Amazingly, it was not even a month ago that Ciro Rinaldi Cellulari was playing Futsal in the WA State Futsal League with the current league leaders, South Fremantle MC.

In Mid 2012 Ciro joined Fremantle Muita Calma after a rocky start to the league with Scarborough Samba Boys where his game time was limited, due to his lack of discipline. The new coach of Muita Calma, Raffaele Capasso, saw some video footage of his games with the Samba Boys and without hesitation made an offer for the charismatic Brazilian. The signing was met with some mixed reactions by his new team mates as the talented player seemed to come and go as he pleased and never really showed any commitment to the club.

This began to change after he played in Melbourne with the SFL 5, an All Star team of players from the WA State Futsal League, which came runners up to one of the strongest club sides in Australia, Pascoe Vale. The exposure and attention he got seemed to drive his passion for the game to another level and showed us all what a talented player he really was.

His next trip, courtesy of the SFL and his new club Fremantle Muita Calma, was to Cairns where his 4 goals in the grand final will go down as one of the most remarkable performances by an individual in any Futsal game you would ever be fortunate to see. An injury in the quarter final had many believing that his tournament was over as he was unable to walk and was left in tears. Team Physio, Fred Salvador Vanin, worked a miracle and got him back out for the semi and the grand final. The rest as they say, was history. His side Fremantle Muita Calma won the Ten Thousand dollar prize and he returned to Perth a superstar.

He completed the year with Fremantle Muita Calma as champions of the SFL Challenge Cup, another $10,000 prize, and the Football West Futsal League. A late withdrawal by Victor Valenca in the Football West State team meant that Ciro also got a call up for the team that competed in the nations capital at the National Futsal Championships, representing WA.

This year, due to the restructure of his club side Fremantle Muita Calma who would no longer compete in the SFL, he was traded to South Fremantle MC where he would still be around some of his former team mates including Luke Tidy, Salman Alhammadi, Mason Vojdani and Adriano Martino. Unfortunately his season came to a premature end as he was made an offer too good to refuse with a Club in Brazil, FIB, where you can see things are looking up for this one time wild child of WA Futsal. Only a few games in and he gets to take the court against one of the greatest Futsal players of all time… Falcao

The SFL and all his friends in WA wish him all the best as his Futsal career grows from strength to strength.

To all the players out there who would one day like to see themselves in a position like Ciro, take the step forward and join an SFL Club and see where the SFL could take you…

email [email protected] or come down to training on Thursdays at Melville Recreation Centre.