Time.news – Born a month ago in the Bolognese area to defeat the boredom and apathy of isolation caused by the virus in children, contactless anti-covid calcium is now ready for export. The idea comes from the Salesian center Cnos of Castel de Britti, in San Lazzaro di Savena in the Bolognese area and provides that the field is divided into different areas thus avoiding the forbidden contacts: forcing you to pass the ball to your partner, among other things, strengthens the team game. The idea had a great national success and aims to break through at European level as well.
The brand – Distance Football, dedicated to Don Bosco – it was in fact already registered in the filing of the Community trademark and is therefore valid in all 27 countries of the European Union.
The Salesian network – schools, parishes, oratories, starting from Andalusia – has already shown interest while the center of Bologna, bounced strongly on newspapers, TV and social networks, hasHe also asked for the patronage of Bologna football – and 7 rossoblù jerseys – to organize a first tournament between schools.
The anticovid football, conceived by the director of the center Carlo Caleffi, sees as a winning model, and not only from the point of view of Covid, a small school, in the green, outside the city, which itself becomes a small community, with lots of space around it where also play football, albeit spaced out in times of pandemic: from the point of view of infections here – where about seventy students aged 15 to 18 study (the group currently most affected by the pandemic in the Bolognese area) divided into 4 classes, a two-year period for wood operator, two years per thermo-hydraulic operator – the covid outbreaks were not seen as well as the infections at school, only a few isolated cases. A school designed, even in the covid emergency, with lessons as much as possible outdoors and windows open even in winter, huge spaces, changed schedules taking into account the fact that the buses were more or less full, kept out of commuter traffic.
Anti-covid football, the Castel de Britti field in San Lazzaro di Savena, in the Bolognese area
The anticovid calcium thus becomes a registered trademark.
Yes, we worked on it both to render Don Bosco’s image and precisely the field designed: we wanted it to be a brand that spoke.
Did you expect all this success?
No – Caleffi laughs heartily – I was hoping that it would appear in the local news and that it was something that could come out in the Salesian context. In fact I had prepared some tutorials, in English and Spanish also on our Youtube channels, because with the Salesian channel I thought of having it released on the European network. In reality there have been some great delays, on the European network it is starting now, in the meantime everything has happened in Italy, it was a surprise.
Is it right to call it anti-covid calcium?
Yes, and that’s what generated the success, the clicks on the internet. Fanpage came to us to make a video because that word, that topic was very clicked. We have reached one million views.
How did the boys experience it?
Very well, because the boys have lived it from the inside, they have traced the field with us, they have lived with us the birth of the project, understanding why. It was born from the ‘cazziatoni’ we did to them because they were becoming annoying, and when we said they always had a cigarette in their mouth and their cell phone in their hand, it was not a joke. The situation was degenerating, however, because anger, frustration and resignation, which is the most dangerous word, was taking hold among the kids. I’m talking about the Hikikomori phenomenon, about kids who are always locked up at home, we have some at school. And those who came, were still coming very little, they were listless.
Did the covid worsen the discomfort that was already present in the boys?
The situation is known, that of adolescents who are in crisis and struggle to find meaning: vocational training is one of the solutions that is less publicized and which is instead one of the most effective, because it is a model of school in which instead of sitting on the bench. So you are not passive, but you learn actively. The covid has really ‘killed’ many children who stravano in the school and has put us educators in difficulty and on their knees: now they finally let us do the workshops, but last year we were forced to do all the activity online, including the plumbing and carpentry workshops, with teenagers who also struggle to have a high level of language and attention: what do you teach them?
Is yours a winning school model?
Not so much Castel de Britti, but the small school model is a winner, where in any case you know the kids and you can manage the discipline. Often the boys tell me “Here we are seen, here you know us, here is a family”.
Why did you call it distance football in the logo?
Because we are convinced that this is a playable game even after the covid, because you can play males against females, young against old, children against adults, because it is a game where you run a lot and move a lot but without physical contact: therefore there is the problem of age or different sex, you can really play everyone. And educationally, it really works a lot.
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