Different Mindset:

“You asked me about Asian players,” said former professional footballer and current FA coach, Noel Blake, during our extensive interview. “How long did it take America to get its first black President? We haven’t had a black Prime Minister in England. I’ve not seen a black Prime Minister in France or Chancellor in Germany.”

He believes that patience is the key in bringing British-Asian players through. “It’s like anything else,” he said. “It’s a different mindset – different culture. Asians and Africans are in Europe in a big way, but it will take time to turn the tide in football. When I started it was forty years ago.”

But it has taken too long to recognise the extent of the problem and deal with it. Frank Soo was in his prime over sixty years ago. Michael Chopra came through this decade, but he was on his own in Newcastle United’s academy. Zesh Rehman has played in the Premier League – all four divsions actually, but while they represented England at youth level, neither was near a  full cap. The problems are well known – what about solutions?

Initiatives:

Chopra is a role model to young Asian players. Others are sorely needed. Empower-Sport Limited has its own initiative,¹ but what other assistance is out there? Last year Chelsea launched Search for An Asian Soccer Star – an initiative we fully support. Their coaches put Asian boys – only those with heritage from the Indian sub-continent in the Under-12 to Under-14 age groups through drills over three days. One from each age group was given the opportunity of an extended trial with Chelsea that involved playing for the academy team. But why was this necessary?

“I think if you talk to members of the Asian community, they’ll say they didn’t feel those opportunities existed and there was a kind of latent, inherent discrimination within the game – that scouts weren’t looking properly,” says Chelsea’s Head of Corporate and Social Responsibility, Simon Taylor. “There was a perception – a stereotype – that Asian footballers didn’t have the necessary physique or talent. In some ways they were not for playing football.”

Taylor has no time for such perceptions of the Asian community. “I think that was a load of nonsense,” he says. “If you look at the opportunities they’ve had, there haven’t been enough, so I think there’s problems on both sides. Stereotypes do exist on both sides of the argument, so what we want to do is break down these stereotypes and we’ve demonstrated already that young Asian kids do have the talent.”

Breaking Down Stereotypes:

He proclaims the success of the first Search for An Asian Soccer Star and rightly so. “I think the important thing we’re doing is if those perceptions do exist in football – I know for a fact that they don’t at Chelsea – but if there are any scouts out there or any managers out there who don’t think there is talent in the Asian community, well we’ve just shown them that there is,” says Taylor.

Three Asian boys earned their chance at the trial last year. They were given the opportunity to train at Chelsea’s academy and play for the team, so how good were they? “When they actually played for Chelsea during their trial, they were by no means the worst players on that pitch,” said Taylor. “Any one of the opposition positions could have been given to those guys. I think it’s important that we show that football realises that the talent is there, but also the Asian community realises that the opportunities are there for them to maximise their potential.”

They didn’t make it at Chelsea, but that is not the point. “We’ve got two lads playing now in a very high level of football,” says Taylor. “Two kids are playing at professional clubs that one year ago were playing Sunday League football with their friends, so we are alterring the perceptions with this programme.” They now play for Southend and Leyton Orient respectively.

Chelsea had to make difficult choices that made their scheme selective. It was limited to Under-12s to Under-14s. Also the boys had to have Bangladeshi, Indian, Pakistani or Sri Lankan origins. Why?

Selective:

“Why these age groups?” Taylor asked rhetorically. “Well I think in an ideal world we’d like to do something for every single age group, but we have to be selective, so last year we looked at Under-12, 13, 14 and the big success was the Under-12s and Under-13s. What we are trying to do is extend the age groups down this year, because obviously if you’ve got an eight-year-old or nine-year-old or ten-year-old with potential, that’s the age to maximise. To make the greatest impact we feel is by concentrating on the potential of the players in those age groups.”

But why limit it to just boys from the Indian sub-continent? “I think it’s a capacity issue more than anything,” says Taylor. “It would be great if we could give every boy of Asian origin an opportunity, but I think we have to concentrate and focus on where the main problems lie and clearly there is a complete and utter lack of professional footballers and footballers playing in affiliated clubs from those four communities.” It’s a fair point and Taylor does not rule out expanding the scheme in the future.

“I think eventually what we’d like to do is solve this problem and then expand the programme, but let’s concentrate in the immediate term on where the immediate problems are,” he says. “There is a massive, massive Asian community of Bangladeshis, Sri Lankans, Indians and Pakistanis in this country yet they are completely under-represented in football, so I think our focus initially has to be on those four areas and if the problems can be overcome, then we’ll look to expand the programme in future years.”

To register for the second Search for An Asian Soccer Star visit www.chelseafc.com/asiansoccerstar but hurry – time is running out!

1 For further information see http://empower-sport.com/ltd/football-trials.php