SaSC

The Homeless World Cup exists to promote social integration through football and to create fresh, innovative strategies to end homelessness and poverty. 
Every year, the Homeless World Cup, a world-class, international football tournament unites teams of homeless players from all 5 continents of the world. The tournament has grown from 18 nations at the first Graz 2003 Homeless World Cup to 64 at the Rio 2010 Homeless World Cup in September of this year.

Over 70% of players experience a significant life change – they come off drugs, alcohol, improve their health and self esteem, repair relationships, get jobs, homes, education, training, become football players, coaches and social entrepreneurs. Nearly 100,000 homeless men and women have benefited and there are now grassroots football programs working with homeless people all year round in over 70 nations.

Competition Format
The Homeless World Cup is a street soccer event, which is fast and entertaining. Each match, officiated by a referee, lasts for 14 minutes, that’s 7 minutes each way with a one minute break for half –time.

The standard of the players and the teams vary greatly. The policy of the Homeless World Cup is to be as inclusive as possible whilst keeping the true magic of competitive sport alive.

Different qualifying or elimination stages are played throughout the week so that everyone ends up playing for a cup no matter what the ability of the team is. The better teams play for the top trophy, next best for the second trophy and so on. All players receive a medal.