Ton's charity to mark 10th anniversary with special celebration

Hundreds of volunteers and participants who are involved in groups run by the club's charity will take part in a sponsored walk from the Battery Park to the stadium before this Saturday's clash against Inverness Caledonian Thistle.

Around a dozen of the organisation's community players will then provide a guard of honour as the players come onto the pitch.

Each member of the Ton squad will wear a special jersey with the details of the anniversary and the game embroidered onto it, which will then be auctioned off after the match.

Morton in the Community chief executive Brian McLaughlin told the Tele that he was thrilled to see the club mark the milestone.

He also praised the hard work of staff and volunteers as he reflected on the group's first decade as a huge success.

Brian said: "It's been a real whirlwind - we started off with four or five football centres and one or two projects within that.

"Since then we've grown to over 20 projects helping 1,200 people a week, it's been a real massive shift in the last 10 years.

"We've invested over £2.5m in the local area through employment, facility costs and physical and mental activities.

"When I first started I was a football guy and my background was coaching, which I thought this would be.

"But since then we've turned it into something else - it's ventured into health and wellbeing projects, employability, education work and then we've also got hockey and football in there.

"Ultimately Cappielow is a home for people outwith a match day now, which I think is so important."

The charity boss believes that they have had a significant impact on the lives of some of their regular participants over the last ten years.

He added: "There will be people standing in these terraces and sitting in the stands who have family members coming here three or four times a week through our mental health, Alzheimer's and education projects.

"It shows the fans that the club can impact their life on more than just a Saturday afternoon.

"The biggest thing for me is saying thank-you to everyone who's helped us.

"People like our volunteer board members, our chairperson Chris McCorkindale who's been here since day one, our amazing staff, over 100 volunteers, parents, guardians and everyone else who's engaged with us.

"We couldn't do it without them."

Morton in the Community's anniversary will also be celebrated later this year as part of the club's end of season Evening with Morton event.

In addition to its range of education and wellbeing programmes, the trust also runs a variety of sports activities.

Angus Bowes, 73, has taken part in walking football sessions since they began around half a decade ago and says they have been a huge help to many participants.

He added: "We've found is that it's a social event for a lot of people.

"Just after playing walking football for the second time I took a heart attack and one of the other boys had a heart condition and didn't know it.

"But because we've had talks about health and wellbeing through the group he went and got it checked out.

"That was all off the back of what happened with me.

"The fact that it's a football team behind all this and the local community are getting a benefit of their involvement is a very positive thing.

"I think we need organisations like this."

Mark Kelly, commercial executive at Greenock Morton says the work the trust does is invaluable.

He added: "The amount of people that have been helped through the different projects they run is fantastic.

"The fact we're a community owned club and we have a trust that gives so much back to it is tremendous.

"We're so proud of everything they've done.

"Celebrating their 10 years this Saturday against Inverness is going to be great and a day that the club, community and fans will be so proud of."