Soccer for Everyone, PWYS wins state cup
The quarter-final soccer match for the 2021 Fall State Cup was about to begin in Murfreesboro, and the team from Memphis had a problem. Tennessee State Soccer Association rules require players to wear socks that match the color of their jerseys. That helps referees keep watch over a game played primarily with legs and feet. The team of teenagers from Memphis, Play Where You Stay, or PWYS, wore black jerseys, but only seven players were wearing black socks. So PWYS, competing in its first state cup tournament, had to start the match on that cold, rainy last Saturday in October four players short. They put seven players on the field instead of the normal 11. No matter. This is a team organized to counter the “pay-to-play” youth sports machine that favors kids with more family resources. This is a team that includes players from 14 Shelby County schools, with links to 10 countries on four continents. This is a team of Black, brown and white sons of refugees and immigrants as well as a few middle-class parents. This is a team of young men who have endured and overcome events exceedingly more traumatic than starting a big soccer match short-footed. “These kids have met every
