Women's matchday with The Kano Kids

For most of the 2022/23 season, The Kano Foundation have been taking kids to the Celtic women’s games.

With the huge surge in popularity of women’s football and men’s games becoming ever more in demand, kids are loving having another way to watch The Hoops.

The Kano Foundation has 40 seats for the women’s games and every time we attend, more and more groups are joining us.

But what does a day at the women’s game look like? Read on to find out…

 

The first thing to note is that the game wasn’t held at Celtic Park! While the women’s games are getting more popular, there’s not quite enough of a crowd to fill 60k, so they’re held at Airdie’s Excelsior Stadium.

Our marchday coordinator, Lee, met our guest groups outside the stadium on a cold day in Airdrie. As always though, the kids were kept warm with the famous Kano hats and scarves while (self proclaimed) human loudspeaker Tina got them in the spirit.

One through the gates, juice and crisps in hand, the Kano flag was raised in the stand. Right in front of ex celtic star Mark Burchill who was there to support his daughter Tyree who, at the time, played for Celtic Women. (She’s currently on loan but we’re sure we’ll see her again soon!) 

 

While the game got off to a slow start, the ghirls were playing well and managed to get a few shots on target. The Kano Kids were in their usual fine voice and even managed to high five some of the subs as they warmed up.

It wasn’t long until Celtic opened the scoring with Chloe Craig firing one in. In the same way they do at Paradise the Kano Kids went wild, dancing and cheering and shouting the players names.

12 minutes later Riordan slotted home a second and things really began to heat up. Manager Fran Alonso likes to change things up and made a raft of subs just a minute later – leading to Natalie Ross scoring in the 71st minute.

From there in, the ghirls saw out the game, defending well and Jacynta almost scoring in the final minutes of the match. 

In all, a great game. But the real highlight for the kids was the post-match and the interaction with the stars of the day. Not only did the team come over and hand out match worn boots, straps and gloves, they also signed autographs and stood for hundreds of selfies, chatting to the kids about the game.

Then captain Kelly Clarke dragged the whole team over for a picture with the Kano flag and a big hug for the supporters.

An incredible day of displays. Both in skills and in kindness and appreciation of the fans.

With a train station just down the road, space for slightly younger kids to play, and fan interaction aplenty, a day watching the women’s team is a day to remember 

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