A well drilled Virgin Media Business team triumphed at the inaugural tournament of The Big Goal, beating a gallant Elite Group team 3-1 in a memorable final staged at St George’s Park - the home of England football - on November 1st.
A total of 12 teams from the ICT industry took part in the finals, which were professionally staged in the Sir Alf Ramsay Arena by The Street Soccer Foundation and main sponsor Giacom, with commentary and interviews provided by Sky Sports presenters Gary Weaver and David Craig.
Speaking after his team’s triumph, Virgin Media Business team coach Steve Round said: “We have a great set of lads who have been so looking forward to today and after our success in the regionals at Nottingham Forest we wanted to prove that we could go all the way.
"We showed some great team play in all our games and I’m very proud of our performances across the whole tournament. Overall, this was an amazing day. The Street Soccer Foundation team, Giacom and Sky have been brilliant, the venue was superb and 100% we’ll be back again next year.”
You can see the Sky Sports post-match interview with the Virgin team here: https://f.io/N77yMT2g
Virgin Media Business made the final with a convincing 4-0 win over Gamma. In the other semi-final Elite Group beat Wavenet 2-0.
The Big Goal is a national award winning campaign that uses the Global No.1 Sport and fuses it together with one of the largest Industry sectors in the UK to help tackle one of the largest social issues in the UK: youth homelessness.
Speaking at the pre-finals press conference, Nigel Sergent, Editor at Large for The Big Goal media sponsor Comms Dealer, said: “Over the last year The Big Goal has united the industry like never before, giving teams from our industry the chance to play in a brilliantly organised tournament culminating in today’s final at the home of England football.
"Thanks must go to The Street Soccer Foundation, Giacom, Sky Business and all the players for taking part. More importantly, I hope the professionalism of this tournament, the media exposure we have received, and the success of the academies sponsored by the teams taking part, providing them with a ready-made CSR/ESG programme, will encourage other ICT companies to get involved in The Big Goal next year.”
Tez O’Brien, CEO of Giacom, added: “In its first year The Big Goal has already helped 462 young people change their lives, but many more organisations from our industry could take part and reap a multiple of benefits. I see no reason why 100 teams could not take part next year and help over 1000 young people out of homelessness through the power of football.”
The full results at the National Finals were as follows:
GROUP A
Focus Group Utd 1, PXC 3; Vorboss 4 Intec Group 0; Gamma 1 Elite Group 0; Vorboss 2 Focus Group Utd 0; PXC 3 Gamma 1; Elite Group 7 Intec Group 0; Focus Group United 2 Gamma 3; Elite Group 1 Vorboss 1; Intec Group 2 PXC 3; Elite Group 4 Focus Group United 3; Gamma 2 Intec Group 0; PXC 1 Vorboss 1; Intec Group 3 Focus Group Utd 4; PXC 1 Elite Group 2; Gamma 2, Vorboss 1.
GROUP B
Daisy Corporate 0 Firstcom Europe 2; BDR Group 0 Wavenet 1; Focus Group 1 Virgin Media Business 3; Wavenet 5 Daisy Corporate 0; Firstcom Europe 0 Focus Group 0; Virgin Media Business 3 BDR Group 2; Focus Group 3 Daisy Corporate 4; Virgin Media Business 0 Wavenet 0; Firstcom Europe 1 BDR Group 2; Daisy Corporate 1 Virgin Media Business 3; BDR Group 4 Focus Group 0; Firstcom Europe 0 Wavenet 3; BDR Group 2 Daisy Corporate 1; Virgin Media Business 4 Firstcom Europe 1; Wavenet 6 Focus Group 0.
SEMI-FINALS
Gamma 0 Virgin Media Business 4; Wavenet 0 Elite Group 2.
FINAL
Virgin Media Business 3 Elite Group 1.