Schalke 04 wins Walking Football tournament in Nijmegen

Schalke 04 wins Walking Football tournament in Nijmegen

Last Friday, EFDN member NEC Nijmegen hosted a Walking Football tournament in the city center. At the end of an exciting day, the players from EFDN member Schalke 04 celebrated their win together with their competitors on Grote Markt, the market square in Nijmegen.

NEC and Grote Markt Supercup have joined forces for the fourth time already to organise a Walking Football tournament at a unique location. Besides Schalke 04, three other EFDN clubs also followed the invitation of NEC and sent their teams: Bayer 04 Leverkusen, PSV Eindhoven, and Werder Bremen. The spectators saw entertaining games and many goals but also some rough tackles. But as soon as the referee blew the final whistle, the players put the rivalry aside and enjoyed to share their Walking Football experiences with each other.

“Grote Markt is one of the best places in Nijmegen for such a tournament. We hope to continue with it next year”, said Luc te Riele, CSR Manager at NEC Nijmegen. Luc te Riele was in particular glad to welcome also clubs from abroad: “We were looking for some bigger clubs and some extras for this year. So we decided to ask the German clubs Schalke 04, Bayer Leverkusen and Werder Bremen. They accepted our invitation and we are really happy about that. We could do that because we have a connection through EFDN.”

Walking Football – a growing movement 

Walking Football is a standard game of football where players walk instead of run. EFDN conducted, together with several members, the European Legends project to spread the methodology across Europe. The game is designed to help people get fit or maintain an active lifestyle no matter what their age and physical condition. The growing Walking Football movement is a good opportunity to get people back into football if they have given it up due to age or injury.