Maputo (AFP)
Sweaty face and shortness of breath, the players put their sticks on the edge of the field. It's training day for the Maputo Red Star roller skating hockey team and the heat under the roof of their gym is overwhelming.
In a circle around their coach, the teenagers listen to his last instructions before cheering at the four corners of a worn wooden floor for a small game 5 against 5.
"I'm very happy when I play hockey, I feel really good, very comfortable," said the final whistle, 12-year-old Mandra Jose Orlando Julai Laquece. "Later I would like to become a professional." Sometimes also called track hockey, roller hockey is very popular in Mozambique. The fans say almost as much as football or basketball.
The national U-19 team finished third in an 81-nation tournament in Barcelona last July.
The sport was introduced on the shores of the Indian Ocean during Portuguese colonization and has survived until then.
"It has become like a drug that has become rooted in Mozambican blood," said Red Star coach Zefanias Jose Taimo, 59.
Mozambique participated in its first international competition in 1978, three years after independence.
But since then he has struggled to perpetuate the tradition. "It's very complicated because our country has serious difficulties," admits coach Taimo, "but we really do our best to encourage sports in general."
Regarded as one of the poorest countries on the planet, Mozambique was the scene of a deadly civil war (1975-1992) and suffered the full impact of global warming along its 2.000 km of coastline.
Two devastating hurricanes hit its shores earlier this year, killing more than 600 people and causing immense damage.
Despite the difficulties of their daily lives, the young players of the Red Star would miss their two practices of the week for nothing in the world.
"I love skating, I skate since I was little," said 13-year-old Romeo Nhacada Dimande, "that's why I really like to play hockey."
© 2019 AFP