The Foróige Ballyshannon/ Bundoran NYP hosted a Football Tournament on Thursday the 16th of May. Local guards, members of the army, teachers, surfers, volunteers and young people from the Neighbourhood Youth Project participated in a 5 aside soccer tournament to support young people in the area.
The Tournament was held on the astro turf pitch, lakeside Ballyshannon. Local agencies and organisations came out in force to support young people in the NYP and make a positive difference in their community. Caroline Cooke, a Foróige Project Worker talks about the tournament:
“The NYP Tournament was organised as a Foróige citizenship project for a group of young people attending the NYP. The group wanted to organise something positive in their community and they also wanted to build positive relationships and links with local agencies and organisations. The tournament was a huge success with all the agencies taking part in a 5 aside football tournament and battled it out on the pitch to be crowned the NYP Champions of 2013. Despite the rain, the local teams turned out in force to support the young people who worked extremely hard to make this event a positive experience for all involved. The support was fantastic and everybody seemed to enjoy the evening.”
Turf n' Surf , Bundoran were the overall champions after securing a place in the final and the runners up were the NYP young people. Stephen Carty, a co-organiser of the event presented the Cup which was sponsored by All Sports of Donegal Town to Connor O'Malley, Captain of the Turf n' Surf Team. Stephen praised all the teams for making the effort to come out in such great numbers to support the young people and also expressed how proud everybody was of the NYP young people for organising such a great event. Stephen said “It was amazing here this evening to see what the young people pulled off with such a great event and we just want to let you know how proud we all are of you and how proud you should be of yourselves. It shows that young people can do so much in their communities and it’s upwards and onwards for these young lads.”
Jimmy Keogh, Principal of Colaiste Colmcille in Ballyshannon said, “I would just like to say thanks to everybody who got involved and to the young people who should be very proud of themselves this evening. I would also like to say what a privilege it is to be involved in the Foróige NYP programmes and a huge thank you to all the agencies here this evening. It is very evident the work you do to help and support the young people in Foróige, with this support and community agencies and community members working together - and the positivity is in the outcomes here tonight.”
