Joseph Paintsil remains hopeful for a call to join Ghana’s World Cup team. He credits his success to years of sacrifice and uses that experience to give back through a residential soccer academy he founded in Ghana. The academy serves about 50 boys aged 7 to 18, providing soccer training, meals, and schooling. Paintsil says the goal is to help families facing hardship and limited resources. Making the World Cup team could raise his profile, attract more funding, and allow expansion. He describes the academy as an independent foundation and plans to add women. He currently funds much of the academy using his salary, with support from Herbalife for sports nutrition, and employs coaches, an athletic trainer, and a trustee while requiring children to attend classes.
"Joseph Paintsil is still hopeful he'll get the phone call he's always dreamed of this week, the one telling him he's made Ghana's World Cup team. That looks like a long shot at this point, though it would be a just reward for the sacrifice, for the blood, sweat and tears the Galaxy winger has put into becoming one of his country's best players, one good enough to play in World Cup qualifiers and start in the Africa Cup of Nations."
"The reason why I want to give back is all about what I passed through, what I faced growing up. I did this because I want [to help] those people who are really in need, those people who are really suffering and people who don't have that ability. There are some families that, it's really difficult for them."
"It's just an independent thing that I made, like a foundation. Going forward, we'll add some women also to it, to make it a great thing. So everything is on its way and everything is coming together. For the time being, Paintsil is funding much of the academy's work on his $4.5-million salary with the Galaxy, although Herbalife, the team's longtime shirt sponsor, is helping with a sports nutrition program."
"There, about 50 boys, aged 7 through 18, not only get soccer training, but are fed and go to school - all the things Paintsil often went without as a child growing up in Accra, the tightly packed capital of a country where much of the population lives on $2 a day. The staff includes three coaches, an athletic trainer and a trustee to manage the place, Paintsil said. In addition to soccer training, the children are also required to attend classes"
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