My Story – Calciomen

I am Emanuele Sordi, a student athlete on the men’s soccer team at the American University of Georgia Gwinnett College. My major is exercise science and at the same time, in order to practice my profession, I am also a Certified Personal Trainer.

I want to tell you why soccer has always been not only a job for me but a real passion.

I was still attending kindergarten when I started kicking the ball for the first time. I grew up in a family of soccer fans and my idol could only be Ronaldo The Phenomeno, a war machine.

He had no flaws: running, strength, dribbling and shooting, truly impressive.

As the years went by, I “fell in love” with Cristiano Ronaldo (and still do, despite my age).

Another phenomenon (and it is useless to make comparisons with the Brazilian Ronaldo) that I tried to “imitate” in every single movement, starting from the plays, passing to the exultations until even the haircut.

But it was at age 11 that my coach consecrated me to the role of center forward.

From that moment my real soccer story began, seeing in Dzeko and Ibrahimovic my real sources of inspiration.

With them I have some similarities, obviously with due proportion. Perhaps more with the former than with the latter: like them, I have a great physical structure, a lot of strength, a good instinct for goal and when I have the ball between my feet it is difficult to move.

Soccer has been and still is a school of life for me. It is not the classic catch phrase: I have learned more from Soccer than from school.

Soccer has allowed me to have so many experiences, one above all the one with the Academy of Prato (Italian professional team), when for example I played matches against Inter, against Juventus and participated in a Tournament in Gallipoli (one of the most important tournaments for Under 12s).

I played and scored against great European teams like Zenith St. Petersburg.

But the most important life experience related to Soccer was the year I played in the Professional Academy of Livorno Calcio.

In fact, just to continue pursuing my dream, when I was only 16 years old, I left my family and moved to Livorno on my own. And it helped me a lot.

“What’s the big deal, a lot of guys do it.”.

That’s true, but almost everyone goes to live in the boarding schools of the soccer clubs-they just must worry about going to school and training.

I, on the other hand, unlike them, lived alone in an apartment, with all that entails. The first time away from home, away from my lifelong friends, and this undoubtedly matured me earlier than many of my peers.

I, on the other hand, unlike them, lived alone in an apartment, with all that entails. The first time away from home, away from my lifelong friends, and this undoubtedly matured me earlier than many of my peers.

I still remember those evenings when, after a workout done all in the rain, completely wiped out, I would come home, make myself something to eat, and not even have time to turn on the PlayStation that I would already collapse on the couch.

In short, an adolescence perhaps not quite so common.

But my dream was bigger than any renunciation.
Although it was not a memorable soccer experience, I learned a lot, both about life and about Soccer, in many ways.

After playing 4 Tuscan Eccellenza Championships (semi-professional Italian league), today I am in the United States, where I continue to cultivate this great passion of mine.

Playing Soccer I don’t momentarily consider it my job, I train and live as if I were a Professional Soccer Player but as of today I am also involved in something else: I work and I teach kids like me to become Ever Stronger Soccer Players.

I pass on all my knowledge and share all my knowledge with them so that they do not make the mistakes I made in the past.

Behind my work is a mix of experience and scientific knowledge: everything I know I have learned through practice in the field, through the studies I have done and am doing to become an Ever Stronger Soccer Player and Trainer.