Football and entertainment with Kobe Bryant and Pep Guardiola

Washington (FCB).- Kobe Bryant and Pep Guardiola pulled on Barça shirts and took part in a charity game in Washington DC organised by Club ambassador Mia Hamm on Sunday. One of the joys of charity games is often seeing things that would never happen in a normal game, such as both teams wearing Barça shirts, an NBA star on the pitch or the return of a football legend –Pep Guardiola. Kobe Bryant wore the number 24 shirt and even kept his sunglasses on throughout the game. Although his height is not ideally suited to football he did score a goal….unfortunately it was an own goal.

Fortunately for the LA Lakers star, he was playing alongside a rather more accomplished player – Pep Guardiola. The Barça boss, who retired as a player in 2006, pulled on the number 4 shirt once again and clear favourite amongst the fans. Pep played his familiar role in the centre of the pitch, setting up the first goal and scoring his team’s second goal. Fellow Barça man Manel Estiarte was on Guardiola’s team, whilst the opposition, wearing the team’s back second strip, had Andoni Zubizarreta in goal. The Club’s Sporting Director of Professional Football showed he had retained his goalkeeping skills with two good stops from Kobe Bryant. The match – the Mia Hamm & Nomar Gardaparra celebrity soccer challenge -was held to raise funds for the many charity projects that the Barça ambassadors organise. This is the fourth edition of the challenge and as well as Kobe Bryant, there was a host of other well known faces taking part, including reporters, basketball stars and members of the US Women’s Football team, who were recently runners up in the World Cup in Germany. At the end of the game, Club President Sandro Rosell came onto the pitch and in front of the 1,500 spectators at the match, presented Mia Hamm with a small present in recognition of the social work she has been doing. Once again, football served as a perfect excuse for helping people and once again, Barça didn’t lose – the game ended 6-6!