England football star Bukayo Saka reunited with his first ever football coach, Colin Nixon, as the two championed the impact that coaches can have on local communities.
Nixon spotted the winger’s flair for the sport when Saka was aged just six, before inviting him to play at Greenford Celtic.
In Saka’s view, Nixon’s support was pivotal.
“Nixon was the manager of the team, and in that team he gave 9 or 10 players an opportunity to come and train every weekend and play matches and have fun and be happy and take them away from something else that they could have been doing which could have potentially not been positive for their lives, starting with myself,” Saka explained.
”I’m here today because he’s one of the people that gave me an opportunity to play football and from then on I got started so I think that him and other coaches in local communities they have a big role in helping the kids of this generation for sure,” the 23 year old added.
Saka is also an ambassador for Chase, which aims to help people from low income backgrounds to access coaching qualifications, and increase diversity in coaching.
According to research from YouGov, commissioned by Chase, over half of those surveyed saying they would be more likely to progress in coaching if they had people to look up to from a wider variety of backgrounds.