Introduction

Lee Armstrong (BHF FC)

Jade and I first crossed paths when she signed for Lincoln City Ladies back in the early 2000s, where I was working with the first team in a coaching role.

Jade’s story

In 2007 my life changed forever. I was embarking on what was going to be the most exciting and nerve racking experience to date. I had been accepted into The FA National player development centre program that ran solely out of Loughborough University. This is where, as a promising young female footballer, you would go to eat, sleep and breathe football. That was going to be me for the next few years whilst I continued my further education.

Within that time I was due a ‘medical’ and the last thing on the list was to have a routine heart scan. During this scan they discovered there wasn’t something quite right. They stopped me from from taking part in any further training and needed second opinions. At just 16 nearly 17 living for the first time away from home this was a very distressing situation for my family and myself. My whole life plans (being a professional footballer) was being questioned at such a young age.

Fast forward a week, I was having further tests to determine what the original scan had found. I found out I had 2 holes in the septum of my heart. This is called an atrial septal defect (ASD) — sometimes called a hole in the heart — is a type of congenital heart defect in which there is an abnormal opening in the dividing wall between the upper filling chambers of the heart (the atria).

Luckily for me I fell in the bracket of ‘in most cases’ the ASDs are diagnosed and treated successfully with few or no complications. I had a minimally invasive procedure called ‘cardiac catheterization’ where they plug the holes with a closure device using a catheter threaded from a vein in your groin, up to your heart. I managed to resume life as normal and have had and continue to have a very successful professional football career.

Without football, and the routine scan that Cardiac Risk in the Young (CRY) undertook, who knows whether I would have been so lucky. Twelve young people (under 35) die a week from from undiagnosed heart conditions.

I am now an ambassador for the CRY charity and try to help raise awareness where I can.

Jade and I have stayed in touch for all this time and been friends for more than twenty years. A few years back, upon arranging to meet up, Jade and I spoke about arranging a football match among friends, a 5-a-side, but this never ended up happening.

Fast forward to Jade and I chatting towards the end of 2023 and speaking about meeting up again and the conversation of ‘that football match’ cropped up again. It was at that time when I realised, with the help of Gary Burr and the amazing set of lads that I had been fortunate enough to play with at BHF FC, we now had the means to create an event, a hopefully impactful event, for the good of both the charity of which Jade is ambassador - Cardiac Risk in the Young (CRY) and The British Heart Foundation. True to form, Gary has been keen on making this happen and has done lots of legwork behind the scenes, as has Ben Robinson (Head of Fundraising at CRY). With BHF FC having numerous matches throughout the year, Gary suggested that a cause as wonderful and important as CRY should receive the proceeds of the event.

My dream has been to arrange a charity football match for sometime now and finally I can make it happen.

I’m teaming up with and against The British Heart Foundation (BHF FC) where we’ll go head to head in a 11v11 charity match on the 25th May 2024 at Leicester City’s King Power Stadium.