PLAYERS and staff of Malvern Town Football Club turned out en masse to be tested as potential donors for a sick five-year-old boy.

Oscar Saxelby-Lee needs a stem-cell donor very quickly to treat an aggressive and rare cancer, T-cell acute lymphoblastic lymphoma (T-ALL).

Following his diagnosis in December, Oscar's parents launched an appeal called Hand in Hand for Oscar, aimed at getting people to register as donors.

Almost 5,000 people turned up at the weekend to a testing session session at Pitmaston Primary School in Worcester, Oscar's school, to see if they were a donor match for Him.

The footballers were on their way to a match at Bilston Town FC when they called in to be tested.

Club chairman Chris Pinder said: “We felt that it was important to do what we could to try and help. As a parent of young children myself, the story hit a real chord, even more so as it is local.

“We arranged it so that all of our players and staff travelling to Bilston Town for our game later in the afternoon called in on the way.

“To hear that almost 5,000 people turned up to be tested shows the real sense of community and how this story has captured people’s hearts. Hopefully a donor match can be found.”

DKMS, the charity that tests the potential donor swabs, has confirmed that the Pitmaston session produced the largest number of potential donors it has ever had; the previous record was 2,200 people.

Mum Olivia Saxelby said: "Oscar is a fun, loving, energetic five-year-old boy who deserves to live to the full alongside the other troopers fighting such horrific diseases.

"Not only does he need to enjoy a normal life a child should live, he now needs someone else to save him."