New York team scores big in first Homeless USA Cup

	The New York team was goal-oriented at the Homeless USA Cup in Charlotte -- and it showed. Mae Lambing

By Melissa Segura, SI.com

While trolling through the ads on Craigslist, Mick Watson could have picked up anything from a free bag of coin wrappers, a Nordic track, a mattress or even a rent-free apartment, provided he was willing to walk around naked. Instead, he picked up perspective. The ad title was simple, really.

WANTED: SOCCER COACH NEEDED FOR HOMELESS TEAM

His sublet-seeking, soccer-playing friends saw the ad, read about how Jeff and Ron Grunberg sought to combat homelessness using soccer, and knew it was a perfect fit for Mick, a 26-year-old Brit who had come to suburban New York to study philosophy. In training 12 years ago, Watson had run into a wall, smashing his kneecap and his pro-playing dreams. Since his injury had sent him to the sidelines, he now drove around with a collection of balls and a pile of cones in his trunk, teaching the game to anyone, anywhere, in between his classes. He could understand how Marx believed in work trumping nature, how Nietzsche explained human persuasion by its need for power, but these Grunberg guys eliminating homelessness with a ball and a net? How many headers had these gents taken?

The guys hanging around outside the Baruch College gymnasium in Manhattan for Sunday-evening practice certainly didn't look homeless. Jorge, a 25-year-old goalie who cleaned offices, sat on a bench with his cousin Daniel, a former Honduran national-team player who moved to the U.S. after the death of his father. Victor, a Mexican defender who works as a day laborer around the city was too busy laughing at his own jokes to notice Mick as he approached the group for the first time. Madhi, a political refugee from the Sudan and the de facto team captain -- in his perfectly pleated khakis and collared shirt -- walked up to Mick and introduced himself. Jeff Grunberg, a sociologist who has dedicated his life to fighting homelessness and now organizes the U.S. homeless soccer movement, and his brother Ron, who admits that all his nonprofit work with the displaced has left him one unforeseen expense from sleeping on the street, also greeted the new coach. Then, there was Gerson.

Gerson sat with his girlfriend while the rest of the team ripped on each other.  Gerson had to wear his own bright red shorts and a different T-shirt while the rest of the team wore the silver basketball shorts and the Homeless World Cup team tops that the Grunberg brothers had not only bought, but also took home and washed after every practice. "Most of the guys only have one pair of shorts and they can't get them all sweaty," Jeff Grunberg explained.

When Mick shouted, "Everyone gather 'round," Gerson was the only one who didn't comply.