Tennis pro Andy Murray to donate £50 to refugee crisis for every ace he scores this year

Andy Murray will donate £50 (about $110 in Singapore currency) towards efforts to help child refugees and their families for every ace he scores until the end of this year. The British tennis star is supporting the charity Unicef and their work with the thousands of children arriving in Europe as the refugee crisis escalates.

Tennis pro Andy Murray

Unicef has also worked to provide food, water, sanitation, medicine and other basic needs for children still living in conflict zones such as Syria, where hundreds of thousands have been displaced by civil war and the threat of terrorism.

A Unicef field trip to Malawi

Murray said he felt compelled to help after seeing distressing images of families fleeing persecution in the Middle East in recent weeks. An image of the dead Syrian toddler Aylan Kurdi highlighted the desperation of refugees left with no other choice but to make the perilous journey to Europe.

Andy Murray at the US Open 2012

He told Unicef,

“Having seen the images broadcast on the news in recent weeks I felt I had to do something to help the millions of children and their families who have been forced to flee their homes and had their lives turned upside down. I’ll get that little bit more satisfaction from each ace I hit knowing that it will be helping Unicef keep children safe.”

War-torn Syria

Savings and investment company Standard Life, one of Murray’s partners, along with the Association of Tennis Professionals (ATP) and UK’s Lawn Tennis Association (LTA) will match Murray's donations pound for pound, meaning every ace that the tennis player hits will amount to a donation of £200 (S$440) for Unicef!

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A spokesperson for Unicef said,

“Andy has done a few things for us recently, such as videos for us which have had big fundraising asks attached to them. This specific campaign is inspired by press coverage he has seen of children caught up in the refugee crisis. He really wants to help.”

Click here to read about what an Egyptian billionaire has up his sleeves to help the refugees.

(All images - credit: Wikimedia Commons under Creative Commons licence)