Zidane, Kaka, Portuguese football legend Eusebio and Haitian players Jean Sony and Joseph Peterson will kick off the
VII Match Against Poverty in Lisbon on January 25
Geneva/Lisbon — Forty international football players hailing from teams across the world will compete in
two heavily star-studded teams in Monday’s seventh annual Match Against Poverty, held this year in Lisbon, Portugal.
For the past seven years, UNDP’s Match Against Poverty has raised funds for global efforts to reduce poverty while at the
same time shining a much needed spotlight on those efforts. This year, in the wake of the massive devastation that struck
Haiti, the organizers and players decided that all
proceeds will go toward relief and reconstruction efforts there.
The players, brought together through the
efforts of UNDP Goodwill Ambassador’s Ronaldo and Zinedine Zidane, include two rising Haitian players from the Portuguese
Football Clubs, Jean Sony and Joseph Peterson, representing their recently devastated nation.
The Brazilian
midfielder Kaká (Real Madrid) will represent Ronaldo who, unfortunately, is unable to attend the Match as he starts, on 24
January, the Brazilian football season with his Club Corinthians.
The Match is also intended to focus attention
on the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs) adopted in 2000. They seek to halve world poverty by 2015.
The Match
Against Poverty is supported by the Fédération Internationale de Football Association (FIFA) and the Union of European Football
Associations (UEFA).
The complete list of confirmed players is as follows: Akwá (Angola), Kaká, Marcelo and Luciano
da Silva (Brazil), Pavel Nedved (Czech Republic), Michael Laudrup (Denmark), Alfredo Esteves (East Timor), Graeme Le Saux
(England), Zinedine Zidane, Fabien Barthez and Christophe Dugarry (France), Jean Sony and Joseph Peterson (Haiti), Baichung
Bhutia (India), Edgar Davids, Patrick Kluivert, Phillip Cocu (Netherlands), Luis Figo, Fernando Couto and Pauleta (Portugal),
Gheorghe Hagi and Gheorghe Popescu (Romania), Lucas Radebe (South Africa) and Fernando Hierro (Spain) will play for the Ronaldo,
Zidane & Friends team. Rui Costa, Nuno Gomes, and former Benfica players will compose the Benfica All Star team. More
top international names are expected to confirm in the coming days. More than 20 TV channels around the world will broadcast
the match live. The match will be refereed by Italian legend Pierluigi Collina.
