You’d be forgiven for assuming that the likes of Neymar or Pele would be involved in taking the first kick at the 2014 World Cup in Brazil.

Instead, it’s something quite different, yet incredibly special and unique. A teenager paralyzed from the waist down is set to kick off the huge spectacle in Sao Paulo by taking the ceremonial first kick!

You read correctly. With the help of the world’s most advanced mind-controlled exoskeleton, the yet-to-be-chosen lucky teenager will take the first kick on perhaps the world’s most prominent sports stage.

The ambitious idea is designed to showcase the Walk Again Project - a nonprofit international collaboration dedicated to researching ways to overcome paralysis through technology. The project itself explains the process, helped through the wearing of a “robotic body suit”, here:

"The candidate teenage kicker will be trained in Virtual Reality to control technology that will eventually allow them to kick the ball at the world cup [sic]. They will do this by wearing a non-invasive headpiece that detects brain waves."

Motorized metal braces tested on monkeys will support and bend the kicker’s legs. The braces will be stabilized by gyroscopes and powered by a battery carried by the kicker in a backpack. German-made sensors will relay a feeling of pressure when each foot touches the ground. And months of training on a virtual-reality simulator will have prepared the teenager — selected from a pool of 10 candidates — to do all this using a device that translates thoughts into actions.

“We want to galvanize people’s imaginations,” says Miguel Nicolelis, the Brazilian neuroscientist at Duke University who is leading the Walk Again Project’s efforts to create the robotic suit. “With enough political will and investment, we could make wheelchairs obsolete.”
http://www.washingtonpost.com/national/health-science/mind-controlled-prostheses-offer-hope-for-disabled/2013/05/03/fbc1018a-8778-11e2-98a3-b3db6b9ac586_story.html

This is cool. Im glad people in wheelchairs are getting the same opportunities as other people, BUT at the same time... why not let him do something that he is already able to do (Im assuming the chosen will be a he).. like "throw" the ball or something instead of strapping all that crap to him to make him more "normal" or "socially accepted" .. Grrrr

#ImTotallyEntitledToThisOpinion
#MotherOfAKidInAWheelchair
#Rantover

^^
Yeah, he could have made a symbolic 'save', but, as in most soccer competitions, a first kick is more traditional.

CFCfan: ^^
Yeah, he could have made a symbolic 'save', but, as in most soccer competitions, a first kick is more traditional.

Yeah, but still, its irritating.. Seems like they are just trying to advertise their robot suit.