Aston Villa Legacy project gets under way

This week saw the start of the Aston Villa Football Foundation and Volleyball England Foundation partnership.

This project is a legacy project for Birmingham 2022 and is funded through the Sport England Inclusive and Diversity (I&D) funding developed through Volleyball England.

The project will see the Level 2 UKCC qualified coaches at the Aston Villa Foundation delivering Volleyball in local youth clubs and schools in this areas of high social deprivation.

The project will provide training and equipment to enable the coaches to provide a quality experience to 100’s of young people in their community.

On Tuesday last week, Nick Shaffery, the Volleyball England Lead for Children and Young People and the author of the new Volley2s programme delivered the first session to a group of 15 Aston Villa coaches.

Nick commented “It was a really great morning working with the Community Coaches at Aston Villa.
The Coaches currently work with children and young people aged 8 to 18 in schools and the community and wanted to learn the basics of the game and take away ideas they could use with their groups.”

Nick was impressed with their enthusiasm and skills, “They took part in games and development activities from the Volley2s resources, the primary resource, I took the group through progressions from Volley2s Red, catch and throw volleyball to the gold stage involving the full range of skills and understanding needed in 2v2 volleyball.”

Nick challenged the coaches to think of how to use and adapt the games and practices for the community groups they work with. We look forward to seeing the outcome of this project and whether we can replicate it with other Football Foundations.

Pete Ezard the Partnerships Manager at Aston Villa Foundation passed on his thanks to Nick and the Foundation. “The feedback from the staff has been very positive. I look forward to seeing the games and practices being used across our Schools and Community programmes. A huge thanks to Nick for his insight and expertise.”

Thank you to everyone at Aston Villa for their support and for supporting the introduce of volleyball to the children and young people of Birmingham as part of our Volleyball Legacy for Birmingham 2022 Commonwealth Games and thank you to Nick for his input, the session was enjoyed by all who took part. Looking forward to seeing the results.