ESPZen: An amateur football league for the rest of us

While indoor football in Singapore has its own growing band of followers (see our feature on Singapore's futsal scene), it's tough when you want to take it up a notch on the competition scale -- the local organization's messy and there's no order in sight. Out of frustration, a group of enthusiasts decided to put together their own amateur football league and the ESPZen league was born.

Lee Taylor was a private banker by trade who had arrived in Singapore from football crazy England. A diehard football enthusiast who started participating an amateur league with his team of banker expatriates to get his weekly fix of football, only to discovered that the situation was less than ideal.

We have players from 4 continents in the world and we still keep in touch with them even when they go professional.

— Dr Maestro, team FC 204 manager

"We rounded up fellow bankers to join a league but the organization was bad. The referees were late and so were the opponent teams. The organizers would tell us that we’re playing in a cup game while our opponents thought it was a regular league fixture just so that they can get more teams to join in their league," said Taylor to CNNGo.

Out of frustration, his team left this league and Lee went on to set up the ESPZen league. "It started really small but every year, a good 20 teams would want to join us and now we have 104 teams divided into 4 different leagues which play on different days," he said.

For teams intending to play 11-a-side field football, they can choose to compete in the Mid-Week, Saturday or the popular Sunday League – the latter having 80 teams playing within 10 divisions.

Ultimately, ESPZen was Lee’s idea of creating a community for people who want to make friends while enjoying the game. "Divisions are also good as there’s no fun always winning or losing matches 12-0. I love tight games where it’s 1-0 or 2-1. They’re more enjoyable like that and the whole idea of ESPZen is about having fun and competing."

It may be an amateur league but the competition's no less fierce as players duke it out on the field.

Corporate teams do join the competition which makes for a very interesting mix of players. "We have directors playing with middle management and staff from the lower rungs of the corporate ladder. It allows them to bond over a simple game of football."

With every the whole infrastructure online, ESPZen also makes it easy for teams to scout for players looking for teams and vice-versa. "This is a good entry point for people to make friends and a lot of expats have a good reason to stay and make a living here now," he added.

One such team is FC 204. They are not only ambitious, their own youth team set up, but also reigning champions in Division 1. After speaking to their manager, Dr. Maestro, we found out that they were also serious about having fun.

Dr. Maestro’s FC 204 has had players going on to play in major leagues like the Spanish La Liga, J-League and the German Bundesliga and he intends to keep up the standard while fostering great friendships in his team.

Dr Maestro explains, "We have players from all over the world in our team. Brazilian, Algerian, British, Nigerian, Japanese, Singaporean. You name it. It is a decent squad but at the same time what I like about this team and the culture we have created is that allows players to express themselves. We don’t scold anyone on the pitch and after the game everyone goes out for drinks!"

Playing in the ESPZen isn’t just about trophies. As Dr. Maestro described, "We have players from 4 continents in the world and we still keep in touch with them even when they go professional. I feel that the memories they have from their time playing with us is a positive one and it is a continuous bond that we all share."

Interested to join a team or form your own competitive squad of players? Register at www.espzen.com.