Inter and Feyenoord: Social Community Exchange | OneFootball

There are always two sides to every game: rivals on the pitch but, off it, friends who work together to promote the values of sport. They are teams, or clubs if you like, with an identity and tradition. They're cultural icons that, especially for UEFA Champions League games, are rooted in their nation's history and often vastly different, although united by football.

Inter and Feyenoord, who have often collaborated on social projects in the past, have decided to go beyond the 90 minutes in order to promote inclusivity in the game, which means seeing your opponent also as a teammate thanks to a shared view of the sport as a tool for integration and education.

As such, a delegation from Inter Campus met with the young beneficiaries of Feyenoord's CSR projects in Rotterdam last week. These promote integration and healthy living in some of the city's most at-risk and multi-ethnic districts. Today, a delegation from the Dutch club was hosted in Milano and met the kids involved in Inter Campus' projects in the local area. The kids themselves were very excited to have a special training session with foreign coaches! These activities were carried out in partnership with the Ospedale San Gerardo in Monza, where the kids receive treatment for childhood leukaemia (Sport Therapy), and on the pitches in the city, where, once they've recovered, the kids find it easier to return to normality after so many months in hospital (Playing Helps you to Recover Better).

The Social Community Exchange project - run in conjunction with UEFA and the United Nations, as part of the Football for the Goals Network, in which both Inter Campus and Feyenoord are involved - allows children to meet representatives of the other team to learn what we have in common as well as what divides us: passion for the game. At the same time, it encourages fans to interact peacefully, holding to a culture of respect and welcoming.

Because without opponents, we wouldn't have football.