Kicking Off Communication: Behind the Scenes of Football at the 1989 Deaf Games

With just nine months to go before the Christchurch World Deaf Games, volunteers were urgently recruited as communicators in a time when qualified interpreters were scarce. Jeff was appointed Technical Coordinator for football, a demanding role that had him working 12 full days to support clear communication between players, coaches, referees, and officials across 12 teams. He arrived early in Christchurch to help sharpen his communicator’s NZSL skills ahead of the event. While football wasn’t NZ’s strongest sport, the team gave it everything and proudly represented the host nation.