Sport wins at the Black Country Games
More than 1,400 youngsters from across the region joined forces for a festival of sport as the Black Country School Games arrived in Walsall.
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A host of different sports were on offer for the primary and secondary school pupils, who have achieved success in qualifying stages to reach the final showpiece.
The Black Country School Games, now in its sixth year, provided the opportunity to get sporty to more than 9,000 pupils in this school year alone.
The event has grown at such a rapid rate over its short existence that the 2016 finals. Once the festival, kicked into gear the action was full-throttle.
They were held at the University of Wolverhampton's impressive Walsall campus – welcomed their 10,000th competitor.
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Paris Ebbans from Reedswood Primary School in Walsall was announced as the 10,000th before the action got under way.
She was presented with a unique trophy by the one of the day's special guests, Wolverhampton's double Paralympic athlete Darren Harris.
The multi-purpose site provided an ideal setting with different sports carried out in the sports hall, on the artificial pitches and full-scale athletics track as well as elsewhere.
In total, 82 schools met and fought it out across 12 different school sports, with the four boroughs of Dudley, Walsall, Sandwell and Wolverhampton battling for top spot.
Athletics (outside and sports hall), rounders, 'multi-skills' (featuring a number of physical activities), cricket, tri golf, rugby, football, dodgeball and a triathlon were all contested.
In the end, it was the green shirts of Sandwell celebrating as they lifted the trophy. Black Country Be Active headed the event.
They will be mixing with young local sporting volunteers and coaches – many of whom had competed in the games while at school – to help organise and run a faultless programme.
Paul Wicker, one of the organisers from Walsall Council, said: "It's sport for young people, delivered by young people.
"For people who don't play sport it's also providing them with other interests to feed in with the dancers in the opening ceremony and other sorts of youngsters showing off their talents.
"I always think of it like a Premier League football team. You have 11 players on the pitch, but there are 200 other roles around that."
The first Games were held in 2010 at Wolverhampton's Aldersley Leisure Village, with the event growing in stature, organisation and quality ever since.
Be Active director Simon Hall has seen first-hand how the Black Country School Games have became what they are today.
Hall said: "I think this event just proves the power of sport for young people. We're not looking for the most elite athletes in schools, we're looking for ways to get more children active in sport.
"The Black Country Games gives young people a chance to experience that sort of multi-event experience, not quite the Olympics, but something they can really treasure.
"What's been really special is being able to identify the pupil who was the 10,000th competitor, which is a huge achievement.
"For 10,000 people from the Black Country to experience these Games is great and key to that is having the leaders.
"Young people have been trained to have the skills like customer service and employability, to begin to be those ambassadors to help the Games happen.
"The Games are all about young people setting out what they want to achieve in school sports in the region."
A former ambassador for the Games was Joel Richards, who was tragically killed in Tunisia while on a family holiday last year.
Richards attended Stuart Bathurst Cathlolic School in Wednesbury and played a huge part in local sport in the Black Country.
The day's trophy, lifted by Sandwell, was named after the former Black Country referee and presented by Joel's brother Owen, also a recently qualified referee.
Wicker explained how the games have developed and how the organisers and leaders try to follow the mentality of school sports while delivering such an event.
He said : "The idea is to create a mini-Olympics for the Black Country, and to have an opening ceremony it adds to it and makes it different for them. We're learning.
"We held ceremonies outside and there were lots of speeches and rain with kids getting bored so we made it more visual, louder and interactive and it gets better each year.
"The six school games' values are honesty, self-respect, passion, determination, teamwork and respect – they're tremendous things to run your event by.
"You want to win but you want people to take part and enjoy themselves."
Friends and volunteers of Joel were gathered in the event to raise funds for the 'Smile for Joel' appeal, a charity that aids victim support.
Kallianne Titley and her brother were friends with Joel and she explained how such a monumental sporting event proved a perfect fitting.
She said: "Sport was what Joel did best and that's what he wanted people to do.
"Every time I saw Joel it was through sport, whether it was helping him by being a guinea pig when he finished his A-Levels or organising an event or football, it was what he did.
"There is no better way to remember him. I was younger and competed here when he was an ambassador, so I know he'd be really proud of what everyone's doing."
[breakout title="SCHOOLS INVOLVED"]
Schools representing Sandwell: George Salter, Sandwell Academy, Q3 Academy, Bristnall Hall, Uplands Manor, Moat Farm, Pennyhill, Oldbury, St Phillips, Langley, Gelebfields, Tipton Green, Lyng, Hargate, Abbey Junior, St Pauls, ACE Academy, St Michaels, Hollylodge and Wood Green Academy,
Schools representing Dudley: Leasowes, Old Swinford, Bishop Milner, Ellowes, Manor Way, Glynne, Windsor, Dudley Wood, Woolescote, Milking Bank, Maidensbridge, Church of the Ascension, Hagley, Sutton, Summerhill and OSH.
Schools representing Walsall: St Francis, Shire Oak Academy, Pool Hayes, Jane Lane, Castle, Lindens, Barcroft, Blue Coat, Walsall Academy, Ormiston Shelfield Community Academy, Whetstone Field, New Invention, Holy Trinity, Birchills, Butts, Reedswood, Cooper and Jordan, Beacon, St John's, The Jane Lane School, The Streetly Academy and Brownhills.
Schools representing Wolverhampton: Highfields, St Peter's Collegiate, Wolverhampton Grammar School, Oak Meadow, Fieldview, Uplands Junior, St Michaels Catholic, Northwood Park, Wolverhampton Girls, St Peter and St Paul, Whitgreave Infant, Woodthorne, Bilston, Christ Church, St Stephens, St Andrews, St Michaels Q of E, Aldersley, Moreton, Our Lady and St Chad, Colton Hills, South Wolverhampton and Bilston Academy, Coppice and The Royal School.[/breakout]
