FRIENDS of Kyle Rees who was tragically killed in an accident at school earlier this year have kicked off their fundraising efforts.

The 16-year-old died when he was struck on the head by a cricket ball at Portchester School and was treated at Southampton Hospital’s paediatric intensive care unit.

Now, as reported in the Daily Echo, close friends at Portchester, which is now known as Harewood College, and neighbouring girls’ school Avonbourne College, have started selling wristbands and pebbles painted as bugs to raise cash for the unit in his memory.

The bugs are painted by Kyle’s mum, Tanya Cooper, and each has his name and date of birth, December 14, 1995, on the bottom.

Kyle’s friends, Daniel May, Louis Rylance, Tom Mansfield, Reece McAneny and Sintija Morgan, dubbed Team 4K, spent Saturday at Sainsbury’s Castlepoint selling the bands and bugs, one of several stops at supermarkets around the area.

Sintija said: “This is for Kyle; this is to make him proud and we’re doing it for his mum.

“It’s to help someone else – he didn’t survive, but someone else might with the money we raise.

“He was taken to Southampton after the accident. It’s about helping others who might be in the same situation. We know what it’s like to lose a friend, so we don’t want anyone else to go through that.”

The group designed and produced the wristbands and have been loaned £1,000 by Dragons’ Den star Peter Jones as part of his Tycoon in Schools contest.

They hope to turn it into a £4,000 profit.

And that profit looks to be well underway as the team raised £512 on the first day.

  • You can buy wristbands and follow Team 4K’s progress on Facebook at facebook.com/4k charity and on Twitter by following @4K_charity.