My name is Anita, I’m an athlete with Oltresport and I work as a consultant at the Rare Disease Observatory. I live with SMA, but above all, I live with a passion that lights me up every time I talk about it: powerchair football.
It’s a sport that, unfortunately, only arrived in Italy in 2016—much later than in countries like France and England—but today it’s growing and gaining recognition, and that truly makes me happy.
I’ve been playing since 2018, and I can say that this sport has changed the way I experience movement and competition, not just my daily life.
Powerchair football originates from soccer and follows most of its rules, but it is played using a power wheelchair. The goal is the same: to score! The sports wheelchairs we use can reach up to 10 km/h and have a front guard to hit the ball.
Everything else—from technique to strategy and teamwork—remains the same as in traditional soccer. Each team has four players: two wingers, a center player, and a goalkeeper. I’ve always played as a winger, a role I find very dynamic and one that I absolutely love.
Physical strength is not a requirement in powerchair football, and this is one of the most important aspects of the sport: it allows people like me, who don’t have the neuromotor abilities needed for other sports, to train, compete, and experience sport with the same intensity as anyone else. It’s a space of real possibilities, not symbolic ones, as is often assumed when it comes to sports associated with disability.
And for me, sport is neither a pastime nor a filler: it’s part of my routine. I train twice a week, for at least two hours each time. It’s a commitment that fits perfectly alongside work, responsibilities, and passions—just like it does for any other athlete.
For me, sport is simply… sport!
Even today, in the collective imagination in Italy, it’s not taken for granted that a person with SMA can practice sport at a competitive level. Powerchair football, however, shows that sport can truly be accessible when the tools are designed to include rather than exclude.
Today, in Italy, there is a dedicated championship and an international federation that officially recognizes this sport. On the court you’ll find both very young players and athletes up to 70 years old: a clear sign of how truly accessible this discipline is, and how it is becoming a rich, diverse, and vibrant movement.
For me, powerchair football is energy—combined with growing physical and mental well-being every time I train. It isn’t a heroic act, nor an exception: it’s simply a part of my life that completes everything else. Nothing more, nothing less.
My days are better because of this sport—not to prove anything, but because it makes me feel good, just as any sport does for anyone.
And so I ask myself: why should practicing sport be considered an exception for those of us with SMA—or similar conditions? Why should it be seen merely as a pastime?
Powerchair football is a full-fledged sport: training sessions, roles, tactics, championships, competition. It isn’t a reduced or adapted version of something else—it’s a complete discipline that allows us athletes to express talent, passion, and team spirit.
When accessibility is real, sport becomes what it is meant to be for everyone: a place of growth, identity, fun, and normality. And it is precisely this normality that deserves to be seen, acknowledged, and celebrated.