"We played barefoot on the streets with whatever we could find. Sometimes we even used oranges." That's Frantzdy Pierrot, speaking Tuesday at a packed Boston ceremony where Massachusetts Governor Maura Healey officially declared it "Frantzdy Pierrot Day" across the state and the City of Boston.
The 31-year-old Haiti striker has earned it. He's third all-time in goals for the national team, helped the island nation qualify for just their second-ever World Cup appearance, and in a detail that almost writes itself — Haiti's opening game is against Scotland on June 13th at Foxborough. In Massachusetts. The state where Pierrot went to high school.
The long road from Melrose High to the World Cup
Pierrot moved to the United States at eleven. He played two seasons at Melrose High School, one at Northeastern University, then transferred to Coastal Carolina before getting drafted into MLS — and eventually making his way to clubs across Europe, including a stint in the Champions League.
His former Melrose coach, Dean Serino — who played hooky from his math teaching job in Stoneham to attend — put it plainly: "He's a player from Massachusetts playing in the World Cup. Just saying that sounds surreal. It's in Foxborough, it's his home state. If you wrote it as a movie, you wouldn't believe it. It's too far-fetched."
Serino wasn't the only one from those early days in the room. Former teammate Anthony McElligott, a senior when Pierrot was a freshman, remembered watching him make the varsity team young and come back from college a completely different player. "A totally different beast," McElligott said. When Pierrot was playing in Israel and the war disrupted training, he rang Melrose to ask if he could come back and work with the squad. They said yes immediately.
What Pierrot announced beyond the ceremony
The football story is compelling enough, but Pierrot used the platform to announce something concrete: a foundation in his name designed to give kids in Haiti access to the game. "I want to represent every child with a dream, every parent making sacrifices, every coach working with limited resources," he said. "Our greatest legacy is what we build for others."
Haiti open their World Cup campaign against Scotland in Foxborough on June 13th. For a nation making just their second-ever World Cup appearance, getting Pierrot — their third-highest scorer in history — fit and firing will be everything. Scotland's defensive line should be paying attention.
