Sports stars Owen Finegan and Wendell Sailor step up to help young cancer sufferers with auction
With COVID-19 seeing a drastic decrease in donations, 1999 Wallabies World Cup-winner Owen Finegan has stepped up to help raise funds for one particular cause close to his heart.
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Among the silent victims of the COVID-19 pandemic are charities who raise vital funds for children like Hugo Kulscar, diagnosed with leukaemia in 2018.
The 13-year-old rugby player relies on donations to The Kids’ Cancer Project to pay for his treatment, so Wallabies legend Owen Finegan has stepped in to offer signed 1999 World Cup and 2001 Brumbies premiership jerseys, and the chance to have him cook dinner for a family in an online auction.
“I can’t think of a more important cause, I am auctioning some of my memorabilia for kids like Hugo,” Finegan said.
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“Hugo loves all sport and played rugby with my son. A diagnosis of leukaemia has seen Hugo undergo two years of treatment and put a pause on a normal lifestyle. Now he counts himself lucky.
“These jerseys obviously hold sentimental value to me, however, for a lot of these kids with cancer will never grow up and have the opportunity that these jerseys afforded me.
“We believe science is the solution for kids with cancer. This year we have committed to funding 35 research projects, across 22 institutions in every state of Australia.”
Hugo said: “I count myself lucky that through this journey I have had my family and so much support. We are fortunate that research improved the treatments I received and in the future kids with cancer will continue to need science.”
The Kids Cancer Project partnerships executive, the former Brumbies halfback Patrick Phibbs, said the coronavirus had seen a drastic decrease in donations.
“Fundraising has been extremely challenging during COVID-19 and has made us reassess the way in which we fundraise in a very short amount of time,” Phibbs said.
“All the social distancing restrictions from COVID-19 automatically cancelled all our events, affected our partners, supporters and individuals’ resulting in a loss of critical funding.
“Like the scientists we fund, we have become more innovative during these difficult times to find new ways of fundraising so we can continue the fight against childhood cancer.”
A huge range of prizes are up for auction, including a round of golf with former Wallaby and NRL star Wendell Sailor, with bidding to end on Friday at 6pm.
Visit https://app.galabid.com/tkcp/items for full details.