Having a Field Day

Challenge League, founded by Theresa Grabowski (centre), offers soccer and other sports for young people with disabilities in Oshawa, Ontario, area.

While soccer for people with disabilities is not as prevalent in Canada as other adaptive sports, such as wheelchair basketball, rugby, curling and tennis, things are looking up.

To learn about the evolution of the sport, let’s take a look across the pond. The Football Association (The FA) in England admits that its work in the area of disability football (as they call it in Europe) was “limited” prior to 1999. There were some playing opportunities as part of community or multi-sport club initiatives, but they were offered sporadically. Since then, however, England has made rapid progress, from community clubs to national teams with links to world championships for athletes who are blind or partially sighted, athletes who are Deaf, and people who are amputees or have learning disabilities or cerebral palsy.

The FA and its partners fund coaching for disability football in select clubs under the banner “Ability Counts.” The FA also launched its Disability Football Strategy (2004-2006), which introduced regional leagues and school programs for children. Beginning around the same time, the government of the United Kingdom expected sports clubs to make “reasonable adjustments” to physical features of premises they own or lease, as per legislation under the Disability Discrimination Act. The conditions for the growth of disability football were falling into place.

In 2005, I had the pleasure of speaking at the Inaugural FA Conference for Inclusive Football. I presented my findings from a pilot project that had set out to discover the best way to engage young soccer players with disabilities (at the time, I was a football development officer for Northamptonshire County Football Association). A network of soccer clubs (both professional and amateur) and a mix of paid and volunteer coaches ran sessions over a three-month period, and we found that the most appealing option was playing at a club facility that gave people the chance to “train like a professional” and visit outside of school hours to play. The results of that project led to the award of three years of funding from the largest football-related charity in England, The Football Foundation, to help pay for facility and coaching costs. The funding wraps up this year, but I’m pleased to report that at least one of the two clubs involved plans to continue its disability soccer program.

I spoke to many people from soccer clubs who said they didn’t know how they could incorporate inclusive sessions into their programs. The FA provided an intro- ductory coaching course that answered many of their questions, and gave each coach a specialist bag of equipment (balls with bells for blind and partially sighted players, weighted balls for training, and extra-large balls for wheelchair football).

Soccer in Canada, as many are aware, faces different issues. First, our geography poses a huge challenge. Rising gas prices and limited facility times mean that players and parents must be extraordinarily committed to take part in a soccer program.

This is a problem with which Theresa Grabowski of Oshawa, Ont., who launched Challenge League Sports in 1994, is very familiar. Challenge League began with a handful of parents who wanted to give their children with disabilities a chance to play team sports. On the first day, they had 54 registrants for baseball. Growing demand led to the addition of a soccer program in 1999 and basketball in 2000, with players grouped by age and skill level.

Now, 47 senior players (ages 12 and up) play soccer each week in South Oshawa. Grabowski has limited the number of junior players (ages 5 to 12) to 25 until she can assess the players’ ability and how that will work with the limited field space available to her. She also deals with field rotations, making sure that soccer pitches, gymnasiums and baseball diamonds are accessible and have accessible washroom facilities, and the intricacies of scheduling players who need to attend the same sessions – not to mention finding sponsors, managing volunteers, raising public awareness, fundraising and the myriad other tasks required to keep the league running. Fortunately, the City of Oshawa has been helpful in meeting some of the league’s needs.

Drew Ferguson, coach of the Canadian Cerebral Palsy National Soccer Team

The second challenge facing the sport is creating opportunities for players who have reached the top level. The Canadian Soccer Association (CSA) is trying to meet this need. The association itself is going through a transition, and has made major changes that will offer long-term benefits to all areas of Canadian soccer.

The coach of the Canadian Cerebral Palsy National Team, Drew Ferguson, is keen to point out the opportunities available since the CSA took over the Football 7-a-side program in April of 2007. “The program is delivered through a partnership between the CSA and the Canadian Cerebral Palsy Sports Association (CCPSA),” says Ferguson. “Last year, the team competed in the Parapan American Games, Rio 2007, followed by the CP-ISRA World Championships, the qualifying tournament for the 2008 Paralympic Games in Beijing. Team Canada managed to secure a bronze medal at the Parapan American Games after defeating the U.S., but failed to place in the top eight, and therefore did not qualify for the Paralympics.”

Ferguson adds that the CSA plans to increase awareness and participation in the sport in hopes of broadening the player pool in time for the 2012 Paralympic Games in London. “The coaching staff will be looking to collaborate with the Canadian Paralympic Committee and provincial associations to promote the Football 7-a-side program.”

The CSA’s Technical Office is based at BMO Field in Toronto. Its initial strategy is to circulate posters to the area’s soccer facilities. With the help of the Canadian Paralympic Committee, the next step is to approach specific groups within the Paralympic world.

As you can see, there is a future for soccer for players with disabilities in Canada. If you or your children are interested in having a go at this fun and exciting sport, get in touch with the organizations listed in “Getting Started." See you on the field!