The Super Vale Abroad Initiative (SVA) was set up earlier this year by a group of exile Vale supporters from around the globe in order to sponsor families to attend Vale home games.
The first family to benefit from this initiative came to the Crawley game on August 18th and since then several other families have enjoyed their first taste of league football at subsequent Vale home games.
SVA are now extremely proud to announce that Vale Legend Robbie Earle MBE has become an Ambassador for the initiative.
Vale Take on Swindon Town in a League 2 fixture this weekend and it was against Swindon that Robbie made his Vale debut in a 1–0 defeat at the County Ground on 28 August 1982. He went on to play just short of 300 games, scoring 77 goals for the Valiants before signing for Wimbledon in 1991 where he was a member of their legendary “Crazy Gang”.
Robbie was captain at the Dons for 5 years and named player of the decade in 2000. He also played for Jamaica 33 times and scored the country’s first ever World Cup Finals goal in the 1998 competition in France before being awarded the MBE in 1999. He was inducted into the National Football Museum Hall of Fame in 2009 as a Football Foundation Community Champion.
Robbie currently lives in California and acts as a principal studio analysist with NBC Sports for their Premier League coverage.
“I am impressed with the work SVA are doing in regard to creating the opportunity to send families to visit Vale home games” Robbie said.
“I am delighted to take an ambassadorial role in the organisation and be keen to see how we can make this group of exile Vale fans in SVA empowered to make this initiative sustainable and able to send even more families to games at Vale park”.
Patrick Scragg, originally from Light Oaks and who now lives in the Central Coast, Australia is the leader of the group and originator of the Super Vale Abroad concept. “Having Robbie Earle as an Ambassador is fantastic news and is sure to raise the profile of SVA.
“We have already manged to turn an idea into reality and with Robbie’s backing we hope to be able to attract improved funding so that more families can take advantage of the initiative”.
Any exile Vale supporter who wishes to join the SVA group and make a contribution towards the initiative is invited to contact Patrick direct via email at supervaleabroad@hotmail.com or through the group website https://www.supervaleabroad.com