donate, if you haven't already done so. We are organising a series of smaller fundraising events all over the country to help us reach our target, so please don't think we're resting on our laurels having achieved the 7 countries target.
Meanwhile, you can donate to Shaun's Cycle's JustGiving page here
We intend to try & attract corporate & local business sponsorship throughout this process now also, so if you would like for your company to get involved in helping young children with neuroblastoma, please get in contact with us. In the meantime, you can follow Shaun's progress on Twitter here
https://twitter.com/oscarsflag or https://twitter.com/oneill_shaun (
& while you're on there, give the wee man himself a follow
https://twitter.com/Wee_Oscar
You can read more about Oscar's story on his blog here
http://oscarknox.blogspot.co.uk/
We would also like to point out that, as before, all aspects of this are entirely self funded, so 100 per cent of your donations will go directly to the Oscar Knox Appeal & the Neuroblastoma Alliance
Thanks for reading
Up the Big Shorts
Baz
Hi,
ReplyDeleteI have a quick question about your blog, would you mind emailing me when you get a chance?
Thanks,
Cameron
cameronvsj(at)gmail.com