FCK, DIF Soldier Project and Copenhagen Municipality work together for veterans
F.C. Copenhagen will launch a specially designed shirt on 1 November as a tribute to the city's veteran soldiers.
The celebration is part of a new collaboration between FCK, the Danish Sports Confederation and the City of Copenhagen, where sports, communities and networking will help veterans in their fight to return to a normal civilian life.
DIF Soldier Project, Copenhagen Municipality and FCK have joined forces on this project ahead of the Veteran Match. The three partners want to honour the Copenhagen veterans and create a good framework for helping the municipality's veterans back into the labor market.
"We all have a huge responsibility to ensure that our veterans have the best possible life and become part of the community in Copenhagen," says Lars Bo Jeppesen, director of F.C. Copenhagen.
"We can contribute to this by supporting this event and thus reaching out to those people who deserve our respect and help when they have given so much to us. We are happy and proud to be a part of the project and we look forward to welcoming the veterans here to Parken Stadium."
Veteran weekend
The Veteran Match event will form part of a veteran weekend this coming this weekend to Parken Stadium.
The event is divided into two parts, with a job fair on Friday, and a matchday event for our 3F Superliga game against Lyngby on Sunday at 16:00.
Multiple purposes
The Veterans Weekend has several purposes. It is partially to provide an opportunity for the public to thank the City of Copenhagen's veterans and partly to give the veterans a networking opportunity in civilian working life.
At the job fair, the veterans will be connected with a number of Copenhagen companies, all of which offer internships or job openings. Hopefully we can match the veterans' dreams, wishes and skills with that of employers.
"As the mayor of the business community, I have wholeheartedly thrown myself into the fight to improve conditions for the veterans in Copenhagen," says Cecilia Lonning-Skovgaard, mayor of KBH's employment and integration administration.
"We have already begun a lot of projects - a special veteran phone line and veteran coordinators are at our job centres - and now we are creating a tradition where we honour the city's veterans every year and help them create a network in the civilian business community and find concrete internships and job openings. I'm proud of that."
Specially designed FCK shirt
On Sunday, the veterans will be honoured by FCK playing in a specially designed match shirt, which will subsequently be signed and sold at auction on Lauritz.com.
In addition, a commemorative badge will be specially designed, which can be bought for the rest of the year in the FCK Fan Shop and in Starbucks cafes across the country. The profit goes to strengthen the work with injured veterans' association participation under the auspices of DIF Soldier Project.
Helping veterans return to good civilian life
Meanwhile, the DIF Soldier Project was to be at the core of major sports event for the veterans in Parken during the veterans' weekend, but it has been postponed due to the the coronavirus restrictions.
"It is of course a pity that we cannot get the veterans in sportswear as well," says Niels Nygaard, chairman of DIF.
"But we look forward to future sporting activities and DIF Soldier Project will play a significant role in the further veterans cooperation between FCK, Copenhagen Municipality and DIF.
"The experience from our successful DIF Soldiers Project is that sports and communities in particular can break down significant barriers among veterans in their struggle to return to a good civilian life."
More planned in future years
According to the plan, the Veteran Match will continue in the coming years. It is also the goal that more Danish Superliga clubs and top clubs in other sports become part of the Veteran Match.