The England Blind football team are currently competing in the 2005 European Blind Football Championship in Spain. The week long Championship features (in European ranking order): Spain, England, Greece, France, Italy, Portugal and Russia. The team is one of five national disability squads who are supported and funded by The FA, with the Learning Disability side due to defend the World Cup they won in Japan in 2002, in Germany next summer, a month after the mainstream World Cup. People who take part in blind football are classified, according to their level of sight, as B1, B2 or B3. Players in the B1 classification are considered blind (while those rated B2 and B3 are classified as visually impaired or partially sighted). Rule Adaptations • The game is played on a solid surface • There are five players in each team • Outfield players are B1, but must wear eye-patches and blindfolds • The goalkeeper is sighted, but cannot leave the area • There are no off-side rules • The football contains ball bearings so that it makes a noise when it moves, whilst the crowd must remain silent, so the players can hear the ball David Clarke from Harpenden is the longest serving member of the squad who has given sterling service for his country in the field of Blind Football.
 | | David in action. |
Well respected throughout the world as a star striker, he is easily the top scorer for England in all competitions and is considered a great role model for the sport. We caught up with David in Spain to find out how the Championships were going and a bit more about playing football blind. How are you doing? David: Very well indeed. We had a victory this morning (Monday) where we beat Portugal 3-1, picking up after a defeat yesterday. So hopefully tomorrow our position in the semi-finals will be confirmed. I don't think a lot of people will know that England have a national blind team? David: You're absolutely right but since it has been funded by the FA from 2000 we've featured in all the major championships and to be honest with you we are looking for lots of people from around Hertfordshire and the Three Counties to assist us in getting more and more players involved. Then we can have a national league and get more and more people putting themselves forward for national selection. Can you tell us exactly how the rules work? It can't be exactly the same as what most people see on a Saturday? David: It is a five-a-side game and the goalkeepers are fully sighted. We use hockey sized goals, but effectively it is usual five-a-side football and it is actually based on the Latin American or Spanish game of Futsal. We have four blind outfield players and they normally play in a diamond formation or just two at the front and two at the back. Does the crowd have to be silent because the ball makes some kind of noise? David: The ball has a rattle in it, ball bearings inside a metal pouch within the ball, but there are crowds - particularly when Spain play. We got a few hundred to a couple of thousand people when we played in Barcelona. It is amazing - all these guys turned up out of the local community and as soon as Spain finished they walked away again. But we tend to play in front of fairly empty stadia to be fair. What is your background? How did you become involved in this England side? David: I started playing football when I went to a special school for the blind when I did my O-levels and A-levels, but I took it on from there. | "We want to do is get the message out to those mainstream schools to say that blind people can do sport at the highest level." | | David Clarke, England Striker |
When the national team started up in 1995 I was one of the players who got involved in that, and that led to the FA getting involved under their disability team in 2000. It's gone on since then and we are now here in 2005 with a team that is really competing. You had a fine victory against Portugal, how far have you got to go to win this European Championship? David: Well assuming that Greece either beat or draw with Portugal tomorrow we will be into the semi-finals. We'll probably play Spain who are the leading candidates for the group. It is going to be tough but to be honest with you, we were going to end up playing them in the Final anyway, so we might as well get it out of the way on Thursday. We beat them in Portugal about a month ago and we have every reason to do it again, so we are two games away from winning the whole thing. Is it difficult to find players for the blind squad? David: The really important thing is that most of the guys who are playing out here went through what I would deem as specialist education, so they were involved with playing football with other blind people and partially sighted people and the PE staff were very much familiar with how to train. But in the education field we have gone down an integration route which means that blind people are generally looked after in mainstream education and the sporting opportunities are not exploited within that.
 | | David takes a fierce shot. |
So what we want to do is get the message out to those mainstream schools to say that blind people can do sport at the highest level, be it athletics, be it cricket, be it football. In our case it is football and we want to include as many players as we can. You're not just good at football, you have a successful career as a commercial banker in the City of London? David: Well that makes me as popular as a tax adviser! I love what I do professionally and this is a tremendous release. And you want to make it big in all sports? David: One of the thrills for me is that we play five-a-side football in Harpenden on a Monday night at Rothamsted Park and to be honest with you it is just a bunch of dad's who like to kick a ball around. But what is great and what I get out of it is that the first time we played for about 20 minutes they were a bit soft on me and ever since then they have been kicking my ankles, so I am competing on the same levels and that opportunity is out there for many people. If England do get through to the final when will it be? David: The final is on Friday afternoon. NB: Since talking to David, Greece beat Portugal 2-1, so England are through to the Semi-Finals. | 
