Rio 2016 president Carlos Nuzman told the specialized website Around the Rings that if the IOC approves the addition of beach soccer to the Olympic program, the discipline would be one of the highlights of the Games. “It’s a great idea. If realized, I’m sure that football and the fans only can win, and that beach soccer will be one of the biggest attractions in Rio 2016“, Nuzman told ATR.

As beachsoccer.com informed, FIFA president Joseph S. Blatter and Brazil 2014 president and FIFA’s Futsal and Beach Soccer Committee Ricardo Teixeira dealt with the inclusion of the popular modality in the Games when they met with Nuzman ahead of the World Cup qualifying draw in Rio on July 30.

It’s worth remembering, as Around the Rings, highlights, that Beach Soccer is already the showcase event of the Asian Beach Games, organized by the Olympic Council of Asia.

Around the Rings also explains that “The Olympic program will be reviewed after the London 2012 Games. During the evaluation process by the IOC’s program commission, beach soccer could be considered for inclusion at Rio 2016. Should the discipline gain IOC Executive Board approval, it would then go to a vote at the IOC Session convening in Buenos Aires in 2013”.

Amidst the fun and frolic of hundreds of Coney Island Beach revelers last Saturday, history was being created on a strip of sand on New York’s most famous summer venue. Beach soccer made an enthusiastic beginning in the Big Apple when Bay 20, at one of the city’s most recognizable locations, was transformed into an arena of dribbling, goal-scoring and tackling by dozens of young players. Organized by the Central Brooklyn Soccer Federation, the series was meant to introduce beach soccer and eventually popularize in New York and beyond.

Four teams played out the first ever staged beach soccer series in the State, and from all indications, the future looks good for the mostly unknown sport here that is hugely popular in the Mecca of traditional soccer in Brazil.

Both Shomari Ramsay and Garth Nelson founders of the Central Brooklyn Soccer Federation were pleased with the response and enthusiasm displayed by the young players who represented Mariners Under-15, Patriots Girls Under-15 teams along, in addition to Brooklyn Italians Youth Under-12 and Under-8 and Champs Under-12 and Under-8 teams.

“Our intention is to introduce the fans in New York to a different brand of soccer, that is just as exciting and entertaining as traditional soccer,” Nelson stated. “Beach soccer is growing fast in other parts of the country and other countries around the world and we plan to have teams good enough from New York to compete against the best in Florida and other states where it is more established”.

Nelson explained that beach soccer in New York has the support of a leading MLS player – the former New York Red Bulls midfielder Dwayne De Rosario, who had planned to attend the games. But because he was abruptly traded to DC United in late June, De Rosario was absent.