City changed our lives - now we help others every day

COACHES EMBRACE COMMUNITY ETHOS OF CLUB CONNECTING WITH 'FAMILY'

- SIMON BAJKOWSKI

PAUL Kelly thought a life in football was over when a serious knee injury at 16 threatened his prospects with Manchester Boys.

His dad, 'in a typical Irish family, told him to get a 'proper job' and he started a bricklaying apprenticeship with Manchester City council while he still had a splint on his leg.

His career was destined to be on building sites in Beswick but instead he coaches football in Beswick instead.

Kelly thought he was rediscovering his love for the game when he was asked by a woman at the council to help out with a session at a youth club in Wythenshawe.

What he didn't know was that it would spark his passion for working with the disabled community that started off with three special schools in the area and now covers 87 including competition leagues at primary, secondary, and all-girls level.

"She said the club would close in six weeks if it didn't turn around so I got off my bum and started speaking to people at bus stops and Googling special schools and within six weeks we had over 40 kids there," Kelly told the Manchester Evening News.

"Someone at City heard about what I'd done and asked if I'd volunteer at City.

"We were having six to eight kids at a junior session on Denmark Road on a Monday and then it doubled and we outgrew the facility and had to move to Nicholls Campus in Openshaw.

Then sudden we got this amazing CFA and we were integrated into this amazing facility where previously there was no room at Platt Lane or Carrington for the community programmes.

"Now we were integrated and on the same pitches as the first teams.

"We went from the outhouse to the penthouse.