Deaf News: GB Deaf football team struggling for cash to compete at Deaflympics

The Independent has reported on the struggle of Britain’s Deaflympics football team to raise enough money to compete at the 2017 Deaflympics.

The team need to raise £20,000 in less than three months, with an overall target of £125,000 in order to compete at the games.

Their financial plight is in stark contrast to the Russian team, who are on a reported £40,000 bonus if they win gold.

Donate to support the team here: https://www.justgiving.com/fundraising/TeamGBDF

Extract below. Read the full story here.

Britain’s most underfunded Olympians are hoping that support from Premier League stars like Jack Butland and James Milner will get them to the Games.

The Stoke keeper and the Liverpool midfielder’s intervention was crucial in taking the men and women’s team to this summer’s Deaf World Cup in Italy, where they finished third.

However, if the teams, who receive no funding from UK Sport, are to make the Deaflympics in Turkey next summer, they need to raise £20,000 in less than three months.

The Deaflympics is the oldest disability sports competition in the world, predating the Paralympics by 36 years. The first was held in Paris in 1924 and the next Games will be held in Samsun on Turkey’s Black Sea coast next summer.

However, unless Claire Stancliffe, the captain of the women’s team, can repeat her fundraising heroics that took them to the World Cup, Team GB will be forced to withdraw.