Walsall Blog - In Memory of Anton

Walsall blogger Mark Jones is delighted the club are continuing to honour the memory of their tragic former youth-team player Anton Reid.

On Saturday evening the football club are hosting a black tie charity event in honour of Anton Reid, with proceeds going to the Cardiac Risk in the Young charity (CRY).

Anton tragically collapsed and died whilst training with his youth team colleagues two years ago. It was one of the saddest events ever to occur at Walsall and does give some kind of perspective to the relative importance of results, squads, fixture lists and the like.

I, for one, think this is a fine gesture by the club, and one which deserves full praise and publicity. Hopefully it will be a sell out and a huge donation to a fine cause can be made.

The ticket price may exclude many fans from attending on the night - and that is merely an observation and definitely not a criticism - so I'm hoping that the club will arrange some other way for us to contribute, be it in the form of bucket collections or a percentage of the 50/50 draw one matchday.

Anton's family deserve to know that he will always be remembered at Walsall.

Mick Halsall was the Saddlers' youth coach on that fateful August day, and he played a major part in trying to revive Anton and get him the medical help he needed. He was also the guy who had to go back into work the next day, the next day and the day after that.

He was also the one who had to pick up the pieces and motivate Anton's distraught team mates, many of whom had witnessed the shocking scenes at first hand, to go out and play football once more.

Mick's role in that tragedy should never be forgotten, regardless of who he is currently employed by.

Two years on and we can only speculate as to how far Anton would have progressed through the Saddlers ranks. Our current first team squad contains two 18-year-old's in Will Grigg and first-team regular Darryl Westlake, and two-17 year-old's in Sam Adkins and Sean Geddes.

So it seems fitting that seven out of starting line up for the very welcome win at Tranmere last week - and three of the subs - were aged 22 or under.

Perhaps the best tribute to Anton's memory will be just that, a production line of talented youngsters coming through to make it in football, fulfilling the very same dreams that were so cruelly denied Anton himself.