FutbolKalean 2015

This Sunday, March 1, sees the start of the 2015 edition of FutbolKalean, the street football championship aimed at boys and girls in the Under-10 and Under-12 age ranges organised by the Athletic Club Foundation throughout Biscay.

This year, there will be twenty locations in which the championship will take place, beginning this Sunday, March 1 in Derio and Leioa and ending with the finals in the Athletic Club facilities at Lezama on June 14.

The tournament is played in a format of four against four, without goalkeepers and with small goals. The idea is to play in spaces such as town squares, pelota courts, pedestrian streets. We want to recapture the essence of football in the street, the spirit of fun, simple participation, sharing moments with friends, the spontaneity and freedom of playing without coaches, adults or referees… and, therefore, matches will not be refereed, but self-managed by the players themselves, who will be able to ask the opinion of a monitor in the event of not reaching an agreement about a certain play.

Two teams will qualify from each venue: firstly, the winner on the scoreboard, and the other designated by the other participants and Athletic Club Foundation monitors for standing out in some sense regarding values. These two teams will be merged into only one, which will represent the location in the semi-finals, played in 7-a-side beach football format. The winners of the semi-finals will play the final at Lezama.

The Athletic Club Foundation encourages all boys and girls in Bizkaia to take part in this special championship, which seeks to vindicate the true essence of football: to be a shared leisure space, a place to grow up in as people and friends. Likewise, the Foundation wants to pass on their help and availability to the town councils of Biscay when organising this championship.