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Nicaraguan children eye football glory
By Nick Caistor | BBC News
Every day, Victor is out football training in the centre of Managua.
Like many, he dreams of representing his country, the small Central American nation of Nicaragua, in South Africa next year. But Victor will not be playing for an adult team in the Fifa World Cup due to start in June next year. Instead, he hopes to travel with his team-mates to the city of Durban in March 2010 to take part in the street children's version of the tournament.
Like many thousands of young children in Managua, Victor's family is too poor to support him, and at 13, he has lived on the streets off and on for years. Now he is one of some 50 children who have been taken in by the charity Casa Alianza. In several Central American countries, Casa Alianza is dedicated to looking after children unable to live at home because of problems of poverty or family violence.
In Casa Alianza they are given board and lodging and taught a profession — usually baking or mechanics, before they are either allowed back to their families or given financial and moral support to live independently.
Eneyda Lira is in charge of the daily programmes organised for the children while they are living in Casa Alianza. She is full of enthusiasm for the football project. "We think this street children's World Cup is a great opportunity to show everyone that they are not just dirty, scruffy children who bother you at traffic lights or are seen sniffing glue under bridges," she says. "Playing football gives them a sense of their own worth — and shows that the game is not just for the great footballers of the world." >>> Go to Full Story >>>