Since 1987-88 the Mathare youth pioneered the linking of self-help youth sports with clearing garbage and improving the environment, reducing drug abuse, preventing AIDS, training young community leaders, providing awards for the best youth volunteers to stay in school and other community service activities.

They were all Nobel Peace Prize nominees in 2004.

They are all winners of the global Common Ground Award for community and peace building.

MYSA started the first girls football leagues in 1992. Today, MYSA has the largest number of female players, teams and leagues in Africa with 10,018 girls playing on 840 teams in 110 leagues in 16 MYSA zones.

MYSA is among the best gender equity organizations worldwide as 49.3% of all elected leaders are female.

The youngest elected football official worldwide was 10-year old Charity Muthoni who was elected in 2008 as the chair of MYSA’s Kayole Zone which then had over 2,000 youth on 127 teams participating in the Kayole sports and community development activities.

MYSA’s most successful failure is Moses Mutuli who lost the goalkeeper competition for the 1992 MYSA U16 team for the Eco-Youth Tournament in Brazil. He then refocused on his studies, graduated at the top of his class at the University of Nairobi, won a Rhodes scholarship to Oxford University, qualified as an actuary, worked for Deloitte in London and South Africa and is now the President of the Actuarial Society of Kenya. In 2011, Moses became the first MYSA alumni to join the MYSA Board of Trustees.

The world’s oldest and largest international youth football tournament is the Norway Cup. MYSA first participated in 1990. In the 42-year history of the Norway Cup, MYSA is now ranked second to a club from Brazil for the most gold medals won.

A juala football made of old plastic bags and string by a MYSA youth sold for Ksh 20 million (US$ 205,000) at a charity auction in 2009 in Dubai and is now in the Olympic Museum in Lausanne, Switzerland.

MYSA won the first FIFA Football for Hope tournament in Berlin, Germany during the 2006 FIFA World Cup and won it again in Johannesburg, South Africa during the 2010 FIFA World Cup.