The first WSM Newham Adult Fives was a great success recently (Mon 2 August). Five teams from various Churches in Newham battled it out in entertaining but hard fought games for the World Sport Ministries Cup.

Two players stood out for their skill, effort and sporting attitudes and received player of the tournament medals. Jason from Cliff Walk Rovers and Nikead from Bonny Down’s Summer Scheme were the two stars. Other players catching the eye were Dipo Oni and Gareth Bebb for Cliff Walk Rovers, Joel Matthews for Cliff Walk City, Richard Marzetti and Pete Laing for Bonny Downs Church.

Despite losing all 4 games the Summer Scheme lads showed great spirit throughout their games. Bonny Downs Church, Cliff Walk City and Cliff Walk Rovers all won 2 and lost 2 games each. Cliff Walk Rovers taking second place on goal difference. The inaugural and comfortable winners with 4 wins from 4 games and a goal difference of plus 12 were the Gateway City team. Leader Dan Grassham’s pretournament quote “I’m quite confident of victory” was quite prophetic!

After the tournament Referee Mark Blythe shared how his thoughts about Suarez of Uruguay went from very high to low during the World Cup. What a shame that a superb player will now be remember just for his cheating, like Maradona, and not his amazing ability.
Mark shared how God had proved himself to him and how his life is now transformed through his belief in what Jesus did for him. Sadly his footballing ability didn’t improve but being able to deal with disappointment has!

The players were challenged to ask their team manager to find out more about what Jesus really did and why.

Results:
Bonny Downs 4 Cliff Walk City 2
Summer Scheme 1 Gateway City 4
Cliff Walk City 5 Summer Scheme 3
Cliff Walk Rovers 2 Bonny Downs 1
Gateway City 3 Cliff Walk Rovers 1
Bonny Downs 4 Summer Scheme 3
Summer Scheme 1 Cliff Walk Rovers 5
Cliff Walk City 1 Gateway City 4
Gateway City 6 Bonny Downs 1
Cliff Walk Rovers 3 Cliff Walk City 5

WSM Newham in partnership with the churches of East Ham, Transform Newham, More Than Gold and the Bonny Downs Community Association helped stage a great day on Saturday 12th June. WSM ran the 2nd year of ‘The Newham Community Fives’ with 14 teams of teenagers and children competing for the trophies in their relevant competitions. It was great fun and fantastic to build further relationships with these 100 players and some of their friends and families. The gospel was shared with all teams at the completion of the tournament and prior to the awards. The football was one feature of a fantastic family festival day which included music, food, play areas for children and the screening of the 2 major Fifa World Cup matches that day. The screen was hired in and was huge. The fun day attracted 2,000 local people and prior to the England v USA game, approximately 400 people watched ‘The Prize’ film where current Christian players give their testimonies. It was a great day full of fun, football, food and faith!

This was our first event as WSM Newham; 7 local Under 16 teams entered the football tournament held at Bonny Downs Playing Fields. Approximately 80 people enjoyed a great day of football, faith and fun. The gospel message was shared by Ben Clark and we were able to give away sports Bibles to 28 teenage boys who desired to read it. A full report of the event will appear soon.