Francesco’s exciting experience | Sport for All

“These guys are just waiting to come to PlayMore! to play together.“

This is the third year since I started ‘working’ for this wonderful project, initially with one hour on integrated football, then it became two, and finally multisport and fencing were added on!

I really wouldn’t know where to begin to describe how excited I am to be part of Sport for All; I could recount a million episodes, but the most emblematic aspect, which I think best sums up my experience in this project, is looking forward to starting the week on Monday with the football kids and closing it with the multisport, fencing and football group on Friday! This is one of the greatest satisfactions for me!

The relationship that has been created over the years with each of the boys would deserve a separate story!

The thing that impresses me most, and literally makes me come out with a smile on my face every time, is that these guys are waiting for nothing more than that moment when they can finally come to PlayMore! to play together.

It may sound like a platitude, but I assure you that this enthusiasm of theirs, this contagious desire generates an indescribable feeling in me that has a simple and natural consequence: it fills my heart with joy!

Over these years I have been fortunate enough to be in contact more and more with each of the boys and now it is as if we have known each other all our lives! With the integrated football kids, every training session seems like the pre-game of the World Cup final, with the multisport group, something new is constantly happening in every lesson and each child is slowly getting to know each other more and more, in fencing I follow two wheelchair champions who are both tetraplegics and our duels are like Pirates of the Caribbean!

In short, I think it is clear how incredible this project is and how it gives these guys the opportunity to get involved without fear and, above all, without limits.

I conclude what I have written by inviting anyone reading this story to take part in even one of these activities, because reading helps and is vital to know what it is all about, but the only way to experience it is to try it out in the field, to be in contact with them, get to know them and play with them!

After these years of working with children and young people I am more and more convinced that it is they who teach me and not I who teach them!

In these years of working on Sport for All courses, I have realised that there are no dis-abilities (without abilities), but many children with different abilities which, when put at the disposal of the group, generate an immense wealth of experience, knowledge and skills.