THE HISTORY
In highlights
Inspired by technical professional footballers, the contemporary artistic form of street football was created in the mid 90’s on the squares of Amsterdam and Rotterdam. Led by Edgar Davids and Nike, the game NIKE Panna K.O. was conceived together with street soccer players from Amsterdam!
The first Panna Knock Out tournament took place in 2001 and, except as a publicity stunt for Nike, was intended to provide street soccer players with a serious platform. A number of legendary Nike Panna K.O. tournaments follow until 2006.
Check out one of the tournaments here.
On the 29th of May a Panna Knock Out tournament will be organized for the first time in Obdam (North Holland). After this, other tournaments will follow soon through the rest of the country. Partly because of these two initiatives, the fame of Panna Knock Out is growing rapidly both nationally and internationally. Many famous names from the street soccer scene like Soufiane Touzani, Jeand Doest, Sean Garnier, Jack Downer, Kristoffer Liicht, Jermaine Vanenburg and Edward van Gils become involved in Panna Knock Out.
Professional football became charmed by Panna Knock Out. Since 2006, Panna Knock Out have been organized tournaments for Dutch clubs such as, ADO Den Haag, Ajax, AZ, Feyenoord, NEC, Heerenveen and Willem II. Later foreign clubs as Arsenal, Celtic, Galatasaray, Liverpool and Real Madrid became partners for the tournaments.
During the 2008 FIFA European Championship in Switzerland, the overwhelming number of Dutch fans literally turned Bern orange. A month before the tournament, Panna Knock Out visited the city. In collaboration with the Dutch embassy, they organised tournaments in order to raise the profile of the Dutch team. Switzerland was only the second foreign country to be visited by Panna Knock Out, after Belgium. Many other countries would follow….
The success in Switzerland was repeated in the United Kingdom. Upon request of the embassy there, tournaments in Scotland and England were visited. The clubs Celtic, Liverpool and Arsenal worked together with Panna Knock Out to make the tour a succes. One year later, a second tour was organised. And Arsenal wanted even more! (see 2009)
During the UK Tour 2008, Panna KO visited the Arsenal Cruyff Court Bergkamp in London to put on a tournament and freestyle shows. The trainers of Arsenal FC were deeply impressed by the game and the skills of the Dutch players. After visiting the 2008 Panna Dutch Championships, they kwew that they had to bring Panna to London. In 2009, we became partners, which resulted in Panna Knock Out tournaments organized by Arsenal for the community.
Watch the Panna Knock Out UK Tour here
In October 2011, Onur Cevik won the Panna Knock Out tournament in the Turkish city, Iskenderun. He was congratulated by the mayor and received a ticket for the Panna Knock Out European Championship. After returning to Iskenderun, he received a badge of honour from the local authorities and was given a great deal of media attention.
On September 20, the first Panna Knock Out tournament was held in Copenhagen. The winner of the tournament became Amin Benmoumo. Because of this, Amin qualified for the World Championship Panna Knock Out. Number two of the tournament became Kristoffer Liicht.
Watch the Pannahouse video about the WSF here
In 2013, the World of Streetfootball tournament took place for the first time in Rotterdam. A lot of famous street football players from the Netherlands, Belgium, France and Denmark came together to compete with each other. Easy Man became the overall winner of the tournament.
Watch the Pannahouse video about the WSF here
On 21 September, the Panna Knock Out World Championship took place in Paradiso, Amsterdam. There were players from 31 countries! Winner: The Belgian Ilyas Toubz.
Watch the World Championship Panna Knock Out aftermovie here
With various performances, the four KNVB street football ambassadors Jeand Doest, Nasser El Jackson, Tom Vegter and Rocky gave kids an unforgettable day. The visitors enjoyed the Urban Sports shows such as freestyle football, ground moves, street dance, breakdance and freerunning. The promotion video is viewed more than 4 million times on Youtube!
Watch here the promotion video of the KNVB Streetfootball
All facets of street football in one day! From panna football to freestyle competitions. From 5 versus 5 to football bowling games. This all tookplace on June 26, 2016 in Rotterdam. A unique event with more than 5000 visitors and 1000 participants.
Watch here the aftermovie of the KNVB Street Football Games
The big success in 2016 were followed up by a second edition of the KNVB Street football games in 2017. This time, the location was the Jaarbeurs Utrecht. Various street football challenges took place with a number of popular innovations, such as Football Darts and Skills Spot. At the same time, the open Dutch Championship Panna and the Dutch Championship Freestyle took place. With more than 1200 participans, the event became again a very big and great success.
Watch the aftermovie of the second edition KNVB Street Football Games here
On Saturday 7 July, the FOX Sports & Eredivisie Football Festival took place in Utrecht. Here, the Dutch Open Championship Panna took place. For the first time the Elite Panna Tournament was organized with top panna players from Denmark, France, Belgium, Germany and the Netherlands.
Watch here the video of the FOX Sports and Eredivisie Football
The Open NK Panna Knock Out took place for the second time while the FOX Sports & Eredivisie Voetbalfestival in the Jaarbeurs in Utrecht on 6 July. In the U15 final Saajan el Jackson beats Mehmet Ezer with a sick panna. Adi won the 16+ title. At the All Styles Knock Out Championships and the Benelux cup, the 16 best Freestylers and street football players from the Benelux battled against each other. Mart Pool was chosen by the jury as winner of the Freestyle championships. Evrim Nallar won by panna from Abdullah Combito!
Click here to watch the after movie from voetbalfestival in the Jaarbeurs
A new concept is launched! Pro football players gave something back to the neighborhood where the grow up in collaboration with Panna Knock Out and Daily Eventz. We organized a tournament on the square where it all began for the players. The first PRO cups where organized with players Georginio Wijnaldum, Jetro Willems, Nasser el Khayati en Royston Drenthe from Rotterdam. Click on the names to see the after movie’s of that specific day.
Rappers Kevin and Lijpe brings an ode to street football in collaboration with Panna Knock Out & Dr. WOOOW! the Panna Knock Out Anthem – Kilometers. The track went viral and went gold in two months. The track already got 8.000.000 streams on Spotify and 2.000.000 views on YouTube!
Click here to watch the videoclip
In collaboration with our partner Monta Street the official Panna Knock Out x Monta Street Streetmatch ball was released. This collaboration is made to give something back to the street football community. All sales will be donated to organize world wide panna events.
Click here to order the ball
The legendary World of Streetfootball competition with all facts of street football returned in the weekend from 14 & 15 September to his place where it belongs. With attendees from more than 20 countries, 15.000 visitors and more than 1000 attendees the event was a big succes. Takuto Kogoru from Japan won the WC Panna Knock Out and is the new world champion. Jassim Mazouz from Belgium is the new Youth World champion.
Click here to see the after movie from WSF