Major milestone for Burnley FC fan running to every Premier League ground

When Scott Cunliffe (44) arrives at the Emirates on Saturday morning for Burnley’s game with Arsenal he will have run more than 1,800 miles so far this season.

In recent weeks, the former St Theodore’s High School pupil has appeared on Sky News, Sky Sports News and BBC Radio 2’s Chris Evans’ Breakfast Show to promote his RunAway Challenge and on Sunday night was a special guest at BBC’s annual Sports Personality of the Year show.

“It was an incredible honour to be invited to the BBC’s Sport Personality of the Year show. Unfortunately, the show was running a bit late so they didn’t have time to ask me any questions. It was still nice to get a mention though.”

After running 212 miles to Wembley for the Spurs game, Scott arrived home on Saturday – courtesy of a lift from Boundary Clarets – at 11-30pm. He was up again at 5am on the Sunday ready to set off to the Emirates.

“So I could get to the Sports Personality of the Year show, I ran to Ashton on the Sunday morning and then got a train down from Manchester to Birmingham for the show. I got up at 4-30 am today so I could then get a train and a tram back to Ashton and continue the run.

“Doing these two London trips back to back has been hard work. It will end up being around 425 miles in two weeks.

“I’m starting to feel a bit tired. My body feels good and my legs are fresh but I’ve just not been getting enough sleep really.”

With nine more away runs still to complete, Scott is well on track to smash his £10,000 fundraising target and is actually now looking at increasing the total to £25,000.

“The support I’ve had has been incredible. There have been quite a few fans from different clubs supporting me which has been nice. A couple of Blackburn Rovers fans have even donated money.

“With Gift Aid we’ve pretty much passed the £10,000 target so we’re going to look at increasing it to £25,000 over the Christmas period.”

All the money Scott raises will go to Burnley FC in the Community, the official charity of Burnley FC. They will then distribute 50% of the funds raised by the RunAway challenge to local charities in Burnley.

The other 50% will be divided between the community trusts at each of the Premier League clubs.

Anybody wishing to donate can do so by visiting www.justgiving.com/fundraising/therunawaychallenge