On Wednesday morning at 9:30, the school bell rang as usual for the first break at the primary school on Fromundstraße on Munich's Wettersteinplatz. The children streamed out of their classrooms as they did every day, only this morning they didn’t head for the playground, but for the gym. A very special surprise awaited them.
Today, they welcomed coaches from Sporting Clube de Portugal and FC Bayern Munich to the gym, who worked together with partner buntkicktgut to prepare a special morning for the students. Buntkicktgut, a long-standing partner of FC Bayern, is an intercultural street football league that offers children and young people from different backgrounds a permanent, organised platform for sport, socialising and social learning. Originating from work with young refugees, the project continues to promote fairness, participation and understanding, and is regarded nationwide as a unique model of integration in action.
Jerseys for both teams were handed out, and within minutes the gym was awash with the colours of the two clubs. The coaches from both clubs then led a joint training session – the children dribbled, passed, laughed and practised new tricks that the coaches taught them. The event concluded with a ‘mini matchday’ between Team Bayern and Team Sporting, in which the coaches also took part. The visit by two former FC Bayern players, Diego Contento and Bernd Dreher, attracted particular attention. Both were actively involved in the session and answered the curious children's questions about their time as professionals.
Although FC Bayern won the match at the Allianz Arena 3-1, that didn't matter at all on the Wednesday morning. The clubs' joint initiative was aimed at something else: giving children a direct experience of football and promoting social interaction across club boundaries. And so an ordinary school break became an example of how sport can build bridges, even on a normal weekday at a primary school in Munich.
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