Palace for Life host first ever SEND football festival at Palace Academy

This week, Palace for Life coaches held their first ever SEND (special education needs and disabilities) football tournament at the state-of-the-art Crystal Palace F.C. Academy for secondary school pupils across Bromley and Croydon.

The tournament was born out of a desire from local schools for more competitive sporting opportunities for those living with special education and disability needs. 3 schools took part in the inaugural event and each brought 2 teams, giving them the unique opportunity to play competitively on the sophisticated training facilities at the Academy.

Ben Perryman, Palace for Life Disability Inclusion Officer said:

“We’re looking to do these tournaments more often, get pupils out of school playing football. It’s a great facility here, normally they wouldn’t be playing on such a lovely pitch!

It’s the social side of it, you’re meeting people from different schools around the area, making friends and playing competitive football.”

Callum, a year 10 student from the Links secondary school in Croydon said:

“We won our first game which was good. I would definitely come back again. It’s a nice facility and we get to play against other schools, which we don’t usually get to do, and helps me and my team mates get better. It’s nice to also get out of school for the day!”

Palace for Life offer a range of disability sport sessions across south London, including our schools programme, which sees our experienced and specialist trained disability coaches deliver a mixture of curriculum lessons and after school clubs. The Foundation also offers vision impaired and blind football sessions, as well as powerchair and down syndrome football.

For more information on Palace for Life’s disability sport programmes, head here.