Players and Staff visit the Battle Back Centre
Armed Forces Day takes place at the Greenhous Meadow on Saturday when Town take on Swindon.Ahead of Saturday’s game Micky Mellon and 5 of his first team squad visited the Battle Back Centre at Lilleshall last Thursday to see the work the Royal British Legion are doing to support wounded, injured and sick Service personnel.
The Centre exists to help people achieve their best possible recovery and either return to Service duty or to make a smooth transition to civilian life.
Jack Grimmer, Jim O’Brien, Andy Mangan, Ian Black and Callum Grogan took part in a game of archery alongside those helped by the centre.
Callum Grogan was Shrewsbury Town’s very own Robin Hood scoring three perfect 10’s from his 5 arrows.
The event allowed the club strengthen their relationship with the Armed Forces, work which has seen Shrewsbury Town in the Community run soccer schools at RAF Shawbury.
Shrewsbury Town Manager Micky Mellon was pleased to be able to carry on improving the relationship.
“Something we have done for a long time is support places like Battle Back,” said Micky.
“It is something we enjoy doing and to get the opportunity to come down and see the guys is always good for us.
“The players are enjoying it, but the important thing is that we are here to meet some good people and get to know them better and have a go at something different.
“We come down here and we are never not inspired by these guys. Their mentality to want to carry on with life after the things that they’ve been involved in is inspirational, it’s terrific.
“But, also to come down and see how skilful they are at these type of things is unbelievable really.”
Chris Joynson, the Royal British Legion’s Operations Manager for the Battle Back Centre, was delighted to see the players come along and take part.
“It’s great to have the players, and the manager and the staff here,” said Chris.
“I am aware that Shrewsbury Town are good supporters of the Armed Forces and so are the general population of Shrewsbury and the supporters who support the Armed Forces and the Royal British Legion very well.
“It’s great to have people who take an interest and support us, but also in the case with Shrewsbury Town players they integrated so easily.
“They are the same age roughly as the wounded injured and sick service men and women we have here, had no difficulty chatting, joined in and it was a great pleasure to have them here,” added Joynson.
Armed Forces Day has seen Town provide 500 free tickets for military personnel ahead of Saturday’s game.
Saturday will also see a number of activities take place before the game and at half time, including tours of military vehicles, a marching band and the matchball being brought onto the pitch by an RAF Shawbury helicopter.