Tournament blog

Hope and Glory

So as England crash out of the World Cup and the country’s hopes are dashed once again, it is now only 6 weeks until the three lions have another chance of World Cup glory in the next World Cup.

Well it’s the World Championships really but even so wouldn’t it be a great if the blind squad could go onto glory on their home soil.
I have gone missing in action from the blog for more than a few weeks due to other work pressure but as the real countdown has now began in earnest I am going to try and write a few words as an update on a more regular basis.

Plans are well under way for the tournament and we are now into the real detail of sorting out transport for the countries arrival, finalising accommodation and catering plans and also looking at what we can offer the athletes and delegates in their spare time.

The interest from abroad has been quite interesting. Brazil sent a delegation from their National Paralympic Committee over to Hereford to look at the facilities in advance of their arrival. As they are the host of the 2016 Olympic and Paralympic Games then they are taking a massive interest in how countries are organising major events. One of the most fascinating aspects of their visit was to glean that their players will be together for over 40 days in a training camp and they are all full time paid players! Well having the players together for such a long time didn’t do Fabio any good, so perhaps the blind team manager Tony Larkin’s jealousy is misplaced.

Also we have a large media contingent from Japan coming across to the event. They are looking to do live web streaming for the Japan games to people back home.

We are beginning to generate both some noise and some interest in the event locally and tickets sales are now picking up at a brisk rate. I really do hope that local people come along to watch the games as it’s a great opportunity to see such an important event that may not happen again for a very long time in Hereford.

So disappointment aside don’t put away the St George’s flags just yet. The event is getting closer by the day and the focus is now all on August 14th at 3 pm as England get us underway against their Iberian colleagues in what will hopefully be a fantastic start to a fantastic event.

Posted by Jon Dutton on 30-06-2010

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