At the 2024 Homeless World Cup, Australia’s daring Street Socceroos nabbed a Fair Play Award on the very first day. It was all new friends, fancy footwork and inflatable kangaroos from there.

Deflating a blow-up kangaroo before entering a South Korean subway carriage during peak hour – to avoid taking up too much space or inadvertently walloping someone with the tail – might seem like a left field way to show respect. But it’s indicative of the thoughtfulness with which Australia’s Street Socceroos performed at the 2024 Homeless World Cup in Seoul. And, as they found, taking inflatable kangaroos to a football tournament is also a language-transcending way to engage with others.

The Homeless World Cup is a sporting event for people who have experienced homelessness or marginalisation. Featuring around 450 players from 40 nations, it is conducted in the international language of football.

Faz, Ibrahim, Abdalla, Faisal, Ron, Malika, Sara and Michael, the Australian players who attended this year’s Cup, have familial backgrounds that include Iran, Egypt, Ethiopia, Somalia, Hong Kong and Afghanistan, as well as Australia’s First Nations. Representative of the tournament’s diversity, the players were eligible for inclusion for reasons ranging from displacement to mental health challenges.

That diversity leant itself to some outstanding cross-cultural communication and connection. In fact, ambassadorship on and off the pitch was the throughline to the Street Socceroos’ Homeless World Cup experience. It serendipitously kicked off the moment the Street Socceroos landed.

Hong Kong were the first team Australia encountered as they disembarked from the plane. It was a boon for Hong Kong-born goalkeeper Ron, who had been wondering whether a team from his homeland would be attending the 2024 tournament. And for the Hong Kong team, who jokingly attempted to recruit Ron, offering him their extra jersey and asking him to go easy on blocking their shots. Ron politely declined their offer, telling them he’d see what he could do about the saves.

Ron comes from a long line of specialist Homeless World Cup keepers for Australia, he was originally a striker. But when he stepped in one day when his team’s goalie was unwell, Ron found his true calling: “I blocked a few shots, and that was the moment I realised blocking a shot made me feel prouder than scoring a goal.”

Within the tournament itself, Australia took the lead on exemplary conduct, winning the tournament’s first award for fair play. In some ways it wasn’t surprising – the Australians have a reputation to uphold.

“We can talk about who the favourites are to win the football, like Mexico or Brazil. When you can then talk about who the favourites are to win the FIFPRO Fair Play Award on the first day…that would be Australia,” Homeless World Cup co-founder Mel Young said during the award ceremony. While he acknowledged that all teams demonstrate good sportspersonship, he noted that fair play is embedded in the Australian team’s DNA.

The Street Socceroos were nominated for being gracious in victory in their first game, against Cambodia. As was customary, the Australians invited the Cambodians into their post-match team huddle where they sang the team’s inclusive anthem: “We are one, but we are many… I am, you are, we are Australian.”

Fittingly, the team received the award while wearing shirts featuring the Aboriginal flag in tribute to Michael, a Ngarrindjeri man and captain for the day. Michael proudly carried the Aboriginal flag throughout the tournament – which was his first trip overseas – and explained the flag’s origin and significance as other players and fans inquired about it. “That’s been a great, special part of this journey,” national coach George Halkias says. “And for other teams, because they’ve come and asked and they now know.”

Throughout the tournament, Halkias encouraged the players to work as a team and to compete right until the final whistle. “There are plenty more wins to be gained from this match,” he told the players when the scoreline was in the opposition’s favour. It was a valuable lesson and indicative of the life skills, both on and off the pitch, that the Street Soccer program seeks to foster.

The team were understandably chuffed to have won the first FIFPRO Fair Play Award – winning it was the team’s number-one collective goal. “Silverware after day one doesn’t often happen. That’s [testament] to the commitment and effort by the players. It’s a good symbol of their efforts,” Halkias says.

For Faz, who provided a steadying presence on the pitch, and even battled through mid-tournament illness to support the team, his ethos is “sometimes you win, sometimes you lose…but what we were trying to do as a team [was to] always try to help each other.”

Faz arrived in Australia from Iran alone, aged 16 – without family, friends or knowledge of the English language. Having lived in Australia for the last 12 years, he recently obtained his permanent residency and is working towards obtaining citizenship. For him, the tournament illustrated the power of connection and collaboration. “It was like, How amazing. How many different nationalities? How many different cultures? How many different religions are here?” he says. “When you come together, it’s stronger.”

Like Ron, Faz experienced an unexpected encounter – this time, finding a player with the same name as him. He thought he was seeing double when he saw the player’s name written on the back of his jersey. One of his final actions of the tournament was to try to arrange a jersey swap with his name twin.

Sharing names and connections was a tournament theme. Abdalla, whose goal-scoring celebration included performing a 360-degree airborne pirouette with the grace of an ice skater, came to the tournament via a familial connection: his brother Bushra represented Australia in the 2023 Homeless World Cup in Sacramento, USA.

The brothers are both involved in the Dandenong Community Street Soccer Program, and Abdalla witnessed Bushra’s Homeless World Cup exploits via the livestreams last year. This year, the roles were reversed, and Bushra was the one tuning in to the matches online. Abdalla laughs and says no when I ask whether we’re likely to see any other siblings playing for the Street Socceroos next year.

As part of their off-pitch activities, the team visited both The Big Issue Korea office and the Australian embassy. (Michael, who’s a vendor in Adelaide, had exchanged a Big Issue magazine with a Japanese vendor counterpart earlier in the week.) While at the embassy, the ambassadorial team and the Street Socceroos discussed how they were each, in their own ways, representing Australia to the rest of the world.

Enter the inflatable kangaroos – for while the team’s on-pitch ambassadorial efforts were well‑recognised, their off-pitch ones were equally crucial. The mascots (named Skippy and Joey) provided authentic conversation starters across language and culture. “Even just going on the tram, just seeing different people react to the kangaroos…really, anywhere we go, reactions to the kangaroo are always fun,” midfielder Faisal says.

The Street Socceroos are now home, and so are the inflatable kangaroos, after the team navigated the difficult diplomatic task of deciding to whom the inflatables would be gifted. But the team’s collective, award-winning efforts won’t end here: the next Homeless World Cup – featuring another generation of Australia’s Street Socceroos – will take place in Oslo, Norway, in August 2025.

By Fiona Crawford @AGirlCalledFred

Fiona Crawford is a writer, editor and researcher whose work details social and environmental issues and football. She is the author of The Matilda Effect and The Rise of the Matildas.

Published in Ed#722