R/Y

MEXICO CITY //
PLAY AS YOU LIVE

Home to more than 20 million, Mexico City is a unique hotbed of vivacious culture and one of the world’s most populated cities. With three top-flight football teams and a myriad of semi-professional and amateur leagues, football influences almost every resident’s life in some shape or form.

Here, small-sided games focus more on technique than athleticism—and the fast, fluid and inventive play results from a city awash with outdoor concrete courts and 7-a-side pitches. One of the most decorated small-sided teams in the city is the Tepito Futsal Crew. Their brand of football embodies many of the skills necessary to survive and grow in a city of Mexico City’s size—improvisation, optimism, a will to collaborate and a touch of defiance.

BUENOS AIRES //
GRIT OVER GODLINESS

Argentina exports more professional football players than anywhere else in the world. Buenos Aires is also thought to hold more football pitches than any other metropolis, and the city’s fervency for the game is visible at every turn. Flags, banners, stickers and tattoos proclaim footballing affiliations, and in areas such as La Boca, entire houses, even streets, are painted from top to bottom in club colours. 

Here, the philosophy that every team is greater than the sum of its parts forms the roots of football culture in the city. Strong leaders are held in greater esteem than out-and-out goal scorers—so while young players in other nations aspire to become a team’s poster boy, in Buenos Aires, technical ability has to be matched with dogged determination and relentless hustle to be respected.

RIO DE JANEIRO //
ALL YOU NEED IS A BALL

Rio is one of football's spiritual homes. The birthplace of 'O Fenômeno', it was this sprawling tropical municipality where Ronaldo developed the explosive skill that would make him a global icon. Here, football is an obsession but it's easy to mistake the joy and ease of Brasilian play for innate ability—in reality, it's defined by almost constant contact with the ball which enables a sense of freedom, improvisation and creative flair.

For many, football represents opportunity and a chance to play in Europe but the famed Brasilian style is developed from deep, life-long bonds among players on the same team. From Copacabana at sunrise and neighbourhood courts at the heart of their communities to favelas and mountaintop pitches, wherever you are in Rio, a football is never far away.

SANTIAGO //
OUT OF THE SHADOWS

The Copa América 2015 was the background to every story—in Santiago, it was seen as the perfect moment to write a new chapter in Chilean football. Incisive on the counter and relentless in defence, Chile triumphantly claimed their first title on home turf with a spirit and style of play born from the streets and courts of its capital city.

Santiago has a long and rich history of small-sided, or “baby football” as some call it. Here, the majority of courts are asphalt, with the occasional synthetic pitch for 7-a-side. However, small-sided football is played on streets, parking lots and improvised dirt pitches that are marked out by the players themselves.

Inspired by those small-sided roots, football in Chile has always been about heart and technique, but an infusion of athleticism, physical prowess and tactical awareness helped the national team storm out of the shadows of its more illustrious neighbours. Those qualities were on display in Villa Portales, a housing estate in Santiago where the play is direct and gritty with moments of grace weaved in-between crunching tackles and thundering shots.

SOCIAL

Following the launch of the films, we used the Nike Football app (and local market social channels) to hero players from the films and their home pitches. Dubbed 'Kings of the Pitch', we then challenged football crews across the city to step up and take down the kings.

Inspired to play, thousands of young footballers set up hundreds of games in their cities—making Mexico City and Santiago the two most active cities in the Nike Football app during the tournament.