Home|Sports|BFA hosts beach soccer campSports
All-girls event wraps up today at the Beach Soccer Stadium at Malcolm Park
Simba FrenchSend an emailAugust 11, 2023 43 3 minute readFacebookTwitterLinkedInShare via Email
Beach soccer is said to be one of the more exciting and entertaining sports to watch, and the Bahamas Football Association (BFA) is looking to grow the sport more. The governing body for beach and field soccer in the country hosted a two-week girls only beach soccer camp at the Beach Soccer Stadium at Malcolm Park at the foot of the Sir Sidney Poitier Bridge. The camp began on July 31 and ends today.
There were about 30 campers who braved the sun and sand to learn about the game as the BFA looks to carry out a FIFA (International Association Football Federation) mandate to ensure that there are some women’s development programs ongoing. The camp came on the heels of the BFA hosting its annual beach soccer camp, from July 17-21, at the same location.
Director of Women’s Soccer for the BFA Soraya Toppin-Herbert said it is a good way for the girls to start to learn the game.
“The Bahamas has been doing very well in beach and we want to expose the girls to another form of the game,” Toppin-Herbert said. “We think it’s a good way for them to develop their technical skills. A lot of them either play with clubs or they’re not playing with clubs. We hope that after this they’ll take some of these skills back to the clubs or they’ll think about joining clubs.”
The campers spent the first week learning the basic skills of the game such as how to dribble in the sand, pulling the ball in the sand, how to juggle the ball, shooting and even bicycle kicks.
“We’ve been trying to ensure they have fun,” Toppin-Herbert said. “That’s the most important thing, but besides that, we’ve been working on the technical skills of beach because it’s slightly different than on grass where you just kind of dribble along the ground. We want to just get them playing as much as possible so that they learn the game through playing. We’ve been teaching the rules so this week more so going through the rules and last week was more about the technical part of it, so they have a little bit of a grasp.”
The campers spent this week learning about the rules of the game such as the four-second rule, how to manoeuvre in the penalty area and getting the ball in and out of play.
“They’ve been enjoying having their own time and it’s just interesting because with the girls, you got a different feel than when you have the boys and the girls. The girls are social beings, so you get to see that part come out as well, in between the breaks between the sessions. So, I think they’ve been having an amazing time,” she said.
Toppin-Herbert added that they are looking to form a development program for beach soccer. They are looking to double the number of women’s beach soccer players, she said.
“We have a women’s program going which is like for 15-year-olds and up so we are looking to start something below there so that we can capture these girls where again they can develop the technical skills, where if they want to pursue it on grass they can also do that but if they want to do it in beach, they can do that as well. The goal is that we will start to build the number of girls playing in The Bahamas. We have a decent number now – probably one of a few Caribbean countries that actually has youth leagues for only girls, but we’re looking to build on that and not just be satisfied with saying we have the numbers,” Toppin-Herbert said.
The BFA will look to host another all-girls beach soccer camp next year and hopefully have a youth league in the calendar year.