This get-together with a group of residents was organised by the FC Barcelona Foundation and is part of Euroleague Basketball's One Team social responsibility program.
Barcelona's One Team ambassadors visit juvenile detention center
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In an activity promoted by the Barça Foundation, Oscar da Silva and James Nnaji, the team's One Team ambassadors this season, recently paid a visit to inmates in the Quatre Camins Juvenile Detention Centre in Barcelona.
One Team is a social responsibility program created by Euroleague Basketball and, in Barça's case, the FC Barcelona Foundation are responsible for putting it into practice. The project is held weekly at the Catalonia Juvenile Detention Center, using basketball as a tool to promote the personal and communal development of the group of young people involved and to smooth their social reintegration.
The players enjoyed an afternoon of basketball and conversation with around 20 young people who play the sport every week, a key factor in the social reintegration process the center is working towards. Da Silva and Nnaji both joined in the basketball session, with the pair of One Team ambassadors getting involved right from the warm-up in the activities. The duo subsequently joined teams that played each other in a series of short games.
"For me, coming here to see the kids is a privilege," Nnaji said. "[To be able] to give them life advice. I can see how happy they are that we're here. So, it's good."
During the weekly two-hour sessions, a Barça Foundation social instructor carries out a range of activities with the inmates, using basketball as an integrating and inclusive tool, which also encourages those values that help cultivate the personal and social side of each individual. These values include teamwork, confidence, empathy, cooperation and self-esteem.
"It's the cool thing about sport: you can learn a lot of life lessons, values like hard work, dedication and having a common goal as a team," da Silva said. "I think that they are things that'll be good for them both in here and outside, so that they can all have a pleasant life once they leave here."
Over the course of the season, the young residents receive several visits from Barça players from both the men's and women's basketball teams and ambassadors from the One Team project, who also participate in sessions. Similarly, these young people have also had the chance to attend training sessions and matches at FC Barcelona's Palau Blaugrana sports arena.
Euroleague Basketball launched its One Team project in the 2011-12 season, with the aim of encouraging the various clubs involved in the highest-level continental competition to carry out social initiatives in order to use the power of basketball as a life-changing tool.