Football and Disability: How is the game becoming more inclusive?

Yussif Ahmed Heath plays football in Qatar Foundation's Ability-Friendly Program. He loves to play the game, even though his body doesn't always cooperate with him. The 11-year-old was born with Cerebral palsy-hemiplegia, which causes paralysis on one side of the body, but still finds great joy on the pitch. That joy turned into exuberance recently when he met retired football legend David Beckham in Doha's Education City.

"He was good. You know he's a player from England? And he was awesome,"

High praise from Yussif for the 47-year-old who fielded questions from the children and participated in a series of football drills and a penalty shootout. The former Manchester United and England international may have been the special guest. Still, Yussif quickly stole the attention of everyone in attendance at the special event hosted by the Qatar Foundation. The program was born from the idea that football, like most sports, still has to make some strides when it comes to being accessible to players with disabilities.

"It's understanding you need to have small groups and cater for small groups, for their needs.

I got [Yussif] smiling for five minutes after an hour, and you go, 'Oh well, he might not want to do it, but at least he went from not being here to today being here for five minutes," explained Ryan Moignard, a Special Needs Football Coach at Qatar Foundation.

"Let's hope tomorrow or the day after we can do 10 minutes."

The program focuses on six main ability groups.

The Ability-Friendly Program has 175 participants with many names on a waiting list. While many players are children, the program is inclusive, with the eldest participant in their mid-50s. The foundation offers a unique program called 'Coaching the Coach.'