Date: 1st April 2016 at 3:04pm
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Liverpool’s Kolo Touré was joined by fellow Reds defender Alex Greenwood, from Liverpool Ladies, and Everton legend Graeme Sharp, who banged in over 100 goals for the Toffees in his day, at the opening of a new third generation (3G) artificial grass pitch (AGP) at Broadgreen International School in Liverpool.

‘‘The Football Foundation are improving the ways professional clubs like Liverpool can work with the local community through improving the facilities at grassroots level,” said Toure, who then joined in with an impromptu rendition of the famous Kolo-Yaya Toure song with some of the schools pupils!

The brilliant new pitch was made possible because the school received a huge £269,093 grant from the Premier League & The FA Facilities Fund, which is delivered by the Football Foundation. The Foundation builds 3G pitches like that one right across the country with money from the Premier League, The FA and the government (via Sport England).

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Kolo Toure sings the famous Kolo-Yaya Toure chant with local kids.

Over £1.3 billion has been pumped into grassroots football by the Foundation since 2000, meaning we can produce more players like Alex Greenwood, who was part of the Lionesses’ successful World Cup campaign in Canada last year.

Left-back Greenwood was delighted to see the pitch already being used by so many footballers: ‘‘The opening proves just how important these pitches are. It was full of youngsters from the school and the Liverpool FC Foundation College enjoying their football.’’ The former Notts County defender will be looking forward to making her debut for Liverpool Ladies in the Women’s Super League, when it starts again in April.

Bona fide Everton legend, Graeme Sharp, joined the Reds representatives at the opening. The Scot won the FA Cup with the Toffees back in 1984, scoring the first in a 2-0 win against Watford in the final! Students were wowed when Graeme joined in with some of their drills, showing them that you never lose it!

Speaking of the pitch, Graeme said: “There is increased opportunity to have more young people participating in football which is so important to the game.”

This again shows how vital the Football Foundation’s work is in getting more people playing football.

 
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