People often ask why I chose to name the sports charity Wrightchoice. The answer is that although our organisation's expertise lies in sports, we are focused on excelling young people and assisting them in making the correct life choices. Life is full of choices; career choices, relationship choices and education choices. Taking myself as an example, at 18 I had the option of joining Reading Football Club on a non-contract basis or signing a month-to-month professional contract at Chelsea. Chelsea were not willing to offer a longer-term deal as my attitude and level of ability was still in question. At the time I needed a support system in order to ‘make the Wrightchoice’. On reflection, I realised that it might have been better for me to join Reading in order to give myself a better opportunity of becoming a professional footballer.  Our vision is to work with young people and support them in making the ‘Wrightchoice’.

The reason our ‘right’ is spelt with a ‘W’ is because Ian Wright has inspired me. For someone to come into the game fairly late and flourish in the way he did is remarkable. I believe that Ian has excelled because of his incredible self-belief, energy and enthusiasm. He demonstrated a never-say-die attitude on the pitch and played with unbelievable passion. After retiring from the game he has continued to illustrate his passion with his work in the media. It’s his ‘we’re gonna make it’ attitude which I think has encouraged me in my life and has been an inspiration for the development of Wrightchoice as an organisation.

Ian Wright’s spirit, attitude and achievements are things that I feel youths can identify with, because his accomplishments demonstrate that anything is possible if you believe in yourself and work hard. I have never met Ian Wright but I hope one day we will be able to meet and we can show him that we are doing fantastic things for our community.

Simon Chandler – Founder.