On a warm Sunday afternoon the elite of the National Rugby League (NRL) and Australian Softball gathered at Blacktown International Softball Stadium to play a game or two of so
ftball for the Play for a Cure Foundation Yellow Socks Charity Softball Game. All the profit from the day we will donate to brain cancer research, through the Mark Hughes Foundation and at the time of this post we have raised $7,072.45 taking the total that we have raised for cancer research, since we started in December 2010, to just under $160,000.
When events like this happen, there are many to thank and the first person is Cindy Wann. Cindy is the Sydney pocket rocket who asked us to bring our Yellow Socks game to Sydney upon the passing of her best friend Tracey Dakin, because she wanted to specifically raise funds for brain cancer research. Cindy and her daughters Stacey and Brooke captained 2 of the 3 teams this year, along with Brett Kimmorley who captained the 3rd team. Sadly Brett’s wife Sharnie passed away this year to brain cancer and the winner’s trophy has been dedicated to these 2 ladies and is known as the Sharnie Kimmorley – Tracey Dakin Memorial Trophy.
The NRL players were outside of their comfort zone, not unlike a cancer patient, but they showed why they excel on the football field and were absolute naturals on the diamond, making for some great games and lots of fun.
The winners in our 2nd year were the team making their debut – Team Dakin – captained by Brooke McManus – well done team!
Thank you to Brett for promoting the day and bringing along the NRL stars (Chad Townsend, Blake Austin, Marty Taupau, Bryson Goodwin, Dave Furner, Steve Turner and John Skandalis) and thank you to Stacey & Brooke and their fellow softballers for taking the time to play and provide such great entertainment (and for all the donated sporting memorabilia). Thanks to our Blues and thank you to Cathy Kerr and NSW Softball for providing us an Olympic stadium to play in – WOW. Thank you to all the volunteers who helped set up and manned stations and to all those that donated the amazing auction items. As you can imagine there are always so many people that make the day possible and we are so grateful to them all. And of course, THANK YOU to the supporters who came out, dug deep and got to enjoy the day along with the rest of us. Without you, we couldn’t do what we do!
A special shout out to Sam Alvaro of McDonalds Waitara Alvaro Restaurants and Patricia Russo of McDonalds Blacktown – they both donated an amazing $1000 each to the fundraiser. It was a real pleasure meeting Michelle and her family and we are extremely grateful for their generosity.
Thanks too to Josh Morris. He played last year but couldn’t make this year so donated $500 in lieu of playing – awesome!
To see all the photos, and a Channel 7 news video of the day, visit our Facebook Page by clicking here.
Whilte there, like our Facebook page and stay tuned because we will be back and we want to see more and more every year come out and enjoy a great day whilst raising funds for brain cancer research.
PLAY FOR A CURE!