The Hargreaves Foundation supports The Lord's Taverners

The Trustees of the Hargreaves Foundation are pleased to announce that the Lord’s Taverners, a charity existing to empower and positively impact the lives of young people facing challenges of inequality, have been granted funding.

With the revelation that sport can transcend linguistic, cultural, and social barriers, the Lord’s Taverners have been providing disability cricket programmes, aspiring to enhance the psychological wellbeing of disabled young people for over eight years.

Acknowledging that 4 out of 5 ‘educational needs’ schools have inadequate facilities and equipment to provide children with sporting opportunities, the Lord’s Taverners have partnered with local country cricket boards and disabled people’s organisations.  This charity provides children at 50 special education need and disability schools/colleges with weekly Table Cricket training sessions.

These training sessions enable frequent interactions for people within a team environment and create greater accessibility to sports. Through these interactions, the cricket programmes aim to develop young people’s social skills, which is a critical outcome as research reveals that 7 in 10 disabled people experience chronic loneliness.

The funding will be used to cover the costs of 50 new Table Cricket sets, which have been specially designed by experts to best suit the needs of the young people. These sets will ensure improved safety, up to 60% quicker assembly time, and stronger durability which will increase the longevity of their function.