A grass roots football club has received an outpouring of support after a fire destroyed their equipment.
MSB Woolton FC was devastated by a fire which ripped through their club hut on Camp Hill, off School Lane in Woolton, where thousands of children play football each week. Merseyside Fire and Rescue Service said two fire engines were called to the blaze at 6.12pm on Sunday, October 9, and arrived on scene eight minutes later.
On arrival, fire crews found a pile of timber involved in the blaze, which had also spread to a metal portacabin. Merseyside Police said it is believed the fire was started deliberately.
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More than £14,000 has been raised for the club in less than 24 hours to help them replace the damaged equipment.
Club Manager Colin Windrow, 52, told the ECHO: "Everything was melted, from the floor, to the goals, to the bibs, to the balls. All of our volunteers, there's 272 of us I think, we were all devastated.
"There's thousands of people that come down here on a Saturday and Sunday morning. We're the biggest grass roots team in Europe we've been told - we've got 151 teams."
Colin said the club's team of volunteers work tirelessly to support children playing football, "and that's the part that hurts the most."
The incident comes following a spate of anti-social behaviour in Woolton, including fires and young people congregating in large groups, intimidating people and using fireworks in Camp Hill Park and in Woolton Village. A dispersal order was put in place by police in the Woolton area from Friday, October 7 until 4am on Monday, October 10.
Colin said the club now needs to look at ways they can stop an incident like this from happening again in the future.
He said: "I don't want to build another club, a new container and it comes along and happens again. Even the local councillors have said lets have a meeting, lets see what we can do which is brilliant.
"The amount of phone calls I had saying 'how can we help' is overwhelming. I'm very humbled by the community of football, so from a bad thing something good came out of it."
Anyone who witnessed the incident or with any information can contact police by DM via our social media desk on Twitter @MerPolCC or Facebook ‘Merseyside Police Contact Centre’ with reference number 22000745900.
If you would like to donate to the Gofundme page set up to support the club click here.
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