Blind Football comes to Ireland
Release Date: Jun 25th, 2010
It’s usually referees that are accused of being blind, this Saturday in UCD it will be the players – for real.
The National Council for the Blind of Ireland, in association with Paddy Power and the FAI have teamed up to host the first Blind Football Tournament in Ireland.
Blind football may be unfamiliar to some but it is played in thirty countries and is growing in popularity at an incredible rate. The main difference between blind football and regular football is that the football contains metal bearing so that it makes noise when it moves. The players follow the ball using their ears rather than their eyes.
The goalkeepers can be fully sighted but all outfield players will be completely in the dark – all players must wear blindfolds so that partially sighted players don’t have an advantage.
Paddy Power’s involvement in the tournament stems from their latest TV advert which shows a blind football match where a cat with a bell on it’s collar runs onto the pitch and is unfortunately mistaken for the ball.
View here: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DEmA_QF30GI
The star of that particular advert, cat kicker and England blind football captain, Ajmal “AJ” Ahmed will be in attendance in UCD’s Sports Centre this Saturday as 16 teams of five players go head to head in a series of 16-minute matches starting at 12pm with a Blind Football skills demo.
Paddy Power said, “The level of skill shown by these blind players is jaw dropping, everyone should go down to have a look – excuse the pun but it’s a real eye opener! I for one didn’t even know blind football existed until we made our latest TV ad but we’re delighted to support this event and hope that it’s a great success for the NCBI – a truly great cause”.
Robert Astick, Head of Fundraising with NCBI, said, “Blind football has given Aj real opportunities in a fast moving and highly competitive sport and the chance to represent his country in international competitions including the Paralympics in Beijing, we hope to find many new players in Ireland to get involved in this fantastic sport”