The Fort Morgan Somali Soccer League team won the state championship in Denver on Sept. 18.
This was the first season, which made it a kind of miraculous win over the three other teams, said coach Abdi Abdikadir.
It can be difficult for Somalis and other refugees to play in regular leagues for young men, due to their odd schedules of factory shift work, he said.
They cannot make it to every practice those leagues require, so they started gathering their friends and making their own leagues, which practice on Saturdays and Sundays from 4 to 7 p.m. at Fort Morgan Middle School, Abdikadir said.
The Fort Morgan team, which is named Real Boys United, has about 20 players, with some still in high school but most are grown and have jobs, he said.
They played against teams from Denver, Greeley and Nebraska for the championship and had to win four games to win it, Abdikadir said.
Somalis in other areas of the country have done much the same, creating leagues in Minnesota, California, Ohio and Washington, he said. Each year, the final teams play for the championship in San Diego, Calif., or Minnesota.
Colorado will have to earn its way into the nationals, which will take some time, but that is the ultimate goal, Abdikadir said.
His players are not at the level of play yet, but they plan to build their skills, he said.
Maybe next year the Boys can bring the national cup to Colorado, Abdikadir said.
Abdikadir was chosen as the coach by the other players, even though this is his first stint coaching, he said. They saw his soccer skills and knew he was good at choosing where to put players on the field.
With this win, the team has players from Nebraska who are calling up and wanting a rematch, Abdikadir said.
They were surprised the newcomers could beat them, he said.
The Real Boys had to fight hard in order to win against more practiced players, but they had an advantage in the final match when they scored three goals in the first 10 minutes, demoralizing their opponents, Abdikadir said.
His strategy is to mix up the field placement in ways that allow his players to overwhelm their opponents, he said.
Abdikadir said he loves soccer so much that if he wakes up in the middle of the night he turns the TV to soccer games.
He started playing soccer as a child, when he and his friends had to stuff papers into an old handbag for a makeshift ball.
Now his players not only have official balls, but their own yellow uniforms, Abdikadir said.
Abdikadir lived in Somalia for most of his life, leaving to attend Al-Azhar University in Egypt for a couple of years before moving to the U.S. in February of 2009, he said.
He was sponsored by his wife, and he works at Cargill Meat Solutions.
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Ft Morgan Times
