An act of true sportsmanship is sending ripples across the world, inspired by a new friendship between the Israeli and Kenyan women’s Lacrosse teams. The two teams met playing in the 2019 Women’s Lacrosse World Championship in Peterborough, Canada. Israel won the game 13-4, yet something felt off about their victory. The team understood that the Kenyan women were not playing with the proper equipment. They only had normal sports sneakers, giving the team a large disadvantage, in addition to a big health risk.
Shortly after their win, the Israeli women took action. They wanted to support fair play, and ensure the Kenyan women had proper cleats before their next game. With a few phone calls to garner parental support, Ella Duvdevani spoke with her father Michael, who owns a ped-orthic clinic in the United States, making the mission for overnight cleats easier to achieve. The Israeli team was able to secure cleats for the Kenyan team. The next day, the Israeli players gifted the shoes to the Kenyan players. A video was captured and posted by the Kenya Lacrosse social media channel and has since went viral with hundreds of thousands of views. The Kenyan team went on to win the next game.
The act of kindness exemplifies true sportsmanship. The Kenya lacrosse team tweeted the video, posting “Yesterday we played @Israel_Lacrosse and had no cleats…after supporting their game today, Israel surprised the whole Team on the sideline with brand new cleats!” The tweet has since gone viral, and has since received hundreds of thousands of views, hopefully inspiring appreciation for fair play over victory any day.
