Saddlers fan raising awareness for charity...
Walsall supporter Damian Inwood (pictured above, holding camera) has been raising awareness for the male cancer charity Orchid by producing short films during this season’s FA Cup.Damian, 41, who lives in Gateshead, was diagnosed with testicular cancer in 2005 but thankfully he made a full recovery.
Ten years after his original diagnosis, Damian is now looking to raise cancer awareness and encourage others to seek help.
He has produced a match highlights video on a game from each round of this season’s FA Cup, starting with Heaton Stannington against Norton & Stockton Ancients in the extra preliminary round.
A fortnight ago, he attended the Saddlers’ second round tie against Chesterfield at the Proact Stadium, which finished in a 1-1 draw.
Damian’s video from the game can be found below – and you can find more of his work on his YouTube channel, ‘Heed Saddler’.
Saddlers.co.uk recently caught up with Damian to find out more...
Q: So Damian, what inspired you to start producing these videos?
DI: “It’s a very important subject to me and something that a lot of people, particularly young men, don’t like to talk about. In my case, I picked it up early, had some chemotherapy and an operation, and it was sorted out relatively quickly. I wanted to get my message across by talking about it and producing these videos, linking it to football.
Q: Tell us about your FA Cup journey so far.
DI: I wanted to follow a route through, starting with one team and following them on to the next round. I live in Gateshead so decided to contact a lot of north east clubs. Heaton Stannington got back to me and I went down there, did some filming and it was a really good day. I saw them at Whitley Bay and then followed Gainsborough Trinity for four games – against Wrexham, Boston, Droylsden and Shrewsbury. I couldn’t film at Shrewsbury’s game at Grimsby for whatever reason so contacted Chesterfield about their match against Walsall and went there.
Q: Finally, what are you ultimately hoping to achieve from producing these videos?
DI: It’s about getting the message out there. It’s been quite a lot of hard work so far, doing the filming, editing and trying to publicise it. It’s all about raising awareness. It’s something people don’t talk about so it’s a way of saying ‘I did it, get yourself down to the doctors and get yourself sorted out’. People don’t like hearing that there’s something wrong with them but at the end of the day, if there is a problem, then you have to do something about it.