Accrington Stanley to celebrate Ramadan with special Iftar event

Accrington Stanley will host a special Open Iftar Event at the Wham Stadium in March.

The club has received a Community Cohesion and Resilience Funding Grant from Hyndburn Borough Council to host the event following a successful fundraising bid, which will now allow Stanley to continue delivering initiatives to positively impact the local community.

Members of the public are invited to break their Ramadan fast together at the Wham Stadium, sharing food and enjoying the experience, while the call to prayer will be delivered pitch side and prayers will take place indoors in a special prayer room.

The Iftar event will follow another exciting initiative being run by Accrington Stanley over the coming weeks and months, which has also received the green light on funding from Hyndburn Borough Council.

Stanley will connect with Year 8 students in every secondary school in Hyndburn, many of whom will have received football shirts through Stanley’s big shirt giveaway when they were at primary school, as they look to share the power and experience of football to prevent and counter harmful narratives.

The project will come in the form of tailored workshops delivered by the club over a six-week period, where sensitive topics will be discussed with the aim of raising awareness of extremist narratives, as well as promoting healthy narratives.

Once the workshops have been completed, the students will be invited to Stanley’s home match against the MK Dons on Tuesday 4th March, with those attending also invited to break their fast at the Wham Stadium ahead of the game.

On the same night, Accrington Stanley will also be running their popular ‘Mosque Walk to the Match’ campaign with local mosque, Raza Jamia Masjid.

Warren Eastham, CEO at Accrington Stanley, said: “These are fantastic initiatives that we are proud to be running as a football club.

“Our aim is to bring people from different ethnic, faith and social backgrounds together through a shared pride in their team and local area.”

Robert Houseman, Accrington Stanley EDI Officer, said: “We are looking forward to welcoming those involved in the projects to the Wham Stadium, many of whom for the first time, for what will be two incredible occasions, including our first ever Iftar Event.”

Cllr Noordad Aziz, Deputy Leader of Hyndburn Borough Council, said: “These events are a great way to bring different parts of the community together to listen, share, interact and better understand each other, improving community connections.

“Accrington Stanley have been running projects for many years which have created a shared and inclusive sense of belonging within diverse communities, but this is the first Iftar event and I am proud to be a lead on it.”

Hyndburn Borough Council were awarded a funding grant of £55,000 from the Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government (MHCLG) to support community cohesion and resilience work across the borough.

Accrington Stanley Football Club represents communities from a wide variety of diverse backgrounds and has achieved a Bronze level in the EFL’s Equality Code of Practice, due to their ongoing work and commitment to Equality, Diversity and Inclusion.

You can learn more about Accrington Stanley on their website: www.accringtonstanley.co.uk