The annual ESS sponsored RAF Festival of Football saw some 500 footballers descend upon the Derby Soccerdome at Pride Park, Derby, on 2 February 2011. The tournament brought together 35 male teams, representing 33 units, and 6 female teams from across the Service and is recognised as one of the largest sporting events in the RAF. The event organiser, Mr John Duff who is the RAF Football Association’s Football Development Officer, was once again delighted by the level of support and participation from Stations. In its 5th year, John was keen to point out that the Festival of Football was still meeting its primary aim of enabling the RAF footballing community to get together and enjoy the benefits of mass participation sport.
The social and morale boosting value of the event was echoed by many of the players and support staff. Such benefits had made a real difference to airmen such as SACs Ashley Whitt and Steffen Williams from 1 Sqn RAF Regiment at RAF Honnington, who had recently returned from a 6 month tour in Camp Bastion. Both Gunners expressed how much they had enjoyed the day and thought that it was a great tournament.
One of the key factors that made the day so special was a visit by the entire Derby County Team, including manager Nigel Clough and star player Robby Savage. As a show of their support to members of the Armed Forces, the players spent around half an hour meeting RAF Servicemen, many of whom were keen to join in the banter and merriment of the day. Such a gesture was highly appreciated by all, with people such as Cpl Ben McEvoy and SAC Jon Perkins from RAF Henlow stating how impressed they were with the length of time the players spent talking to the teams, giving the firm impression that they wanted to be there and were generally interested in what the servicemen had to say. Cpl McVinnie from 111 Sqn at RAF Leuchars also commented on the banter between the Derby players and the RAF personnel, saying that Robbie Savage had been happy to engage in jokes with the lads. Several of the teams even tried to recruit the players as ‘ringers’ to give them a helping hand, but were kindly turned down.
This years Festival of Football was also the first time that the tournament had been used as an opportunity to exercise the RAF FA’s new partnership with the RAF Benevolent Fund (RAFBF); the RAF’s leading welfare charity. Paul Hewson, a Regional Director for the RAFBF said: ‘the RAF Benevolent Fund is delighted to be the RAF FA’s chosen charity in 2011. Events like the ‘Festival of Football’ show off the enormous enthusiasm there is within the Service for the sport, and explains why the RAFBF is working so closely with RAF Football this year. Football plays a central role in maintaining morale among RAF personnel, a task which is one of our key charitable objectives.’
To enable the Festival of Football to be so well attended, particularly in today’s ever increasing climate of austerity, the financial support of ESS as the events main sponsor is a critical factor. The Director of Defence Operations at ESS, Mr Ray Innes, stated that he was ‘delighted to see the tournament as popular as ever’ and stressed that ‘without doubt the Festival of Football is one of the most successful sporting events that ESS support’.
Another group of individuals who were crucial to the events success were the legion of referees that officiated the numerous fixtures. As relatively junior referees, SACs Ian Hurst and Richard King from RAF Conningsby talked of the challenging dynamic of refereeing 5-a-side football, where the key is to ‘balance the need of letting the game have sufficient flow, whilst trying to temper the passion and spirit of the players to stop the game getting out of hand’. They went on to comment on how the matches also allow referees to see challenges in more detail, which is a great opportunity to develop their skills for 11 a-side games in the future.
Having now become a permanent fixture in the RAF Footballing diary, it is encouraging to see that the reputation of the tournament is spreading, with new teams such as MoD Corsham being entered. Many of the teams also included players from other services, such as Cpl Richard Ross of the Royal Signals representing Northwood, who stated that he was ‘highly impressed with the level of organisation that had obviously made the tournament such a success’. Some of the joint teams did get some banter however, with the medical personnel of RCDM Birmingham attracting some friendly jokes at their calls for a medic for an injured colleague.
Sgt Tanya Blackman, an Air Loadmaster on C130Js at RAF Lyneham, was one of over 50 women footballers who participated in the tournament. Tanya, who is also a member of the Women’s Development Squad, highlighted that the event was an excellent opportunity for the community of female footballers within the RAF to get together. Moreover, she thought the event was a superb vehicle for allowing new players to get involved in Women’s football within the Service and for new talent to be spotted. Regarding ‘the Derby County experience’, apparently one of the favourites of the girls had been the ever polite Nigel Clough, who was more than willing to pose for photographs with the ladies.
In the Men’s tournament, the 35 teams were split into 6 groups who competed fiercely to get through to the knock-out stages. The top 2 teams of each group then went through to the Cup competition, with those finishing 3rd and 4th competing for the Plate. After a highly entertaining series of games in the knock-out stages of both competitions, the Plate Final was won by RAF Wittering, who overcame Corsham 1-0, through an excellent goal scored by SAC Gaz Williams. The match was a hard fought affair with Corsham having numerous shots on goal, but Wittering’s clinical finishing proved to be the deciding factor. The Cup Final was much more one sided, with Brize Norton dominating most of the game with slick passing and quick movement, enabling them to put 3 goals past a brave Brampton/Wyton team who were unable to get a goal in reply. The Brize Norton Manager, FS Andy Gibson, was delighted with the win and highlighted the achievements of SAC Ryan Kiteley who scored the last goal of the final, in his final game of football in the Service.
Due to the few numbers, the Women’s tournament was based around a league format with the top 2 teams playing off for the cup. In the play-off a strong RAF Brize Norton team overcame the girls from RAF Marham 3-0 in a highly entertaining match. The Plate trophy was awarded to Odiham who finished in 3rd place, with a joint Brampton/Wyton team taking the plate runners up prize for their forth place finish.
Building on the success of previous years, the 2011 Festival of Football epitomised the ethos of sport and participation within the RAF. The hundreds of players at the tournament clearly had a highly enjoyable time, which was made that little bit more special with the help of Derby County. With RAF Brize Norton travelling back with a bus full of trophies, no doubt there will be more teams than ever applying to take them on in next year’s tournament, details of which will be available from the RAF FA HQ in autumn 2011.