"Every weekend they arrive with their boots and their grief, their studs and their memories of the Grenfell Tower fire which changed their lives for ever and killed 72 people. But the Grenfell Athletic football players, in two men's teams and a women's side, also bring hope, pride and even joy as they climb up their Saturday afternoon and Sunday morning amateur league tables with growing conviction that their club is a rising force."
"For Taylor, who runs the club and manages the Sunday men's team, it was like living in a different world in the aftermath and nothing like where I grew up. There was a lot of sadness and darkness in the air. The 39-year-old pauses while he searches for the right words to describe how the community around Grenfell changed. Loss was in the air, Taylor says."
"We had people that were instantly grieving. And with that grief came panic, anxiety and anger. Multiple emotions were in the air. For a week or two it was chaos. We didn't know who was still alive, who was in hospital from smoke inhalation or injuries. While we were waiting some people would speak to the other residents who would then speak to you. So you would work out who was still missing."
Grenfell Athletic fields two men's teams and a women's side and competes in weekend amateur leagues. Rupert Taylor and Paul Menacer founded the club to help the community cope after the Grenfell Tower fire. Menacer was asleep in the tower on the night of 14 June 2017 when the building became a blazing inferno that killed 72 people. Taylor runs the club and manages the Sunday men's team. The aftermath brought widespread sadness, darkness, panic, anxiety and anger, with weeks of chaos and uncertainty about who had survived or been hospitalized. The community sought togetherness and tried to pull together under tragic circumstances.
Read at www.theguardian.com
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