Keighley chairman Gary Fawcett hopes to raise £1m for family of the late Danny Jones
Thursday 7 May 2015 19:26, UK
Keighley chairman Gary Fawcett is hoping to raise £1m for the family of the late Danny Jones, who died on Sunday.
The Wales international half-back lost his life after suffering a cardiac arrest during Keighley's League 1 match at London Skolars, leaving behind wife Lizzie and five-month-old twins.
Initial results from a post-mortem, released on Thursday, revealed Jones was suffering from hereditary heart disease that was not revealed when he underwent an ECG scan late last year.
"At the time of writing, the fund that has been set up for Lizzie, Bobby and Phoebe stands at £72,000 and I know that there is a huge amount of fundraising to be done over the coming weeks," Fawcett said in a statement.
"We all know that there will be a wave of donations from all the rugby league clubs, in particular, over the course of next week which will smash the RFL's current £100k target for the fund. This is fantastic and amazing and yet it is simply not good enough.
"I met Lizzie yesterday. She said that she didn't want Danny's death to be in vain and would like to see the changes in sport that would ensure that what happened to Danny on Sunday would never happen again.
"The fund will provide future financial stability for Lizzie and the twins and it will give Lizzie the financial capability to enable the necessary changes in the sport to ensure that what happened to Danny will not happen again.
"The fund needs to be much, much bigger for the objectives to be achieved. Our club is planning at least five months fundraising and, although we will raise a significant amount of cash, it still will not be enough.
"Last night, during my interview on Boots 'n' All, I stated an objective of £250k for the fund. Overnight I have thought about it and the fund needs to be over £1m."
