AN ANNUAL football match which was set up to honour two best friends has now raised enough money for three defibrillators in Basingstoke – and has been given a fourth for free.

George Nash and Fred Elgar were friends for nearly 60 years, moving from London to Winklebury in the early 1960s, but in October 2020 they both sadly died.

To honour them family and friends have organised The Legends of Winklebury Memorial Football Match for the past three years.

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The match committee set out to raise enough money for three publicly accessible defibrillators to be placed around the Winklebury community, to its delight the match in August 2023 raised enough for three devices and a fourth has been donated for free through the DHSC Community AED Grant Team, with thanks to London Hearts.

All of the defibrillators are located in fully accessible areas and fully operational. The cabinets also contain critical injury packs to be used for emergencies where a person has suffered major trauma with heaving bleeding.

Event founder Cathy Nash said: “Support for this event has grown over the years and has given the community of Winklebury a day of fun and remembrance. This growing support has brought in an increasing number of contributions from businesses and the public alike. This support has enabled the committee to supply and install the four defibrillators.”

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The defibrillators are located at The Church of the Good Shepherd, Winklebury Centre; Sycamore Halls Community Centre, Sycamore Way; The Winkle Public House, Watson Way; and L Titcombe and Family, Elmwood Parade.

“We understand that not everyone feels confident about using this equipment and have therefore already held one CPR training session and will be holding another in the New Year.  Look out for information on the Winklebury Legends Facebook page,” Cathy added.

In the UK there are more than 30,000 out-of-hospital cardiac arrests a year where emergency medical services attempt to resuscitate the victim. However, the survival rate is low – only one in 10 people that have a cardiac arrest outside of a hospital survive, but, if defibrillation is used within three to five minutes it can produce survival rates as high as 50-70 per cent.

The Winklebury Legends committee are not resting and are now working on the 2024 event which will take place on Sunday, July 28, at the FA Stadium in Winklebury.