Owensboro Street Soccer Bowl keeps growing
Jun. 25—The Owensboro Street Soccer Bowl had its run for a fifth year at Legion Park earlier in June. The multi-division tournament had over 40 teams this year and is ready for more growth.
"The turnout was great, we had 41 teams and that's the best so far," said Nikos Agisilaou, who runs the street soccer bowl with his brother Christakis. "The quality of competition was good. Most people who play soccer in the area were there. We were excited. Our first year we had 18-20 teams, it has grown. A lot of high school coaches in the area are getting their kids out there, they get a team together. We had a lot of younger ones out there, this is the first year we had our own middle school girls group."
Nikos is the new boys soccer coach at Apollo High School. Christakis is head coach at Madisonville-North Hopkins.
"Street soccer is completely different, it's 5 v 5," Christakis said. "The ball moves fast, play goes fast. To me it's similar to hockey, if one guy makes a mistake can cost your team a goal. The mental aspect of this is big. Players have to move together, it requires you to think faster, make decisions faster, put the last play behind you and move on. If they can master playing on that small court, playing in small spaces with pressure, the better street soccer players are better outdoor soccer players."
The street soccer court at Legion Park was built in 2017, and with the number of teams playing this year, games were also played at the SportsTutor.
"Our first year of doing this on this court, I don't think we imagined it would grow this quickly," Christakis said. "Every single semifinal and final this year was close, they could've gone either way. That's what we want to see, kids having fun, showing passion. When they are super competitive, people are in to it, kids from other teams stay after their games, they are walking around watching the other games. I think we will continue to grow this tournament."
When they were younger, the Agisilaous would put tournaments on with neighborhood kids and kids who were soccer players in Owensboro-Daviess County.
"We come from an immigrant family," Nikos said. "We welcome all those different guys out there playing, that's the most nationalities we've had out there as well. We had 13 different nationalities in our bowl this year."
Players of different nationalities were Burmese, from four different countries in Africa, Hispanics, along with black kids and white kids from OBKY.
"The main reason Nikos and I wanted to do this was give kids an opportunity to play, grow the game," Christakis said. "Let's pick up five, six, seven players, see if we can go beat the best. It gives the kids something to do in the summer, something for people to enjoy. It brings everybody together, everybody together in one moment. Soccer has been a passion of mine since I began walking. We love to see street soccer taking another step. We appreciate everybody who supports us in this."
