{"id":686940,"date":"2026-06-06T00:03:21","date_gmt":"2026-06-06T00:03:21","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/686940\/"},"modified":"2026-06-06T00:03:21","modified_gmt":"2026-06-06T00:03:21","slug":"ahead-of-world-cup-atlanta-sting-brings-power-soccer-to-georgia","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/686940\/","title":{"rendered":"Ahead of World Cup, Atlanta Sting brings power soccer to Georgia"},"content":{"rendered":"<p class=\"text | article-text\">ATLANTA, Ga. \u2014 The Atlanta Sting are racking up goals on the court as soccer in the United States heats up ahead of the World Cup.<\/p>\n<p class=\"text | article-text\">The Sting are a power soccer organization that uses specialized wheelchairs to play the game.<\/p>\n<p class=\"text | article-text\">\u201cIf you see it for the first time, it could be pretty wild. All the spin kicks and passes and trying to score on goal,\u201d said Eric Dornan, an Atlanta Sting player.<\/p>\n<p class=\"text | article-text\">The specialized wheelchairs sometimes make the game sound more like NASCAR than soccer.<\/p>\n<p class=\"text | article-text\">\u201cThey\u2019re rear-wheel driven, which gives them base to spin the chair very quickly. That trajectory is what allows the ball to move really fast,\u201d said Matt Williams, Atlanta Sting coach.<\/p>\n<p><img decoding=\"async\" class=\"img-fluid\" loading=\"lazy\" src=\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/06\/TTS5DAUVGFEG7JUOMD5I7KOPNQ.jpg\" width=\"5635\" height=\"3756\" \/><\/p>\n<p class=\"text | article-text\">\u201cYou accelerate, you feel the wind on your face. You spin the chair and you hit the ball at just the right angle, right on the tip of your guard, and you just&#8230; it\u2019s crazy,\u201d said Matthew Williams, an Atlanta Sting player.<\/p>\n<p class=\"text | article-text\">Dornan started the organization about a decade ago. He has seen the power soccer community grow from just a few teams in the 1990s to dozens around the country.<\/p>\n<p class=\"text | article-text\">\u201cWe like to get out and have a lot of fun, and that\u2019s how we get out and meet people. This is the best place to meet people who have something in common with you,\u201d Dornan said.<\/p>\n<p>Player finds competitive outlet<\/p>\n<p class=\"text | article-text\">For 17-year-old Matthew Williams, it is the perfect opportunity to feed his competitive fire.<\/p>\n<p class=\"text | article-text\">\u201cI was playing adaptable hockey and that was just not my thing. I didn\u2019t have as much control over myself and I didn\u2019t like it, and I thought all adaptive sports would be the same&#8230; We found soccer, that changed it for me. I had self-control, I could drive my own chair, I could hit things,\u201d Matthew Williams said.<\/p>\n<p class=\"text | article-text\">His father, Matt Williams, coaches the team.<\/p>\n<p><img decoding=\"async\" class=\"img-fluid\" loading=\"lazy\" src=\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/06\/EFPCB5A6DJFH3PTC42MJRVBKTY.jpg\" width=\"1280\" height=\"720\" \/><\/p>\n<p class=\"text | article-text\">\u201cIt\u2019s very isolated and very restricting. Sports just opens you up to meeting others, people from all kinds of different backgrounds. Not to mention the challenges you deal with in sport, which helps you build character,\u201d Matt Williams said.<\/p>\n<p class=\"text | article-text\">Whether it is the thrill of beating an opponent or the camaraderie of a team, power soccer has a little something for everyone.<\/p>\n<p>Copyright 2026 WRDW\/WAGT. All rights reserved.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"ATLANTA, Ga. \u2014 The Atlanta Sting are racking up goals on the court as soccer in the United&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":686941,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[18],"tags":[23,3,21,19,22,20,25,24],"class_list":["post-686940","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-united-states","tag-america","tag-news","tag-united-states","tag-united-states-of-america","tag-unitedstates","tag-unitedstatesofamerica","tag-us","tag-usa"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/686940","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=686940"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/686940\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/686941"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=686940"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=686940"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=686940"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}