Football mad children of Lewes were counting down the days until they got to play in Patina’s Dream Team tournament which took place at Lewes FC’s Dripping Pan on Thursday 4 May in aid of their Moving On parade on 7 July. We were so lucky to have a beautifully sunny day for the tournament.
This is the eighth year of this popular fundraiser and this year it was back at the hallowed grounds of Lewes FC. The tournament was so popular this year that it sold out in 24 hours!
Teams were invited to come up with names inspired by this year’s Moving On theme of ‘All the World’s A Stage.’ Inspiration was drawn from plays, musicals, pantos and performances. We had some brilliant team names including, To Be Or Not To Be United, Three Lions-King FC and As You Strike It. The Dream Team tournament is run as an inter-school competition so teams are often made up of friendship groups from across Lewes. Below are some of our brilliant teams.
The children of the Lewes Percussion/Samba group popped down to the Dripping Pan and created some amazing music for our footballers and spectators. Many thanks to the musicians and Grant Allardyce from Create Music for coming along.
The fundraiser stands proudly alongside Lewes FC’s women’s team and their Equality FC campaign. The teams who competed on 4th May were made up of an equal number of girls and boys. When the Dream Team tournament started back in 2015 people were sceptical that the schools would be able to persuade any girls to play but boy were they proved wrong!
140 Lewes children took part in the tournament. The games were refereed and the scores were kept by 12, Year 9 and Year 10 students from Priory School who did such a professional job. We had four pitches on the Dripping Pan where each group played each other.
The nail-biting final was between The Chips FC and The Rapids FC. It ended in a penalty shoot-out and the winning team, The Rapids FC were presented with the Patina Dream Team trophy and individual medals by Shirley-Anne Sains, the Mayor of Lewes to rounds of cheers and whoops.
We are grateful to all the volunteers who came to help make the tournament including the Patina Cantina such a success and in particular, Sauro Scarpelli for organising the groups and for overseeing the matches, Priory PE teacher Tim Warren for organising the Priory School sports leaders to be our referees, time keepers and scorekeepers and Andie Capie for being our wonderful MC. We are also indebted to Lewes FC for lending us the Dripping Pan for the afternoon, what a venue!
“What a brilliant, fun tournament. All the kids had a brilliant time, and was so well organised. We made it through to the semi-finals, and thoroughly enjoyed the whole thing. We even got a rainbow over the Dripping Pan at one point!”
Congratulations to The Rapids FC on winning the Dream Team tournament and well done to all the teams who played. What an amazing afternoon! Next step, Moving On!