The first #secondfanshirt donation to go to a Non-German team has been awarded to liberi nantes, a refugees sports team from Rome/Italy.
Liberi Nantes was founded already in 2007 as the first Sport Association in Italy who promotes and guarantees the free access to sport for all refugees and asylum seekers. They offer sports, a possibility of freedom, for recovering their dignity, for rebuilding themselves and create new relationship of friendship and faith to women and men who were able to escape war or dramatic humanitarian situations.
Liberi Nantes Football Club is the first team in Italy entirely composed of refugees and asylum seekers. The composition of the team is multicultural, the colours of the flag are the ones used by the United Nations and the access to the training is free and open to everybody. At the moment, the club consists of open teams, composed by 80-100 refugees who play and train at the XXV Aprile ground, as well as an official team which plays since 2008 in the 3rd Category tournament organised by the Federazione Italiana Giuoco Calcio.
Just recently the Guardian published a short movie on Liberi Nantes on their website.
Martin Endemann from FSE: “The decision by the FSE-Committee to give a donation to Liberi Nantes was also made to honour the long-standing work of loads of Italian volunteers for the team. We´re particularly happy that our members from Unione Italiana Sport per Tutti (UISP) are heavily involved in the great work the club is providing.”
Do you also know a refugee aid project in need of support? Let us know! Click here to find out more on the #SecondFanShirt donations procedure.