Football: Newport weight loss team wins UK-wide tournament

A team of footballers who began playing to lose weight have won a tournament featuring teams from across the UK.

Newport's Conquered All The Chippys beat Portsmouth's Purple Cobras 3-1 to bring the Man v Fat title back to Wales from the FA's national football centre, St George's Park.

The teams all play as part of a national programme for men with a Body Mass Index of more than 27.5.

Coach James Stanford said the men were "over the moon" at Sunday's win.

Team captain David Scanlon scored two of the goals while the third was scored by Tom Atkins.

Vice-captain Matt Cronin, of Cwmbran, Torfaen, said it was nice just to get picked for the team.

"No-one knew what was going to happen so to go on and win it was a big surprise," the 33-year-old said.

"If I was not so tired after such a long day I would have had a few more drinks to celebrate."

The electrician has lost 3st 8lb (23kg) since he started losing weight, bringing him down to 17st 2lb (109kg).

Coach James Stanford claimed it wasn't only about winning a tournament", but was "about the camaraderie and having an experience that makes us better friends".

A second team from Newport, the Champagne Super Rovers, made the semi-finals of the competition.

Players are weighed weekly before a 30-minute game of six-a-side.

There are goal bonuses given to teams based on the amount of weight players have lost.

"We selected who would take part in the tournament randomly from a pool of players who had lost a minimum of 5% of their weight each since they began," Mr Stanford said.

"This meant that we didn't only pick the best footballers, but rewarded those who had achieved their weight loss goals."

Launched in November 2020, there are 88 players in the Newport league.

Between them, they have lost 94st 9lb (601kg) since joining the Man v Fat programme - or just over seven Gareth Bales.

The winning team lost about about 18st 12lb (120kg) between them - about one-and-half Aaron Ramseys.

Mr Stanford added: "As it turned out, several of our players had lost 10% of their weight, some even 15%."

Man v Fat has more than 6,000 players in 100 leagues across the UK and is designed to help men with a body mass index of more than 27.5 lose weight.