Players from the Rinascita Refugees enter the field for a match in Leverano, Italy.
Deep in the eighth tier of the Italian soccer league, far removed from the star-studded ranks of AC Milan and Juventus, there is an amateur team in the southern town of Carmiano. Its players, from countries such as Guinea, Mali and Senegal, share a common identity: They are all migrants.
The team is known as the Rinascita Refugees (rinascita meaning “rebirth” in Italian). With the slogan “let’s kick racism,” the team is funded by social programs through the Italian Ministry of the Interior. It serves as a launching pad for migrants who dream of playing professionally.
One of the social programs, Carmiano Solidade, serves as an important protection for the players and helps foreign minors who leave their countries alone. Benefits such as education, legal protection, psychological support and health care have been crucial to helping Rinascita players be welcomed into Italian society.
According to the International Rescue Committee, more than 700,000 migrants reached Italy between 2014 and 2020 — a number that has been since increasing. Often, asylum seekers reach the Italian peninsula through dangerous sea routes via the Balkans.
However, between a brutal journey to continental Europe and fake or exploitative agents looking to scam aspiring players into signing sham contracts, it is no easy feat for migrant players looking to play professionally.
“Every year, thousands of children leave West Africa with the dream of becoming professional footballers in Europe, but only a few make it,” said Giuseppe Carotenuto, an Italian photographer who has been documenting the team since 2022.
“They land in Europe with the promise of tryouts with important international football clubs,” Carotenuto added. “Once they arrive in the EU after having paid thousands of euros, they are instead abandoned without documents and exploited as labor in the fields in Spain and Portugal.”
Ameth Bamba Keita, a 20-year-old defensive midfielder from Senegal, is a testament to the difficulties that some players face when coming to Europe.
According to Carotenuto, Keita was spotted by a Spanish agent who said he had “seen him play for a long time and that he could help (him) become a player in Europe.”
Keita had allegedly been arranged a trial, or tryout, at UD Almería, a club which at the time was in the second tier of the Spanish soccer league.
After a journey through several countries, Keita found himself lodging near a farm in the Spanish countryside. The agent returned the next day, and Keita was looking forward to beginning his trial. However, there was never a trial to begin with.
The agent threatened Keita, forcing him into work harvesting tomato plants until his debts of bringing him to Europe were repaid. Keita worked for weeks until a man from Burkina Faso helped him escape.
Carotenuto said one thing that stuck with him were these words from Keita: “When I become a professional footballer, with the first money I will return to my country, to the village where I left my mother and my sister. I haven’t heard their (voices) for a long time. I will go back there to search (for them) and try to take them with me.”
Keita and Ndao play with a soccer ball in their courtyard.
Ndao shows a medal that he won from a tournament.
Senegalese forward Saliou Ndao arrived at Rinascita Refugees in a similar situation.
Ndao, 20, was a student in Dakar, Senegal, when he was approached by a Guinean agent offering him a trial at Sporting CP, one of the top clubs in Portugal. Ndao was asked to play for the team but was withdrawn after his agent asked the club for too much money, according to Carotenuto.
“After trying several times to call the agent without ever receiving an answer, Saliou realized that he had been abandoned and left without a passport in a country whose language he did not even know,” the photographer said.
Despite their personal hardships, the team has had success. In April, the team had a historic victory, winning the Italian Cup in their division and allowing them promotion to the next group of their tier.
“In the moments spent with the guys, I tried to understand what the driving force was, the engine that pushed everyone towards that desire for social redemption,” Carotenuto said. “Part of the answer lies in the figure of their coach.”
Hassane Niang Baye, a former player in the Senegalese and German leagues, has been spearheading Rinascita since 2015, the year the team was created. Prior to his tenure, Baye arrived from Senegal in 1997 and worked as a parking attendant and street vendor in Italy to make ends meet.
Carotenuto describes Baye as the “head of the family” and a father figure to many of the players.
The Rinascita Refugees train at night.
A player’s shoes are seen at his home in Italy.
Baye’s successful coaching and mentoring has even guided players such as Moustapha Cissé to professional levels. Cissé, a Guinean, had a brief spell at Serie A club Atalanta and is currently playing for their under-23 team in the third tier of the Italian league. Cissé arrived from his home country as an orphan and studied to become an electrician during his time at Rinascita.
After earning promotion to a higher tier, Rinascita faces new challenges ahead, with more experienced teams and more rigorous games. But the passion and talent is strong within a team that came to Italy with the hopes of playing professional soccer.
“It is becoming a real school of talent under the eyes of Italian and international football clubs,” Carotenuto said. “The story of Moustapha Cissé is a concrete example of this.”
Carotenuto’s project is ongoing and was shortlisted for the Sony World Photography Awards in 2023. He said he eventually plans on making a documentary about the team.
