East Auckland’s Fencibles United AFC has launched a new Adaptive Football initiative designed to give young players with different needs the chance to participate in the sport.
Chairman Aaron Carson says the football club is often viewed through how its men’s and women’s First Teams are performing in their respective competitions, but it offers much more than that to its local community.
“Whether it’s our ‘Fantails’ girls-only football, our girls-only leagues, or our afterschool programme, we try to cater for everyone.
“Fencibles has now started a new program called Adaptive Football, which is aimed at giving those with different needs the opportunity to be part of the club and train in an inclusive environment.”
The programme’s development has been led by Fencibles senior coach Kyle Park, who says the opportunity to be part of something new and watch it grow is “amazing”.
“I’m learning as much as the participants are. It’s great as we all have fun and find football-based activities that suit everyone’s needs.”
Carson says Fencibles are lucky to have been supported by the Halberg Foundation, Blind Sport NZ, Aktive, NRF, Eastern Suburbs AFC and Special Olympics NZ.
“We’ve been looking at different ways to grow the game and support our wide community needs. NRF spoke to us about extending Adaptive Football across Auckland.
“We then worked with Eastern Suburbs AFC, who’ve been delivering Adaptive Football for over 12 months, and they helped us with their experiences and learnings and then we put a program together.”
Adaptive Foodball at Fencibles is open to anyone.
East Auckland families who have a child who wishes to participate in the programme can email community@fencibles.org.nz or register through the Fencibles’ website at www.fencibles.org.nz.
Fantails, the club’s other recent new initiative, was launched by New Zealand Football after the Women’s World Cup.
Carson says clubs apply to be Fantails-approved and then deliver to a certain criteria.
Fencibles is the approved club in east Auckland.
“The target market is girls aged five to 12 who haven’t played before or who haven’t played for long and who wish to get the ball at their feet a bit more without a boy knocking them over.
“One of the criteria is the program needs to be delivered and coached by females only.
“This allows clubs like ours to utilise our female coaches and to also gives our women’s First Team players an opportunity to give back to these younger girls.”
Fantails coach Katie Hamilton says: “This is Fencibles’ second year running Fantails and it’s growing rapidly.
“The environment is safe where girls can be themselves, try new things and boost their confidence.”
