Former Tipperary Minor hurler and now Republic of Ireland and West Brom striker, Shane Long, linked up with Lucozade Sport to launch the Lucozade Sport Club Crusade in his home in his home county Tipperary. The Lucozade Sport Club Crusade initiative invites sports clubs to sign up their adult teams to collect Lucozade Sport and Lucozade Sport Lite bottle caps for a chance to win €10,000. Clubs are categorised depending on the number of members so that clubs will be competing against other clubs of similar size. There will also be a draw for €5,000 for any club that collects at least 400 bottle caps.
Shane Long said, “I don’t get home too much during the season so I am particularly delighted to be back in Tipperary to launch the Lucozade Sport Club Crusade. I have fantastic memories of playing at my boyhood clubs both Soccer and GAA. These clubs have played an integral part in my development as a player and have helped to get me where I am today playing professional football for West Brom and hopefully heading off to Poland in June with the Irish team for the European Championships.”
“I was involved with various clubs growing up between football, athletics and GAA. I played hurling with Gortnahoe which gave me the platform to go on to represent Tipperary at intermediate and minor level winning a Minor Munster Championship medal which, to this day, I am extremely proud of. My previous clubs such as St. Michael’s, St. Annes, St. Kevin’s, Gortnahoe GAA and hundreds of others around the country play a massive role in the community in keeping people fit and healthy and supporting a healthy lifestyle no matter what the sport is. The Lucozade Sport Club Crusade allows any club to enter and all they have to do is collect Lucozade Sport caps to be in with a chance to win €10,000 which I am sure can be put to great use and would benefit the whole community.”
Jim Geraghty, Senior Brand Manager for Lucozade Sport said, “We piloted the Club Crusade initiative last year internally with our employees and it proved really popular with the sports clubs that participated. Lucozade Sport has been supporting grass roots sport in Ireland since our launch in 1990 and we are dedicated to giving Irish sport as much support as possible. We know how difficult it is for sports clubs in the current environment and so €10,000 will hopefully be a great boost for the eventual winners.”
We recently presented cheques to last year’s winners, Malahide Utd football club, Croom GAA, Tullamore GAA and Clonakilty GAA for winning last year’s crusade. That funding will contribute in no small way to financing gear, improving facilities etc. We decided to launch the initiative nationwide this year to allow any club to get involved and we are delighted that Shane Long is here with us today to launch it.”
