The trophy, to Neil Richardson, was a surprise. He had been told he was expected at Carlisle United's Community Sports Trust awards simply as one of several dozen guests.

Instead, he was called to the stage and honoured with the club's mental health football achievement award. "It was a bit nerve-wracking," Neil says. "It's a good job the telly cameras weren't there."

Some years ago, the thought of being in a room with so many football people, and walking forward as a shining example, would have been alien to the 34-year-old.

Yet the game has helped to transform his life. And Carlisle United's part in his story is not to be underestimated, either.

It began when Neil moved from his Whitehaven home to Carlisle in his late teens. In this period his mind was a much darker place.

"I was just ill, mate," he says, recounting his tale easily. "I wouldn't know how to describe it. It's not good, though. Hearing voices, stuff like that. Just very poor mental health, really."

Neil adds that "life got on top of me" at this time and, in Carlisle, he was sectioned under the mental health act, and admitted to the Carleton Clinic in Harraby.

Warren Thompson, activities co-ordinator at the clinic's Hadrian Unit, remembers Neil as a young inpatient. "He used to isolate himself a lot, and be very reliant on medication," he says. "He was very conscious of his weight as well, and wouldn't go out into groups because of that."

The psychosis suffered by Neil from about 18 brought, he says, a "stigma", adding that some around him struggled to accept his condition. Yet the introduction of something simple had a remarkable effect.

"One day Warren just said, 'Are you coming for a game of football?'," Neil says, "and that's how it started."

What started was a regular football session, originally attended by a small handful of inpatients "on the old abandoned tennis courts" at the mental health clinic. The sessions grew popular enough to enable Warren to relocate them to Greystone Community Centre, to cope with the increased numbers.

Later, Neil says, some health and safety and insurance problems arose, and the sessions had to be stopped. "It was crap when it got cancelled," he says. But about three years ago, the clinic was contacted by Carlisle United's community sports trust, the club's registered charity, to ask if there would be enough people interested in attending a starter football session at the Blues' Neil Sports Centre, as part of a new mental health project.

The timing was perfect, and nearly 30 people came. Now, with United's official support, the mental health football group attracts almost the same number every week. Carlisle's ebullient CST manager, John Halpin, helps with the coaching, and teams represent the Blues at tournaments; at Everton last summer, at Middlesbrough this.

Neil, a big man with a few piercings, has thrived in the group, making friends and emerging as a natural organiser. "It has given me confidence," he says. "And the confidence has gone into other parts of my life."

He explains that, after being discharged from the clinic, he progressed from living in supported accommodation to his own flat, and whereas before he was under the attention of 24-hour mental health staff, he is now able to call a community psychiatric nurse only if he needs to.

"I'm champion now," Neil says. "I still know I'm ill, and I still take my medication. But without [the football group], I wouldn't be where I am right now, in my head."

Warren, who has known Neil since his most challenging times, says the sessions that United support are invaluable. "It's the social side," he says. "They all build up friendships, build up their confidence.

"Some lads say, for example, that at weekends their moods aren't great, but they come to the football and it lifts them. I know one lad who had never come out of his bedroom for two years. He had no confidence. But he came to the football, and now he's coaching young kids. It's surprising how it helps."

Through openness, and more enlightened attitudes in wider society, the "stigma" regarding mental health problems is slowly being reduced. Yet the war is far from won.

"Years ago I was sitting on a bus near Harraby, and there was this fella who had a bit of a limp, through a road traffic accident," Warren says. "Someone looked at him and said, 'He must be one of those ******* from the clinic.' I went and spoke to him and told him he was out of order, that he didn't know that man from Adam and he shouldn't be judging anybody like that. He apologised.

"I've seen that a lot - not as much as I used to, thankfully - but it's still there, in all walks of life."

Football, Warren says, acts as a "therapeutic tool" that can help reduce such stigma. "Some lads - and girls - here won't play in mainstream football, but they feel part of something here. They feel valued and accepted."

Both Neil and Warren are encouraged when prominent sports people with mental health problems speak out, where possible. As an example they praise the boxer Frank Bruno for his openness about bipolar disorder. "People can relate to these sports stars. They might feel, 'I can get over this, because he has'."

There is pride, Warren says, when their group contest tournaments in United's kit. Feeling that they are part of Cumbria's professional football club is an uplifting thought. "I love playing with the badge on," Neil says. "I love it."

He has not yet, he says, found an appropriate place for his trophy, which he received from Blues midfielder Jason Kennedy at last month's ceremony - but progressing through life in better health is the real reward.

"He's lost a hell of a lot of weight and is more confident in himself," Warren says, as Neil disappears into the sports hall at the University of Cumbria's Fusehill Street campus - a base for the group while the Neil Centre and Brunton Park are repaired after the floods.

"It's hard to speculate, but the alternative would probably be Neil being back in his bedroom, not coming out of the house as much, not having as many friends - and probably more hospital admissions.

"He has come on leaps and bounds. He's a perfect example of how football has helped."