A SCHOOL badminton team has been given a helping hand by Darlington Building Society.

Staff at the town’s Tubwell Row branch have donated £100 to Hummersknott Academy’s badminton club, which will go towards their upcoming European tour.

Relying on funding from the local community, the team are playing against teams from across the country at a tournament in Sheffield, which will be followed by a European tour visiting Munich, Salzburg, Vienna, Bratislava and Prague.

Rebecca Johnson, branch manager at Tubwell Row, said: “The team have put in lots of effort to raise funds for the trip and we thought it was an excellent cause within our local community and were happy to support them.”

The team’s vice-captain Richard Smith said: “As a club, we do lots of bag packing and raising funds by offering a prize or a service in return, but donations such as the ones made by Darlington Building Society are incentives to do the best we can on court and, more so, do the best we can as international ambassadors.”