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FOWLER RAISES £10,000 FOR LOCAL KIDS HOSPITAL
Not content with putting a smile back on the faces of Liverpool supporters since returning to Anfield in January, Robbie Fowler made sure there were a lot of happy faces at Alder Hey after helping raise £10,000 for the children's hospital.
Within hours of the striker being unveiled at Anfield following his shock transfer from Manchester City, Fowler suggested that the shirt he wore to greet the press and pose for photographs alongside Rafael Benitez on the Anfield pitch should be auctioned off to raise money for the Imagine Appeal - a fundraising initiative to help Liverpool's Alder Hey hospital to continue their pioneering work in caring for the health of over 200,000 children and young people every year.
A father of three girls with another baby on the way, the appeal struck a chord with the player who is back training at Melwood, less than a mile away from the world famous children's hospital.
However, neither Fowler nor Christine Done, Imagine's Senior Fundraising Manager, were quite prepared for just how much the shirt would raise when a 'sealed-bid' auction was launched on liverpoolfc.tv.
"I think we thought it might possibly raise a thousand pounds - and if it had of done, we would have been delighted because a thousand pounds is a lot of money - but when I got a call from Liverpool saying the website had received a bid for £10,000, we were all absolutely ecstatic," reveals Christine.
"It's amazing to get such a large donation of money to the Imagine Appeal without us having to do much work for it as all the work has come from Liverpool Football Club and the liverpoolfc.tv website."
The person responsible for the astonishing £10,000 bid was Shakeel Ahmad, a lifelong LFC supporter and regular visitor to liverpoolfc.tv.
"I saw that there was to be an auction on the website for Robbie's shirt and I was happy with where the money would be going to," Shakeel, a 34-year-old father of two young girls himself, told liverpoolfc.tv. "I wanted to make a good bid so I could win it but ultimately I knew the money was going to be spent on children and that was the reason why I made such a large bid. I might have been able to win the auction with a smaller bid but while I might have got the shirt, the kids would have lost out on some money being spent on them.
"Obviously, the fact that it was Fowler's shirt was massively important. Robbie Fowler is an absolute legend in my eyes. He was my favourite player when he was first at the club and to have him back at Liverpool again is just amazing. It's a piece of memorabilia that I will always treasure because the day he returned to Liverpool from Manchester City was one of the happiest days I can remember since I started supporting the club. When I heard the news that he was coming back, I couldn't stop grinning. It's definitely the best transfer the club have made in my time supporting Liverpool – as a footballer he's still got a lot to offer but with me, it's more personal that that. Robbie Fowler is Liverpool. His spirit embodies Liverpool Football Club and you can see in his eyes just how much he loves playing for the club."
While Shakeel was delighted to win the auction for the shirt off the back of his hero, Christine Done was simply delighted with the amount of money raised for such a worthwhile appeal.
"What Shakeel has done in donating £10,000 is an unbelievable gesture and the money will make a massive difference to this hospital," she revealed. "The NHS only has a finite amount of money so we can't just buy the latest equipment, toys for the children, conduct research or make the quality of life more bearable for the children while they are hear unless we raise the money ourselves with campaigns like the Imagine Appeal.
"What the NHS is able to provide is adequate but what we're doing here is trying to create the most fantastic children's hospital in the UK and make sure that when children come here, they have as comfortable a stay as possible."
To mark the handing over the shirt, Fowler travelled with Shakeel to Alder Hey to meet some of the children that the money will go a long way towards helping. Although the hospital had only arranged for Robbie to meet and pose for photographs with 12-year-old Daniel Golding and 14-year-old Mark Peers (both pictured, below), two big Liverpool fans currently staying in one of the wards, Robbie personally made every effort to sign photos, pose for pictures and speak to every child in the ward. While the biggest smiles of the day were to be seen on the faces of the children who got to meet one of their heroes, Fowler's actions didn't go unnoticed by the staff at Alder Hey.
"Robbie was here as a squad member of Liverpool on past Christmas visits but back then he was still a relatively young lad," remembers Christine. "Now he's a dad of three with another child on the way and I think he understands just how important a hospital like Alder Hey is for the children of Liverpool and beyond.
"You can see the difference it made to the children when Robbie walked in. It's such a long day in hospital as there's only so much TV you can watch when you're stuck in bed all day. So, for someone like Robbie to turn up today and give up an hour of his time to spend with the children means so much to both the kids and their parents. It breaks up the monotony of the day. You have to remember that it's not just the hour that Robbie spent here, we had a whole morning of excitement looking forward to the visit and then a whole afternoon when everyone talks about the experience of seeing Robbie."
Before he left the hospital, one final request was made: could Robbie go and visit a four-year-old boy on another ward who is suffering from meningitis? Ryan Kinsella (pictured above) was too sick to be in a ward with other children so he was in bed in his own room with his parents keeping him company. All morning he had wanted to see Robbie but when Robbie happily agreed to go and see him, the youngster had fallen asleep. After speaking to Ryan's parents, Robbie held the boy's hand and posed for a photograph so there would be proof he'd turned up. It was a moving moment.
"I think Robbie was very brave to do what he did today," admits Christine, "particularly when he went to see little Ryan because that's a really difficult thing to do. Ryan is a very sick little boy. To say, 'Yeah, I'll go and see him', when he's a dad himself and to see a child of a similar age to one of his own in that condition is very hard. I have nothing but respect and admiration for him for doing that.
"I can see the difference in Robbie from when he last came here on a Christmas visit with the Liverpool players in 2001. Some players will always be better than others in how they deal with things like hospital visits but you find as players get a little bit older, they get a little bit more confident in their ability to talk to the children. I certainly couldn't fault his attitude today." |
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