On Friday Shrewsbury Town in the Community welcomed 8 children from Belarus taking part in the Chernobyl Children’s Lifeline project to have a tour of Montgomery Waters Meadow and enjoy a free football session at the Community Football Hub with one of our coaches.

The Chernobyl Children’s Lifeline project runs every year in a range of different locations throughout the county as children living in areas affected by the fallout from the Chernobyl disaster in 1986. It is estimated that by each child spending just a month in the UK it can add up to two years to their life expectancy due to the cleaner air, food and water.

The children are all sent to live with a host family for one month over the summer and for the past few years, hosts Andy and Amy Smith have been bringing their group to Montgomery Waters Meadow for a tour of the stadium and a behind the scenes look at Shrewsbury Town. Although none of the children speak English, a translator accompanied them to make sure that they were able to understand everything being said and were able to learn about how a professional football club runs. The group were shown the home and away dressing rooms, the safe standing area, they were able to sit in in the dugout and also received a goodybag of Shrewsbury Town items from the clubshop at the end of the visit.

Along with the visit to Montgomery Waters Meadow the children will take part in numerous other activities during their stay such as trips to outdoor activity centres, safari parks and into the town centres of Shrewsbury and Telford.

We hope that all the children enjoyed their visit and the rest of their time in the UK where they will be taking part in numerous other activities over the next few weeks and we look forward to seeing Andy and Amy again next year! 

See more information about Chernobyl Children’s Lifeline