Hearts and Balls
Stuart House
Eskmills
Musselburgh
EH21 7PQ
Charity No SC033927
|
|
Thanks to the good people at Just Giving, you can now make one-off or monthly donations securely online. Click the button above to visit the Hearts and Balls page on their website.
|
|
 |
|
|
Background
Hearts and Balls aims to ensure that those connected with rugby are supported by the wider rugby community in times of need. This assitance can be long term or short term; it can be financial and non-financial; it can be directed towards and individual or towards a group; it can be advocacy and advisory.
We do not fund other charities or movements but will connect people and groups to ensure that help is directed where it is most needed. We will lobby for change in the interests of vulnerable people and groupsand we will act as advocates."
Hearts and Balls was conceived in 1999 when a player from Lismore Rugby Club in Edinburgh suffered a serious spinal injury that left him paralysed. Lismore set up and ran a highly successful appeal which they decide to continue by widening its support to cover players and loved ones impacted by serious injury or illness and Hearts and Balls was created with the aim of 'helping rugby help its own'. Over the past 6 years Hearts and Balls has helped numerous players and families impacted by injury, illness or bereavment.
|
Testimonials
Many great players and people associated with rugby have been involved with Hearts and Balls since it started here are sone of the things they say about us:
"Hearts and Balls is totally committed to helping our seriously-injured rugby friends enjoy a quality of life that their tragic injuries have dictated they must now lead. Rugby is a game that many of us have taken a huge amount from and it is only right that we now combine to put something back in. I encourage you all to support this extremely pro-active support group to sustain their excellent work moving forward."
- Gavin Hastings (Watsonians, Scotland, Barbarians and British Lions)
Sport is a vital part of our community and for all the good that it achieves sometimes things go wrong. That is when Hearts and Balls steps in. I have experienced intimately the work that John Evans and the team at Hearts and Balls have contributed for seriously injured sportspeople. They make a positive difference to our community. I thoroughly endorse their fundraising efforts."
John Eales (Australia's 1999 World Cup Winning Captain)
"The work, aims and achievements of Hearts and Balls are impressive, necessary and so important to those that benefit."
- John Frame (Gala, Scotland and Barbarians and founder of The Sportsman's Charity)
More importantly, here are some of the things the people we work for say about us:
"Hearts and Balls" is a charity run by rugby followers aimed at offering practical to those physically disadvantaged through the game we all love. This is vitally important as it lets the disabled players know that a lot of people really care!!
- David Mercer (Broughton)
"I am a young person with a complete spinal cord injury as a result of a rugby accident in 1996 in Australia, hearts and balls are far more than a charity to me, hearts and balls are a group of caring human beings that fully understand the challenges that spinal injured people face. Demographics mean nothing to hearts and balls, hearts and balls are looking to assist me with a new power wheelchair and I do not reside in the UK I reside in Orange NSW Australia.
It would be easy for hearts and balls to not be concerned about somebody who has sustained a spinal cord injury from rugby in Australia, not hearts and balls they care enough to make it their business to help somebody on the other side of the world, this assistance has been valuable considering my wife and I have just had identical twin boys and the financial assistance toward the power wheelchair is invaluable to our family particularly at this time.
Hearts and balls are a wonderful organisation and my wife and I and twin sons cannot thank them enough.
Sincerely
Rocky Mileto"
Hearts and Balls!
These volunteers have such warm hearts and have had the balls to push for help for others.
Thank you for all the tremendous help that you have given to me and my family.
Eddie Renwick
(JedForest)
Hearts and Balls has provided a constant for those that have suffered, physically and emotionally, through serious injury from participating in the sport of rugby. It has not only provided financial assistance but, more importantly, it provides a medium through which despair and hope can be redistributed and mediated to the benefit of those most affected. Above all, Hearts and Balls has given those whose lives have been turned upside down, the opportunity and the forum through which they can begin to take the next step forward. It reminds you, above all, that you are not alone.
Dugald McArthur
(Broughton)
|
Our Directors
Malcolm Gillies
Liam McArthur
My rugby career was put out of its misery after only a handful of unremarkable performances for Kirkwall Grammar in Orkney in the 1980s. Accused of pushing in the lineouts and jumping in the scrums, I have no doubt that this was a mercy killing. However, my far more talented younger brother, Dug, was a keen rugby player. Tragically, he was left quadraplegic after a terrible rugby accident in 1996. As a Trustee of Dug's Trust Fund, I met John, Jeff and others involved in Struan Kerr Liddell's appeal and realised that such injuries were rare but sadly common enough. Hearts and Balls emerged from a belief in the need for more of a collective approach to supporting guys like Dug and Struan, financially but also emotionally.
Jeff Milliken
I played rugby until well past when I should have stopped, on the odd occassion I still turn up although many would query what game I am playing. I have been fortunate through work to live in Asia, Latin America and the UK and on each occasion rugby has been the bridge to great experiences, memories and friendships. On the way there has been the odd broken bone, 2 lost teeth and a few stitches (I was a slow scrum half ) but the ´trade off´ was personally worth it. On the very odd occassion that ´trade off´ is something a lot more significant. I played when Struan Kerr broke his neck. Hearts and Balls, does not change peoples lives, does not make it better, but we believe what we do in some small way helps some very courageous people.
John Evans
Hearts and Balls started in 1999 and since then we've developed our network of helpers and those we've helped and continue to help. Rugby is a game that brings together a fantastic range of people and I don't think any other sport could offer the help the way that rugby does to former players.
]
Jim Littlefair
I was enormously fortunate to play at Stewart's Melville thru the late 70's and early 80's and to have played with some very fine players. Whether the Calder, Brewster, Morgan and Scott brothers say the same of having had to play with me is open to some conjecture.
My exposure to the plight of the catastrophically injured player and his family occurred when Jonny Mitchell, Captain of North Berwick suffered a serious spinal injury in the first scrum of the club's game at Hawick Linden. I am delighted to have been involved with Jonny's Trust Fund and now the wider causes that Hearts and Balls can assist.
|
People Who Have Helped
We have developed relationships with several other partners including:
Murrayfield Centenary Fund
New Zealand Rugby Foundation
Sportsman's Charity
Hearts in Union-Australia
|
|
|
|
