Louise Barry, Teacher of PE at Rainham School for Girls, reports back on her team’s experience when representing England at the Futsal World Cup, in Sardinia last month.
In December last year, my school was asked by the English Schools Football Association to represent England in the Futsal World Cup in Sardinia, Italy. We started by competing in a local school Futsal event, making it to the Regionals as winners and finally ending up in Birmingham where we became National champions.
The countdown began and we had 104 days to prepare for the competition – organising training sessions, raising money for new kit and getting match fit for the biggest competition of our lives. As you can imagine, the buzz around the school has been massive and we could not believe how lucky we were to be asked to compete in this huge event. We had great support from our players’ parents, the staff at school, our head teacher and governors – all helping with donations and kind words of encouragement and support. Everyone associated with the school was extremely proud of what the girls had achieved.
When the day finally arrived, all of us were ecstatic. We had an amazing send-off, watching a video that I had made of celebrities and sport stars (including Peter Crouch) wishing the team good luck and then being taken to the airport in the official England coach.
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When we arrived in Sardinia, we were given our itinerary, ending up in a pool against Turkey, Finland and Israel. We beat Israel 9-3, lost to Turkey and sadly lost to Finland. Overall, we finished in 3rd place and made it through to the quarter finals. Here we faced France in an amazing game we were unlucky to lose, but went into the next round to play Belgium. We played fantastically well and won 3-1. The girls could not believe their luck – a little school from Rainham was playing for a 5th or 6th position in the world!
In our final game of the competition we were facing China. The game was end to end and it was the best Futsal we had played. The atmosphere in the stadium was electric and the girls fought for the whole duration of the game. It was amazing to be part of such a special occasion and we were unlucky again to come away losing 2-1.
After the gutted feeling sunk in – it finally dawned on the girls that England is 6th in the world … Rainham School for Girls are 6th in the world!
Finishing positions:
1. Turkey, 2. Finland, 3. Brazil, 4. France, 5. China, 6. England, 7. Belgium, 8. Italy, 9. Russia, 10. Romania, 11. Israel, 12. Guatemala
I am extremely proud of my girls and cannot thank them enough for all their hard work both leading up to the competition and during it. They were not only a credit to the school – but also their country. They have helped to show the rest of the world that anything is possible with a little hard work and determination. Never did we think that we could represent England in a world completion – let alone finish in a respectable 6th place.
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