Opening Ceremony of the IFCPF Men's World Championships

On Monday the 26th of September at 16:00 UTC+2  the openings ceremony did take place at field of play at Geovillage. During a parade all the Match Officials and teams entered the Field of Play.

Mr. Marco Richi, President of the Local Organisation Comitee, welkcomed everybody. He is pride and enthousiastic that the biggest Paralmypic event of the year in Sardinie can be hosted here. Then Mr. Walter Silvestri, General secretary of Fispes and Mr. Tom Langen, Technical Delegate IFCPF also spoke about how graeteful they are and that they are looking forward to the inaugral World Championships. 

The spectators could listen to Mr. Rostyslav Prachun at the piano and Mrs.Sophia Murgia as a singer who did sing a beautiful  “Nel Blu dipinto di Blu” and “We are the Champions”. 
 

By kicking a matchball by Mr. Tom Langen declared the IFCPF Men’s World Championships open! 
 

Four continents are represented at this inaugural World Championships!

The participating countries are:

#Italy 🇮🇹 #SouthKorea 🇰🇷 #Scotland 🏴󠁧󠁢󠁳󠁣󠁴󠁿 #Japan 🇯🇵  
#Egypt 🇪🇬 #Colombia 🇨🇴 #Chile 🇨🇱 #Denmark 🇩🇰

All of them with their own story:

Group A

• Italy will compete for the first time on an international championship, having only participated in development tournaments.
• For South Korea it is more than 10 years ago that they participate at the world level, as they did participate in the Asia-Oceania Championships 2018 and in the qualification tournament in 2017.
• Chile did participate in the Americas Championships in 2018, but have never taken the step onto the world level.
• It is also so nice to see Scotland who have a rich CP Football history, but we haven’t seen them on a world level since 2015.

Group B

• Denmark we have seen in 2018 during the European Championships. 
• Colombia have never participated on a world level, but they participated twice in the Americas Championships
• Japan is a well known country in CP Football, it is great to have them here, but also have not competed internationally since 2015. They are the only team here who also entered the first IFCPF Women's World Cup earlier this year.
• For Egypt it is their first CP Football tournament ever and we see them being grateful and enthusiastic to be here. They are also the first African nation to compete at the world level.

On Tuesday the 27th of September the first matches will start at 9:30 CEST+2 at Geovillage, Olbia, Sardine (Italy).

• 09:30 (UTC +2) Denmark - Egypt 
• 12:00 (UTC +2) South Korea - Chile
• 15:30 (UTC +2) Colombia - Japan
• 18:00 (UTC +2) Italy - Scotland

Of course a big welcome for all of the participating countries! And to all:
good luck, pøj pøj, buena suerte, Kōun o, haeng-un-eul bibnida, buona fortuna 💪🏼