Bristol City Robins Foundation joined young people across the globe in celebrating World Book Day, with the help of the Premier League.

To mark World Book Day 2026, the Robins Foundation have gifted over 50 books to all of their partner schools equating to 1,240 books in total. The giveaway, which has been supported by the World Book Day Charity and National Year of Reading initiative, forms part of the League’s partnership with the National Literacy Trust on Premier League Primary Stars literacy activity.

At a time when reading for pleasure levels are at a two-decade low, and 1 in 10 children and young people don’t have a book of their own at home, supporting children and young people to find the joy in reading is more important than ever. Research shows that reading for pleasure can benefit a child’s reading skills, wellbeing, empathy, confidence, and aptitude for learning. Since Premier League Primary Stars began in 2017, more than 460,000 free books have been gifted to young people across England and Wales.

The Robins Foundation held a reading session with adults from their Walking Football programme and pupils from Victoria Park Primary School.

Former players, Trevor Tainton and Dave Rogers, shared some motivational words with pupils whilst detailing their incredible careers at City. Both had been in attendance at Robins Memories, the Foundation’s loneliness session that focuses on bringing older adults together to socialise in partnership with the Former Players Association.

The pupils then introduced themselves to the Foundation’s Walking Footballers and showed them the book they would be reading together: Unbelievable Football: The Most Amazing World Cup Stories You Never Knew by Matt Oldfield.

Both pupils and Walking Footballers alike enjoyed learning football facts.

The Foundation’s Community Engagement Lead Roza Bailey shared:

“We’ve been wanting to bring our older participants to meet with our younger participants for some time now. Seeing this event finally come to fruition has been incredibly rewarding.

“The launch of the Foundations loneliness awareness campaign last year was so much more than a video. Everything we do is about building community and engaging people of all ages in positive activity so combining two groups who otherwise would not cross over, was fantastic.”

Source: https://www.bcfc.co.uk/foundation-news/foundation-celebrates-world-book-day-2026/

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