LA Stars - ESFNA 2006 Champions
LA Stars Celebrating, the scoreboard shows "LA Stars 2" and "DC Stars 1"
Left to Right
Guest of Honor Olympian Geremew Demboba handing the Championship Trophy to LA Stars Captain Yared Girma (who was named ESFNA 2006 MVP, also scoring the most goals for the tournament at 10 goals), standing next to Olympian Geremew, Guest of Honor Professor Pankhurst, Guest of Honor and LA Stars & ESFNA co-founder Fisseha W/Amanuel; ESFNA President Dawit Agonafer, (turning sideways in blue shirt: LA Stars' beloved coach Mengistu Hussien).
 In addition to the Division one trophy, here are other awards LA Stars received:
LA Stars' beloved coach Mengistu Hussien who they carried on to the field soon after they won the championship.
L.A. Star's phenomenal goal keeper, who is also the current Ethiopian National Team Goalie. Surrounded by his team members, ESFNA President Dawit Agonafer, LA Stars Coach Mengistu Hussien, LA Stars Assistant Coach and Representative to LA3 Aberra Gebre.
LA Stars Ethiopian Soccer Club
ESFNA Member since 1985
www.ethio-lastars.com
The Ethio LA Stars Soccer Club which had such a humble beginning has grown to be one of the strongest clubs within the federation, contributing its share and basking in its earned glory.
 Since formally joining the federation in 1985, Ethio LA Stars has earned 3rd place in 1985, 1st place in 1986 &1998 and 2nd place in 1997 and 1998 in the annual tournaments.
In addition to the above accomplishments during the annual ESFNA tournaments, Ethio LA Stars was the regional champion during the 1989, 1991 and 2001 Western Regional Tournaments.
History
 The genesis for Ethio L.A. Stars Soccer Club can be traced to those Ethiopian players who were instrumental in putting UCLA on the North American Soccer map in the late 60's and early 70's. After finishing their collegiate careers, Fisseha W/Emanuel, Yaregal G. Yesus, Tekeda Alemu, Solomon Terfa, Shewangizaw Agonafir, Girma Belay and a few other from the Ethiopian Community in Westwood started a tradition of playing soccer on Friday afternoons. Due to the limited number of Ethiopians in the Los Angeles area in those days, these games had more of an international rather than a national flavor.
The games than included players from Africa, the Middle East, Latin America and Europe. Within a short period of time some from the above group added Tamrat Asfaw, Adem Mohamed, the late Zerihun Tadesse, Million G. Yesus and others, and more or less created a proto-club that played soccer on a regular basis with an Ethiopian flavor. At about the same time across town at USC a group of Ethiopians had started playing semi organized soccer. Fisseha, Gebre, Addis Hagos, Stephanos Teshome (Steve), Mekonen Girma, Wossen Mengiste, Afework Tesfatsion, Sirak Seifu, Moges Araya and Bemnet Gaim were the main driving force behind this venture.
Talking amongst themselves, the two groups decided to combine their forces and play together on a weekly basis, once the UCLA group had secured a regular playing field on the UCLA Campus.
 The positive atmosphere created by this merge became the cornerstone for the solidification and growth of our organization. The late 70's and 80's witnessed the unprecedented heights to which our organization grew. Every Saturday afternoon, our club fielded four teams (with reserves to boot!) they played year-round of exiting and competitive soccer. The year-round games were capped by a tournament amongst the four teams that produced a champion at the end. These annual championship tournaments were eagerly awaited both by the players and the Los Angeles Ethiopian Community at large. Fans and invited guests numbered in the hundreds, making it one of the biggest gathering of Ethiopians for any event in Los Angeles.
In 1983, Fisseha W. Emannuel proposed program to our organization that would take a selection of players from our club to Washington D.C. for a soccer match, with a promise that the Washington D.C. team will come for a return match to Los Angeles. Despite the fact that we had a strong organization that conducted year-round soccer tournaments, the majority felt it was not a workable proposition. However, with the force of his personality and perseverance, a team was sent to Washington D.C. and the promise of the return match realized, thus laying a firm building block for the establishment of ESFNA on year later and the rest as they say is history.
 Photo Guide:
Standing L to R
Simon (British); Teferi (Jambo); Yohannes (Johni); Fesseha (Temenjaw); Alemayehu (Moral); Abdul (Woriha)
Sitting L to R
Abera (Nebiro); Asfaw (Kesu); Zemariam (Z-Man); Haider (Haji); Behailu (SF); Solomon Legesse; Solomon (Gragne)
content source: ethiola-stars.com & Kedami Mekonen |
