Just over £14,500 donated to NHS and Saints Foundation from rugby club-themed face masks sales

Northampton Saints-themed face masks has raised £14,540 jointly for the NHS and the Saints Foundation following 'incredible' numbers of sales by rugby fans.

Saints' online store sold more than 4,000 black, green and gold masks, which featured a club crest design with all profits donated to the club's charitable arm and Northamptonshire Health Charity.

Saints Foundation managing director Catherine Deans said: “The generosity of Northampton Saints raising funds through face mask sales and donating to the foundation has helped to sustain us through our most difficult period to date.

“The pandemic has caused unprecedented challenges for our charity and the programmes we offer to educate, inspire and support young people across Northamptonshire.

"With schools and further education providers closing, and the majority of our fundraising events getting cancelled, our core revenue streams were hit fast and hard.

“We have remained open for our most vulnerable students, so we are incredibly grateful for this support – to all of those who bought the face masks, and to the club, thank you.”

While the masks did not offer medical-grade protection, ensuring supplies of personal protection equipment are not taken away from front-line key workers, they were designed to complement protective measures and social distancing rules.

Northamptonshire Health Charity has allocated the money to the community midwifery unit currently set-up at Franklin’s Gardens.

Head of fundraising Alison McCulloch said: “We want to give Saints huge thanks for raising funds to support our community midwives during these times, and in such an innovative way.

“The amount raised by selling these unique face masks is incredible and will go a long way to helping us to fund the alternative accommodation that our community midwifery teams need.

“We are very proud to be supporting our local NHS teams and we couldn’t do it without the support of our local community, so thank you very much to Northampton Saints!”