Homeless USA Cup in Washington, DC this week!
Posted by USA - 25/06/2008
The USA Team for the Homeless World Cup 2008 will be selected this weekend!
Keep up to speed with the action at this years USA Cup by linking to our blog. See pictures of the stadium and read stories about all of the fantastic players who will travel across America to take part in the Homeless USA Cup 2008.
For 8 players the dream will continue on to Melbourne to travel with Street Soccer USA and represent the country at the Homeless World Cup.
Check back Monday June 30 for pictures of award winners and the 2008 National Team.
http://www.communityworks945.org/StreetSoccer945/blog/index.html
Profiled here are the teams from Los Angeles and St. Louis, two of eleven cities that are traveling to Washington, DC this week to compete in the Cup.
Los Angeles
The LA team is organized out of Jovenes Inc. a spanish language teen shelter in LA.
Some say Andrea Marchetti's team is the team to beat. If the team's talent is as big and strong as the heart of player Johny Figueroa they should have nothing but success on the pitch in DC. Below is an excerpt from the note Johny wrote expressing his interest in the coming to the Homeless USA Cup.
"I came to this country looking for a better future. As you also know I have experienced the hardships of sleeping on the street. Being homeless is really depressing, at that time I felt very miserable because sometimes I was unable to eat. I felt angry at myself because I was living in such bad conditions, until I did not believe in myself anymore. But now I have a stable job and I am full-time student at Pasadena City College, thanks to wonderful people that have made me believe in myself.
Soccer has always been my passion. I been playing since I remember. I believe that soccer has taught me many valuable lessons. I learned that it is important to fight and work for what you believe in. I have learned more skills than soccer, such as teamwork and communication skills. I have learned that it's good to broaden one's horizon by meeting and becoming friends with people from other schools and communities. I believe that I have demonstrated my love for the game by my leadership, hard work and dedication. I have demonstrated my passion for learning by dedicating myself to excellence in learning. Because of all I believe that soccer has been I big influence in shifting my life from homeless to a successful student and soccer player. "
St. Louis
Keith Deisner, director of development at Peter & Paul Community Services in Soulard, is a soccer nut. Colleagues know him as the guy who wears a different European soccer jersey to work every Friday, the one who had to get satellite television in order to watch the World Cup.
Deisner and David Flomo, a former child soldier from Liberia, started St. Louis' first homeless soccer team in May. Their players come from the shelter operated by Peter & Paul at 8th and Allen streets. Every Friday night the men stow their belongings in the shelter, then head out to a nearby parking lot that doubles as their playing field. For 90 minutes they run laps and drills under the tutelage of Flomo and four assistant coaches, including Deisner.
Deisner and Flomo find themselves proselytizing for the program every chance they get: "Whenever I tell people about it, they give me this look like I'm pulling their leg. But I'm telling you, this thing is real, and it's big."
So big, in fact, that St. Louis' six-man squad is headed to the Homeless USA Cup in Washington, D.C., later this month on a $1,800 travel grant proffered by the national governing body of homeless soccer, Charlotte-based Street Soccer USA. Albeit a long shot, if any of the local players impress Street Soccer representatives in D.C., the men could be chosen for the national team traveling to Melbourne, Australia, later this year for the 2008 Homeless World Cup.
St. Louis' Liberian coach David Flomo is quite the physical specimen: five-foot-eleven, 230 pounds, thighs the size of watermelons. He says he was homeless for more than a decade after being drafted into the Liberian army when he was sixteen. It was soccer that sustained him through many difficult years, eventually earning him scholarships for high school and college in Ghana and Kenya, Flomo explains.
"It's a program that gives people a goal to come back to every week," says Rob Cann, whose Charlotte-based team practices two or three times a week, year-round. "They see their body transform through training. And it's looking at guys for what they can do, as opposed to what they're struggling with."
The youngest member of the team, 24-year-old Daniel, holds down a job preparing food at the Centenary Church kitchen. He moved into the transitional housing program at Peter & Paul in May, hoping it might motivate him to work harder to get a roof over his head. "I could've continued staying with family, but I was starting to be co-dependent on them. I want to get something for myself, and do it by myself."
Daniel says he first thought the soccer team sounded like a fun distraction; now he's getting more out of it than he imagined. "You're looking at the big picture with this," says Daniel. "You're planning for something."
Deisner and Flomo aren't betting any money that their team will return with a trophy. "What I would like," says Flomo, "is the consistency: to come back home and keep the team going, to get to the point where we, too, can practice several times a week."
Comments
Kat 25/06/2008
The venue is looking AWESOME!!!! Good luck to you all over there. Thinking of you and sending some great vibes. Wish we were there. xxxx
