Middlesbrough's U12 academy players have been busy planning and delivering all aspects of activities relating to the #NoBarriers #Tull100 project...
Launched in March and continuing through to November, the Tull100 project is using the story of Walter Tull to inspire a series of inclusion projects at football Clubs and community organisations around the country.
Walter Tull was one of the first black heritage professional footballers and in 1917 he became the first black heritage Infantry Officer in the British Army.
The U12's recognised that an area of the community that was underrepresented in top-class football, in supporters at Middlesbrough FC games and amongst academy players was the Asian community. With about 7% of the community population in the Teesside area Asian Muslim, there are no boys of that heritage as part of the Boro academy.
The players therefore used the Walter Tull story and the #NoBarriers concept, visiting a local Mosque alongside first-team striker Rudy Gestede, who regularly uses the facility, whilst also providing presentations and matchday activity to widen the understanding of the project.
Barry Dawson, Head of Education and Welfare at Middlesbrough, said: "The U12’s embraced the Tull 100 - Football remembers - project with a real keen interest and a passion to make a positive change in the Teesside area using Football and Walter Tull as a catalyst for that change.
"The academy U12 group reflected on the life of Tull and how he broke down barriers of ignorance and maintained the qualities of a gentleman, being a leader of men and representing his country on the battlefield with distinction,"
He added: "Football has a responsibility to remember and share with the young players of today the sacrifices made to protect the allied nations and their liberty, as sharing stories of remembrance and of those that we have lost is how we keep from really losing them."