Grappenhall Sports Club under 11s have three defibrillators

One of the coaching team at Grappenhall Sports Club under 11s, Stephen Maltby, proposed getting defibrillators for the three teams in their age group.

He helps look after the ‘Bayern’ side in their age group.

Stephen, of Chester Road, used to work for a company that install defibrillators outside fire stations so he’s aware of their importance.

And following Christian Eriksen’s cardiac arrest at Euro 2020, that highlighted the need for more devices that gives a high energy electric shock to the heart of someone who is in cardiac arrest.

“It was at the forefront of everyone’s mind so I thought ‘let’s try and raise money through Just Giving’, and the response was unreal,” Stephen, who has lived in Warrington for 10 years, said.

“We hit the target within about four or five days which was slightly over £2,000. That was through parents, grandparents, family and friends.

“One lad who plays in the team, his grandparents gave £500.”

After a huge amount was raised so quickly, Stephen tried his luck by asking LEW Electrical Distributors, who he uses, if there was any chance he could get a defibrillator.

LEW Electrical Distributors provided a defibrillator

He continued: “They said ‘yeah course’ and bought us a defibrillator as well.”

“We had a little bit leftover so we’re spending that on new first aid kids.

“Our three teams won’t all be at the same spot every week so we took it upon ourselves to get each team in our age group a defibrillator.

“We didn’t want it to be one between our age group and you have to pick if the teams were in Warrington, Sandbach and Frodsham and we didn’t want to do that.

“I’m immensely proud of the fundraising and we are so grateful for the donation. They didn’t have to but they’ve given back into the community and it’s great.”

Stephen, from Liverpool, hopes that it can show other sides that people grouping together can work to great effect.

“This is just to raise awareness for other kids teams and groups to let them know that it might sound a bit daunting to raise this amount of money but our parents, wholesalers all got behind it and we raised all the money.”

The football club have since secured another defibrillator from the Football Foundation.