Hundreds of school children celebrated the launch of a new football development project in Dakar, Senegal. The Lycée Lamine Gueye has a capacity of 3,000 students and the project, part of the FIFA Forward programme, follows a Memorandum of Understanding with the Confederation Africaine de Football (CAF) and the African Union in February 2019.

The project includes the construction of a new pitch, an outdoor futsal pitch and the renovation of changing rooms for boys and girls. It will allow the community to benefit from facilities which it hosts training sessions for clubs and schools in the Dakar-Plateau area, inter-school (UASSU) and inter-university competitions and pupils from surrounding colleges.

“This smile is the joy that we want to give to all the students of Lamine Gueye,” FIFA President Gianni Infantino told the audience. “Football is joy. It is hope, smiles. We must use this magic to train our young people of tomorrow. It is important to make sure that sport and education go hand in hand, because sport and football are a school of life."