Tom Blau
It will be the first time at the nationals for the U14 56ers.
When the U.S. Youth Futsal National Championships open in Overland Park, Kansas, on Feb. 16, Madison will be well represented. Four teams — two each from the Madison 56ers and Madison Futsal Forge — qualified as Midwest regional champions last month and will now compete in their respective age groups in the country’s largest national youth futsal tournament.
Wait: What’s futsal?
The sport is a variation on soccer, usually played on an indoor hard court with two teams of five players each, including a goalkeeper on either side. Madison Futsal uses Madison East High School and the Verona Athletic Center, while the Madison 56ers own a building in Oregon.
“Futsal is growing in Madison,” says Ilir Lushaj, director of Madison Futsal, a league and academy that began in 2010 and expanded with the Forge in 2012 to train players for regional and national competition. “We are now starting to see technical players at ages 9 and 10. In time, this will have a huge impact on the game of soccer.”
The two Forge teams at nationals are the U16 boys’ and U12 girls’ squads; a pair of U11 and U14 girls’ teams will represent the 56ers. Forge has sent teams to nationals before, but this marks the first time for 56ers’ teams. All told, 118 teams from the United States and Canada will compete.
Ilir Lushaj
Team from the Madison Futsal Forge, after January's regionals. The Forge will also be heading to nationals in Kansas City.
“This is a strong showing for our teams from the Madison area,” says Tony Wright, the 56ers’ director of coaching. “We are especially pleased, as many of the players from the Madison Forge program play their club soccer with the 56ers. Indoor soccer is a necessity during the winter months, and futsal fits perfectly into our developmental training program.”
Many of the world’s top soccer players played futsal. It started in Uruguay in 1930, “where amid the euphoria that greeted the country’s victory at the inaugural FIFA World Cup on home soil, there was a football being kicked on every street corner,” according to the United States Youth Futsal website.
Today, futsal is still gaining its footing in the United States. “Madison 56ers and Forge have continued to commit to grow the sport,” Wright says. “Trainings, skills academies, leagues and tournaments are more prevalent now.”
“Like every other good thing,” Lushaj says, “it takes time, patience and love for the game.”
