Meet Calvin Do’oro: the new Kurukuru’s superstar

The Kurukuru, Solomon Islands national futsal team, is the powerhouse of the sport in the South Pacific; the likes of Elliot Ragomo, Anthony Talo and Jack Whitney always helped the national team to dominate the competitions of the region. Solomon Islands took part of four World Cups and they are hoping to take part of the next edition as the new head coach, Damon Shaw, is preparing a new team – a mix with experience and young players. One of the upcoming stars of Solomon Islands’ football is Calvin Do’oro, a name that is rapidly getting known by futsal fans across the country.

The first tournament playing for his country was the Melanesian Cup played in Fiji this April: “It was great and a history for me as part of my futsal career“, said Do’oro to Oceania Football Center. Do’oro already collected the Golden Boot and Most Valuated Player award of the competition as the Dawn FC player helped the Kurukuru to win the competition beating Vanuatu in the final – “despite being my debut for the national team I could already get many prizes, it shows how hard working and my passion through this sport, especially while I am playing for my national team“, added Do’oro.

But Do’oro has a big way before making it to the national team squad; he has experience of representing Solomon Islands internationaly at youth rankings and also playing futsal in different countries: “I am one of the players who’ve been to Argentina for the U-17 Youth Olympic in 2018“, he said, “After came back from Argentina I went to play in Vanuatu with one of the best local clubs, HUKA FC, for almost three years and eight months – from 2019 ’till 2022“, said the player.

“Recently when came back to Solomon Islands, the National Super League had already kick off and the requirements to be in the Kurukuru trials is that we must play in the league before I got selected. So I had a chance to replace James Egeta – another national team member – for Dawn FC. Then I got registered under the team and I manage to play the last five game and we came out as runners up last season of the National Super League“, explained the player on how he was selected to the Kurukuru.

When talking about his next challenges, Do’oro is clear: “My biggest goal is to qualify for the World Cup“, he said – “our challenge is in the team we have young players in the squad and weneed play more international matches to get more experience and then we set to go for World Cup qualifiers” said the new Kurukuru member. “It is not going to be easy to qualify this time, futsal is growing in the region. But if we stick to the game plan and every single player contribute in the game then I think everything will be fine, but like I said again every team is prepared and they want to qualify” he added.

As the Kurukuru get ready for upcoming friendly matches in Vietnam in the next days this month, Do’oro expressed how it is being to be coached by Shaw: “He is an amazing coach, full of futsal knowledge. It is great to be training with him and to be learning new things every training session. We have a good relationship“, he said.

Do’oro and his teammates are set for challenging friendly matches straight ahead as they prepare for their ultimate goal to: to qualify Solomon Islands for their 5th FIFA Futsal World Cup. In addition, the young Solomon Islander also stated that he is working towards playing professional football and a contract overseas seems to be already in the horizon.