FRANZ Beckenbauer or Bobby Moore? Richard McBrearty of Football Memories Scotland holds up two red cards ‘defender’ cards to the group, prompting a lively but light-hearted round table debate.
After a show of hands – and bearing in mind the participants are all Scottish – the German former Bayern Munich player is declared superior.
The bright and colourful Top Trump style cards are part of a new set created for the 60th anniversary of the European Championships that will be shared amongst more than 250 football reminiscence groups across Scotland, from Stornoway to Stranraer.
The 60-deck of ‘European legends’ includes the 55-times capped Denis Law and Celtic legend Danny McGrain and is designed to stimulate memories of golden moments from some of the greatest Uefa championship matches from 1960 to 1990.
They were launched yesterday at Hampden Park, which due to host Uefa Euro 2020 matches in June, and will enhance what is already offered through the Football Memories Scotland project.
A partnership between the Scottish Football Museum and Alzheimer Scotland, it is the oldest football reminiscence programme in the world and other countries are now replicating the idea.
While many of the volunteers leading the reminiscence groups are likely to be football fans themselves, and in some cases former players, the cards are designed in such a way that it’s not essential to have an in-depth knowledge of the sport, widening the opportunities for their use in care homes, libraries and even hospitals.
The A5-size cards were designed by Luke McCarthy and according to Richard can be used in a variety of ways to stimulate memories and conversations about football. Players are colour co-ordinated depending on position.
He said: “You could create a dream team or they could be used to create a quiz. We are delighted to have this fantastic resource. These cards will help people with dementia and people facing social isolation and we are very lucky because they have been designed in such a way that you can be a football fan but you don’t need to have much knowledge of football.”
According to those involved in the project, the groups are not just beneficial for those suffering from dementia but experiencing other forms of memory loss or loneliness, depression and social isolation.
Roy Mills, 80, from Burnside, suffered memory loss after a stroke two years ago. Every month he drives his friend, Niall Hopper, 84, to a local group. The former Queen’s Park player who went up against Celtic at Parkhead in the quarter finals of the Scottish Cup on March 11, 1967, is affected by dementia.
Like the other men in the group, Roy says Niall “comes alive” during the sessions but says he draws as much benefit himself.
He said: “Niall looks at the Queen’s Park team and he can tell all the names. It’s the same with any group...the men, you mention football, Celtic and Rangers and they come alive.
“He benefits and helps me.”
Robert Harvey, who played for Clyde in the 1970s and whose mother had dementia, is regional coordinator and volunteer for the Glasgow groups. He says the cards will be a welcome addition to football memorabilia used in sessions. He said: “The recurring thing is that people with dementia are surprised about what they can remember.”
Aleksander Ceferin, UEFA President, said the cards would allow more people to “unlock memories and share their love of the beautiful game.”
Why are you making commenting on The Herald only available to subscribers?
It should have been a safe space for informed debate, somewhere for readers to discuss issues around the biggest stories of the day, but all too often the below the line comments on most websites have become bogged down by off-topic discussions and abuse.
heraldscotland.com is tackling this problem by allowing only subscribers to comment.
We are doing this to improve the experience for our loyal readers and we believe it will reduce the ability of trolls and troublemakers, who occasionally find their way onto our site, to abuse our journalists and readers. We also hope it will help the comments section fulfil its promise as a part of Scotland's conversation with itself.
We are lucky at The Herald. We are read by an informed, educated readership who can add their knowledge and insights to our stories.
That is invaluable.
We are making the subscriber-only change to support our valued readers, who tell us they don't want the site cluttered up with irrelevant comments, untruths and abuse.
In the past, the journalist’s job was to collect and distribute information to the audience. Technology means that readers can shape a discussion. We look forward to hearing from you on heraldscotland.com
Comments & Moderation
Readers’ comments: You are personally liable for the content of any comments you upload to this website, so please act responsibly. We do not pre-moderate or monitor readers’ comments appearing on our websites, but we do post-moderate in response to complaints we receive or otherwise when a potential problem comes to our attention. You can make a complaint by using the ‘report this post’ link . We may then apply our discretion under the user terms to amend or delete comments.
Post moderation is undertaken full-time 9am-6pm on weekdays, and on a part-time basis outwith those hours.
Read the rules here