We got to the beach around 11 and met up with Kyle and his group. They had just finished kicking the ball around with some kids, so we spent an couple hours just sitting around on the beach. After they went to lunch, Bennett and I walked the beach until we found a game. The sand was shin-deep, the players weren't great, and the hog in the Germany jersey on our team didn't know the concept of passing or teamwork. A little unsatisfying, but still fun. Bennett and I were clearly the best players, so we moved on after 20 minutes.
We met up again with Kyle and his group after they finished lunch. We sat down at a huge futsal area with 4 courts in a quadrant followed by courts and fields as far as the eye could see up the street. Every court was filled with 5v5 plus at least 10 people on each sideline, either waiting to play or just watching. The best game was front and center. These boys could play. This is where we wanted to be. At first it was fun just watching them. We didn't think we were going to be able to get on the court as it was only locals. Nobody was wearing shoes. Teams were just understood or figured out - no shirts v skins or lights v darks. Rules were very lax, and a little shirt grab, hack to the ankles or high elbow was fairly common. Not really understanding the atmosphere or the players at the time, I thought a fight would break out on a couple of occasions. They were arguing, a couple pushes and aggressive finger-pointing, but nothing malicious... To their standards.
We gathered our team, laced up our shoes(I was barefoot), got in position to be in line to play, and we waited. We waited with the sun on our backs. We waited as the sun started going down. We waited as the sky turned from light blue to yellow to light orange. Finally the final goal went in on the game before us, and we walked onto the cement court. Winners start with the ball. Game time.
"Gringooos!" We were well used to being called that. Hell, I kinda liked it. The game kicked off and it was of pace and quality - two or three of their players were very skilled - great control, quick little buggers, could put it on frame from anywhere and were smart defensively. Notice all the sole of the foot everyone used. We gave up the first goal after a minute or two. After waiting this long, we weren't going to go out that fast. It seemed to take us a couple minutes to really figure out the game, but we started getting 2 people wide once I got the ball, having 3 options to move the ball quickly. See James facing towards me wide left.
Bennett(White shirt) took over the game with a sweet bit of dribbling before punching a ball into Kyle(long blonde hair with red shoes) who did a moving cruyff-flick to slot it back post to tie it up. We quickly took the upper hand and won 3-1. Here's a content Bennett after the first goal
We lost the second game 3-2 by giving up goals from a mix-up that gave them a tap-in, then a deflected own goal. The sky had changed to red by this point and it was time to move on. A beautiful evening - my favorite picture below.
Out of all the cool stuff we've done, this really ranks up there as one of my top single memories of the trip. It was rugged, scrappy, a little unexpected and a heck of a game. We got to play in a few more games after that, which were all a lot of fun, no question. These games, in Brasilia, the much wealthier national capital, were much cleaner than the game in the poverty-ridden Recife.
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