BATLEY BULLDOGS chairman Kevin Nicholas would be happy to see Rugby League fans get shirty as the club aim to push the amount they have raised for breast cancer charities past the £250,000 mark.
They are closing in on that target after bringing in just short of £31,000 through this year’s events, including the annual Beverley’s Pink Weekend around August’s home meeting with Keighley.
The event was started in 2014 by Beverley Nicholas, the wife of long-serving official Kevin.
Beverley, a tireless worker for both the club and her fundraising project, died after suffering from breast cancer in May 2019.
Now Batley are staging an online raffle for one of their shirts from 2016, the season they reached the old ‘middle eights’ (also know as Qualifiers) and so faced four Super Leagues sides (Huddersfield, Hull KR, Leeds and Salford, Hull KR and Huddersfield) under the late John Kear.
It was among those on the coffin of the former England and Wales coach at his funeral in June following his death aged 71 and has been donated by his widow Dawn.
Hugely-respected Kear had two spells at the Batley helm, forming a strong bond with Nicholas, who said: “The amount raised so far this year is outstanding and has got us to just short of that £250,000 mark.
“Getting to that in 13 years would be a fantastic achievement, and hopefully this raffle will help us do it.
“It’s a shirt from a special year for us and we are so grateful to Dawn for kindly donating it.”
The club is staging a fireworks spectacular, including live music and fairground rides, at their ground on Saturday, November 7.