The Community Champions League is a social street football competition organised locally in ten cities in eight European countries, where participating teams can earn more points through fair play, equitable support and volunteering in community activities than by winning their street football matches. The European Football for Development Network (EFDN) is coordinating the project in partnership with ten football clubs from the Netherlands, England, Scotland, Norway, Portugal, Hungary, Belgium and Germany.
The aim of the programme funded by Erasmus+ is to promote social cohesion, education and volunteering through sport. The Community Champions League provides an opportunity for people from different cultures to come together to build relationships and friendships while breaking down barriers by preventing violence, racism and intolerance.
Cultural understanding
The Community Champions League project focuses on the key element of “cultural understanding” to generate and emphasize mutual respect while building trust and strong relationships among participants.
The target group is boys and girls aged 8 to 16. Fair play, respect and tolerance are the values that will be spread throughout the competitions and community activities organised by the programme partners. The local Community Champions Leagues bring together youth from different backgrounds in the same neighbourhood to compete as a team against their peers from other neighbourhoods in the city to become the Community Champions of their city. These city-wide competitions lead to social cohesion and teaches the participants valuable life skills.
Community Champions League Festival
The winners of the Community Champions League are masters of fostering social cohesion in their communities. The Community Champions League Festival in 2021 will be a gathering of teams from all over Europe that have won their local CCL competitions. The winners will be crowned the Community Champions of Europe.
THE OBJECTIVES OF THE COMMUNITY CHAMPIONS LEAGUE PROGRAM ARE:
- Combating racism, discrimination and violence in sport
- Social inclusion in and through sport
- Promoting social cohesion through sport
- Promoting active citizenship
- Promote volunteering in sport
- Promote the positive involvement of parents and neighbours
- Social inclusion and acceptance of refugees and migrants
- Increase participants’ social and bridging capital
- Reduction of petty urban crime
- Teach valuable life skills
- Promoting a healthy lifestyle
The Erasmus-Plus funded Community Champions League Programme kicked off in January 2019 and activities are being delivered over a 28-month period.
Who is EFDN?
The European Football for Development Network (EFDN) consists of more than 100 professional football clubs, leagues and FAs who are not only committed to their social responsibilities but have the passion to cooperate and engage on a European level.
This collaboration creates a network for sharing knowledge which develops a diversity of training methods that directly benefits local social responsibility and community programmes. The aims of our network are to promote the power of football as a tool for social development, exchange knowledge and create funding opportunities for local participants of our member clubs within their regions.
The network currently consists of more than 90 clubs, leagues and FAs from 29 European Countries which benefit from our official strategic partnerships with Fare network, CAFE (Centre for Access in Football Europe), the Social Football Club Alliance, European Healthy Stadia Network, European Club Association and UEFA Foundation for Children.
Presentation at the 14th EFDN “#Morethanfootball” Conference in Breda