BY WILLIAM CÓRDOBA and JORGE HEREDIA
As the soccer World Cup (the biggest sporting event in the world) gets ready to kick off on June 11 in South Africa, soccer fever is rampant all over the globe.
Meanwhile, here in San Quentin soccer players would like to resume the soccer program that has been on recess, so to speak, since April of 2008 when the volunteer coach resigned for personal reasons.
An attempt to find a new volunteer coach was made through the Internet and with the help of a few prison employees and the Recreation Coordinator, but the attempt was fruitless. It seems like no one is interested in taking the task without a financial incentive.
Inmate Pascacio, a member of the prison’s soccer team, said that someone in the outside community wants to donate soccer equipment to the prison but won’t do it until a volunteer coach takes control of the team. And those who like soccer ask that a better effort be made to reactivate San Quentin’s soccer program.
Prior to April of 2008 the prison’s soccer team played against teams from the Bay Area on weekends. Also, there was equipment for all players and there were two time slots to play soccer during the week. There is no such thing now.
We spoke with the Recreation Coordinator about soccer in San Quentin. His attitude appeared to be that of someone who wants to better this situation. Still, he didn’t tell us anything different from what we had gathered from other sources for this story.
To tell the truth, since April of 2008, soccer has not been getting the same amount of attention from the Recreation Department than other sports practiced in San Quentin. Perhaps it’s because soccer is not such a popular sport in the U.S. or because the majority of those who practice it here are foreign nationals. Who knows? But if in fact, there is a degree of indifference towards soccer, we pray that it be left behind and that we move on to find a solution to this problem.
After all, regardless of who may practice this sport behind these walls, soccer is a positive way of recreation that unites many cultures. That’s the main reason it is the number one sport in the world
