Spirit of Football: Creating community, building confidence
UEFA Foundation partner harnesses power of football to promote inclusion, create life-changing opportunities and bring joy to disadvantaged people across the world.
One Ball, One World. That’s the philosophy behind non-profit organisation Spirit of Football, which uses the power of the global game to foster diversity, respect and teamwork across Germany, England and Brazil.
By organising football and cultural activities for migrants and refugees, disabled people and people from disadvantaged backgrounds, Spirit of Football works to combat prejudice and provide a community for those who need it.
“Every trip, every excursion is not only a growth in terms of football – they love seeing football – but in terms of learning to spend time with other people,” project coordinator Joaquin Ñáñez explained ahead of the UEFA Conference League final in Leipzig, Germany, where the UEFA Foundation gave 50 children supported by Spirit of Football the chance to watch Crystal Palace’s 1-0 victory over Rayo Vallecano.
“We were really excited to come with them and see their reaction to this full stadium, with the floodlights, with a lot of expectation and with different people from all around the world.”
Touching on his work with disabled children, Ñáñez explained how people with learning disabilities are relatively well-placed in German society compared with other countries: “Through football, they get a community and a sense of belonging.” Nonetheless, integration into the world of work remains a challenge.
“Through football, they get a community and a sense of belonging.”
- Joaquin Ñáñez, Spirit of Football
Creating opportunities for growth
Spirit of Football organises various trips throughout the year, with each excursion providing a learning opportunity and a memory for life.
On a recent trip to the Gothia Cup in Sweden, the largest youth football tournament in the world, they even came away with a trophy, but for Ñáñez, that wasn’t the main accomplishment.
“Some of them travelled abroad on a plane for the first time in their lives and managed to speak in English with other people,” he says. “For us, those are the success stories because they show that they can go beyond the borders that sometimes we, as society, set them.
“Football can bring people together. That sounds like a cliché, but it is a fact. That's what we need in the world of today, more than ever – to open up to other people and new things.”