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FIFA's Football For Hope

A Ronaldinho XI saw off a side captained by Andrei Shevchenko 6-3 in FIFA's Football For Hope benefit match held here which raised up to three million dollars for the tsunami disaster.

Although Barcelona's 100,000-capacity Nou Camp stadium was less than half full - 36,000 tickets priced between 10 and 29 euros had been sold hours before kick-off - FIFA president Sepp Blatter applauded the initiative.
"This is the first time in my 30 years in FIFA that we have seen such an assembly of great players coming together for a humanitarian cause," said Blatter.
"It's a great moment for international football," Blatter added.
The match was preceded by a minute's silence impeccably observed in honour of the 287,000 people who died after a powerful undersea earthquake off the Indonesian island of Sumatra sent huge waves pounding into coastlines around the Indian Ocean.
And in an entertaining affair in which the players sported the Football For Hope logo on their shirts Samuel Eto'o, playing on his home turf, opened the scoring in the 13th minute on the day he was named African Footballer of the Year.
His Barca teammate, World Footballer of the Year Ronaldinho fittingly got the second six minutes later.
The ever-smiling Brazilian only had to tap in after his fellow countryman Kaka flicked the ball across the goalmouth after having his own attempt parried by the keeper.
Alessandro Del Piero pulled one back for Shevchenko's side, the Juventus ace set up by a brilliant pass from Zinedine Zidane.
A minute later Shevchenko should have levelled but the Ukrainian's header was tipped over the bar.
Eto'o doubled up on the stroke of half time, dummying the keeper to score into an empty goal.
The second half proved equally productive, with Shevchenko's side levelling after strikes from Gianfranco Zola and David Suazo.
But Ronaldinho's team had the last word with a quick-fire double from Southampton's Senegalese international Henri Camara and a 79th minute effort from Eintracht Frankfurt's Korean midfielder Cha Doo-Ri.
Frank Rijkaard, coach of the winning side and of Barcelona, said: "I think it's right to participate in an event like this - it's important for the victims of the tsunamis and I think the players did a great job."
Lennart Johansson, boss of UEFA, European football's governing body, praised the speed with which football responded to the tsunamis.
"Many governments reacted slowly to the catastrophe, football reacted immediately," he said.
Addressing the teams beforehand Mohamed Bin Hammam, president of the Asian Football Confederation, said: "You're all extraordinary players but you're also extraordinary people."
In total football has raised an estimated ten million dollars for the December 26 disaster.

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