The scene of the event.
On the morning of May 19th, the Shanghai "Sunshine House" special Olympic five-a-side football match opened in Aihe Ennuobao public welfare base.
This is the first integrated football match for the students of Sunshine House in Shanghai. Teams composed of sunshine students and integrated partners from all districts in the city experienced the charm and happiness of football in the form of "integration of the disabled and the healthy".
The event was jointly sponsored by Shanghai Employment Service Center for the Disabled, Special Olympics International and Shanghai Special Care Foundation, and was hosted by Shanghai Aiheen Sports Club. In the meantime, Shanghai Disabled Persons’ Federation and Shanghai Sports Federation gave great attention and guidance.
Sports director Cheng Kelun, East Asia Region of International Special Olympics, Zhong Ming, member of Shanghai Paralympic Committee and founder and chairman of Shanghai Aiheen Sports Club, attended the opening ceremony.
This competition is the first integrated football match for the students of Sunshine House in Shanghai. The competition adopts a five-person system, and the competition system consists of group competition and qualifying.
Among them, the group stage was divided into two groups, A and B, according to the lottery results. After 22 wonderful competitions, the champion, runner-up and third runner-up of this competition ended up in each family.
Throughout this competition, the organizing committee of the Games started from many aspects, such as safety guarantee, schedule design, on-site experience, etc., which reflected the professional ability of the Games service and practiced the spirit of the Special Olympics.
As a sustainable competition platform, Shanghai Sunshine House Convergence Soccer Competition aims to provide a professional convergence soccer competition opportunity for the sunshine house groups in the city, encourage the sunshine houses in all districts of the city to set up convergence soccer teams and carry out daily training by means of competition, test the training results of each convergence soccer team and share the coach’s experience in the coaching process, so as to promote the development of convergence sports in East Asia of Special Olympics.
It is worth mentioning that May 21st is the 33rd "National Day for Helping the Disabled" and the 24th "Shanghai Week for Helping the Disabled". The holding of this event also actively demonstrates the value of the popularization of the form of integrated sports among the disabled.
Indeed, sports has become a new channel for Special Olympics athletes to integrate into society. Holding this competition will not only help them establish new hobbies and enrich their communication life, but also inject more positive energy into their lives with the spiritual core of football.