MAN CITY ANNOUNCES THE RETURN OF CITYZENS GIVING

Manchester City has announced the return of its global charity initiative, Cityzens Giving, and is calling on City fans to pledge their support.

The initiative funds community football projects run by young people, created to tackle pressing issues affecting their communities including crime prevention, girls’ empowerment and disability inclusion.

For the fourth year, fans of City Football Group’s family of clubs – including Manchester City, New York City FC and Melbourne City FC – will decide how a £400,000 charitable fund is split by voting for one of six causes that inspires them the most. The more votes a project gets, the more funding it will receive.

Projects combine youth led project delivery with pitch building and refurbishing, where needed.  

City Football Group chief executive, Ferran Soriano said: “Since the Cityzens Giving initiative launched in 2014, we have trained 750 young leaders in 18 cities around the world who have in turn, worked with 23,000 children and young people in their communities.

“We are immensely proud of our community work that empowers better lives through the universal language of football. By placing fans at the heart of the decision making we are creating a truly connected global community.”

Young Leader Roosevelt, 19, is a shining example of the positive impact fans votes can have on the lives of others. The aspiring musician from Manchester first came on board with City’s family of global community projects in 2015.

Combining his two great loves – football and music – Boots and Beats was the project Roosevelt attended in Manchester and is something he feels has been a great benefit to both himself and the wider Manchester community.

“Cityzens Giving is really important because in certain communities you really need projects like this to make sure young people are happy, learning and developing new skills which will help them for the future.” he said.

“It changed my life. It’s made me understand who I am as a person and opened my eyes to a lot of things.”