Deaf footballer gains top coaching badge (From The Argus)

Deaf footballer gains top coaching badge

2:00pm Friday 26th June 2009

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Roanna Simmons is hoping to be a role model for deaf footballers after claiming a national first.

The 31-year-old from Brighton, pictured, has passed her level 3 UEFA B licence in football coaching.

She is the first deaf female in the country to attain such a qualification.

Now Simmons hopes other deaf or disabled females will follow her lead by going into sports coaching.

Simmons is a Great Britain deaf international who played in the 2005 Deaflympics and she will take part in the 2009 tournament in Taiwan in August.

She is also coach for Fulham Deaf Ladies FC, who she guided to the league title and two cup finals last season and was named coach of the year at the end of the campaign.

The UEFA B coaching course took 11 months to complete, including a one-week residential stint at Keele University, and out of the seven deaf coaches on the course three of them completed it.

It was set up in partnership with the National Deaf Children’s Society (NDCS) and the Football Association and there were also hearing coaches on the course.

Simmons is now qualified to coach anyone deaf, disabled or hard of hearing.

She said: “Because I sustained a serious knee injury last November, this was a positive distraction knowing I couldn’t play football for seven months and when I passed it was mind blowing for me.

“My family supported me throughout the course and are over the moon.

“Now I can set the trend of disabled/deaf female coaches to do the same as me. Nothing is ever impossible because of my deafness.”

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