IMAGINE going to a football match but not seeing any of the goals? That’s the dilemma facing around one million people in the UK who are blind or partially sighted, as well as the estimated 700,000 people who have sight problems that have an impact on their daily lives.

For most football fans, there’s nothing quite like attending a live match. Coverage of the game on TV or listening on the radio can never quite provide that match day experience. From the smell of the pies to the roar of the crowd, there’s nothing quite like saying, ‘I was there’.

It’s something most of us take for granted. However, for a blind or partially sighted football supporter the story is different.

Sadly, many visually impaired supporters currently choose to stay away from games, simply because of the inaccessibility of most grounds and the lack of a dedicated commentary.

Provision for blind and partially sighted supporters varies immensely but, sadly, very few clubs achieve a standard where blind and partially sighted people could feel really included in the game.

All this is about to change at Wrexham’s famous old Racecourse Ground, where last Saturday, during a game against Eastleigh, the club launched a new initiative where ‘describers’ provide free Audio Descriptive Commentary (ADC) for any blind or partially sighted fans, who can now enjoy their match day experience by listening to fully trained descriptive commentators.

“The first questions we get asked about ADC, is ‘what is it?’ and ‘how is it different to what I hear anyway?’,” said Alan March, of providers Alan March Sport, who work at a number of grounds and clubs, including Wembley Stadium, Leicester City and Nottingham Forest.

“Our audio describers are trained to keep up with play to the second, and focus on the action - if something happens in the match, the listener will know exactly what happened, where it occurred and how it transpired.

“All our commentators are trained to the highest standard to deliver not only the commentary itself, but also before and after care to visually impaired spectators, so our listeners don’t miss anything that happens on the field, but are kept fully up-to-date with any information they need to know off it.

“AD commentary’s big strength, if done well, is keeping pace with the ball, with the correct emotion for the type of play and being ‘on the ball’ when the defining moments happen.

“All the things that people take for granted who aren’t blind or partially sighted. Things that can be missed or perceived unimportant to those that don’t know the difficulties some face, trying to enjoy the beautiful game.”

Steven Jamieson, who works for Alan March Sport and is part of the audio description team at Nottingham Forest, was on hand at the Racecourse Ground to oversee the launch.

“Wrexham AFC and their Disabled Supporters’ Association (DSA) have been really active in trying to get the very best experience for their members and they’ve been in touch with us for a couple of years now trying to make this work,” said Steven.

“It’s amazing when you see a club adopt AD when it’s not just a way of ticking a box, which it quite often is.

“The DSA were so passionate about it, got behind it and threw everything they could at it to get as many people informed and educated.”

As well as providing additional narration, AD describes all significant visual information such as body language, facial expression, scenery, action, clothing and colours, with Steven, to quote a football cliche, over the moon at the response it received from Wrexham fans.

“The feedback was amazing and it was genuinely inspiring too,” he said. “We had one guy come along who said he’s been a Wrexham fan for 70 years but he had stopped going at the end of last season.

“He decided to come back on Saturday because he knew the service was there and for me that was an absolutely amazing story.

“There was also a little girl there with a visual impairment and her dad was saying how much she enjoyed the game and was now really into football because of the commentary. When you hear stuff like that it makes everything you do so worthwhile.

“It means absolutely everything to those people who like live sport. Imagine if you’d been into sport all your life and then you lost your eyesight? I honestly don’t know what I’d do but I know I wouldn’t want to give up football but for a lot of people that’s exactly what they’re forced to do.”

Steven has an interesting exercise he suggests anyone wanting to know what it’s like for these fans at a match to try out.

“Just shut your eyes next time you’re at a game,” he adds. “You’ll find it’s really quite disorientating and frightening.

“There are all these sounds, smells and the atmosphere kicking off around you and it can be overwhelming. To have a specialist service like the one that is provided at Wrexham is so important and I’m delighted for them.”

To compliment this initiative, Wrexham AFC are also launching their match day programme in audio CD format, enabling you to purchase an audio CD and listen to the match day programme at your leisure.

It will be charged in line with the club’s printed programmes at the price of £3 and available to purchase each home game from the club shop and soon will also be available online.

If you are interested in using the ADC service, please email wxmdsa@gmail.com