Football tournament for young people brings community together through sport

A grassroots football tournament for young people from across the county has been hailed as “a great success”.

Nottinghamshire Police’s Community Kicks tournament took place at Gresham Sports Park in West Bridgford on June 9.

The annual event is a community-focused initiative that uses football as a universal language to foster positive relationships between police officers and young people.

Around 300 players competed against each other to win trophies, medals, and be crowned champions of their age category.

Teams of boys, girls, and mixed genders aged between nine and 14 took part in a series of seven-a-side group matches before entering a knock-out stage to decide the winners.

This year’s winners were:

• 10-12 Younger Boys – DLFC Gold
• 10-12 Boys – Bestwood Colliery U12s
• 13-14 Boys – Clifton All Whites
• 10-12 Girls – Pacific

Families turned out in their hundreds to support the tournament’s players, with an estimated 1,000 total visitors from toddlers to grandparents pitching up with picnics, chairs and gazebos to create a friendly atmosphere and cheer on their loved ones.

During the tournament, teams also took part in a virtual reality experience and educational workshop led by Virtual Decisions to raise awareness of knife crime and the consequences of carrying weapons.

The day also involved engagement activities from departments across the force including the roads policing unit, hate crime team and careers service.

NET Trams, the RSPCA, the Violence Reduction Partnership and footballers from Notts County Women’s team also took part in the afternoon’s community-driven activities.

Nottingham-based business the Skinny Food Co provided free goody bags to all players as well as offering free products at their stall to members of the public.

The event was organised as part of the force’s Prevention Hub, which is a collaboration between multiple force departments responsible for developing and delivering strategies to prevent crime and disorder throughout the city and county. 

Inspector Paul Peatfield, Nottinghamshire Police’s Prevention Hub lead for engagement, said: “Engaging with young people from across Nottinghamshire is really important to us for building trust and confidence and nurturing these relationships.

“This event was all about bringing our communities together through a passion for sport and providing young people a platform to excel and engage with police officers.

“I would like to say a massive thank you to all the teams and their coaches that made the tournament such a fun day and a great success.

“As part of the force’s Prevention Hub, we run a variety of programmes and initiatives to help enrich the lives of young people from our schools and early intervention officers to our cadet scheme.

“I would also like to extend my thanks to our partners and sponsors – Kbeverage, Lidl, Mitie, the Co-op, the Violence Reduction Partnership, and Skinny Food Co – for supporting Nottinghamshire Police to enable this event.

“We are looking forward to running Community Kicks again and seeing you all in 2025.”