Popular sponsors of Reading Football Club, Select Car Leasing, are donating their matchday rights to mental health and suicide prevention charity, Beder, next month.

A local company who have been involved with the club for almost a decade, SCL own naming rights to the Select Car Leasing Stadium and front of shirt.

However, they have regularly gone above and beyond, even assisting the club in covering bills in the past 12 months as the club continues to battle off-field crises.

In the latest gesture of goodwill, the company will donate their front of shirt sponsorship and matchday rights to mental health and suicide prevention charity Beder as Bolton Wanderers visit Berkshire on Saturday, February 1.

The charity were founded in 2019  by Razzak Mirjan and his family following the tragic loss of Razzak’s brother, Beder Mirjan, who took his own life aged just 18 in 2017.

This ties in with Time To Talk Day on the February 6, a chance for all of us to be more open about our mental health and talk about how we really feel.

Mr Mirjan, told the club: “We’re incredibly grateful to Select Car Leasing for giving us this unique opportunity and we can’t wait to see the Reading players wearing our one-off Beder shirts.

“The idea is simple. We hope that by seeing the Beder logo on the players’ chests and throughout the stadium it sparks enough curiosity from supporters that they Google our name and find out what we do. It’s about kick-starting new conversations about mental health and suicide prevention and making more people feel comfortable about opening-up.”

Mark Tongue, CEO and Founder of Select Car Leasing, added: “Football brings people together, uniting fans from all walks of life with a shared sense of belonging and identity. So what better way to spread the word about one of the UK’s leading mental health and suicide prevention charities than by putting Beder’s name and logo on the front of a team’s shirt?

“Personally speaking, my own family has been touched by the loss of a loved one through suicide, so this is a topic close to my own heart.

“When we learned about the charity’s aims and ambitions, we jumped at the chance to put Beder in the spotlight at the Select Car Leasing stadium for this special, one-off occasion. It’s a chance for people to start thinking more deeply about mental health, to check in with friends and family, and to open-up about how they might be feeling. These aren’t easy conversations but it’s vital that we all have them.”