I always say, when you wanna do something in life,
no matter where you come from, you can do it.
I am Patrice Evra.
Some people know me for playing football
for Manchester United and France.
Other people know me as Mister...
I love this game!
I've been invited to take part in Mandela Day.
Nelson Mandela is a global icon.
He spent his entire life fighting for freedom,
equality, and justice, and brought an end
to Apartheid in South Africa.
Every year on Nelson Mandela's birthday, July the 18th,
people in South Africa take part in an act of service
in their community inspired by his legacy.
Ndaba Mandela:
It's really about getting involved,
getting dirty, putting on your gun boots,
putting on some gloves, and going out there.
Patrice:
will be taking Mandela Day global
by joining forces with the Nelson Mandela Foundation
and undertaking our own act of service in communities across the world.
- Nice to meet you. - I love this game, man.
Always! That's what I'm talking about.
- Man: Can we go? - Man 2: Yep.
Man: Amazing. Thank you so much for being here, man.
I am Ndaba Mandela, the grandson of Nelson Mandela.
Oh, I remember this one.
England versus South Africa.
I think they beat us two-nil if I'm not mistaken that day.
My grandfather loved sports because he felt that sports
could bring people together in a way that little else can.
Patrice: When in prison on Robben Island,
Mandela used to listen to football on the radio
and said it was the only joy for prisoners.
After his release, he was instrumental in securing
the 2010 World Cup in South Africa.
Sport has the power to inspire
and unite people.
Patrice:
of becoming a professional footballer.
The huge salaries on offer
seem like a way out of a tough start in life.
One route to the Premier League
is through academies set up by clubs
to sponsor the best young talent,
with the hope of one day getting them into their first team.
But each year, over 11,000 of these young players
are released from their academies with no backup plan.
So for my act of service, I am off to visit
one of London's semi-pro football teams
who are giving players a second chance at the game.
I've pulled in one of YouTube's top football creators, Jeremy Lynch.
He's going to be helping me surprise the club with a very exciting gift,
and we will be giving the team the game of their lives.
So whoever wins, they get to play in non-bibs.
- What is the number of guys? - Did he do the--
- I'm not English. I'm French. - Non-double.
Patrice:
was started in 2015 by Bobby Kasanga.
It is the first ever semiprofessional club in Hackney,
which in 2021, had the highest knife crime rate of all London boroughs.
Bobby's original mission was to help kids off the street
and out of the clutches of gun crime.
But the club has now also become home to kids
who have been released from academies,
giving them another shot at the game.
I met Mandela when we--
Manchester United, we went to South Africa.
When you meet someone like Nelson Mandela,
you meet someone to allow you to be free.
For me, Mandela Day is like being kind,
make sure that you're taking care of other people,
and it's just honor for myself to be here.
- Hey, Mr. Evra. - Yilmaz, how are you?
- You good. - I'm very good. Yourself?
- I'm good, thank you. - Bobby, how are you?
- You good? - Ah, very good.
Boys, come in! Let's go! Jog in, jog in, jog in, jog in, jog in!
- ( overlapping shouting ) - Jog in! Jog in!
- How are you guys? What's your name? - Patrick.
Patrick. How are you?
- Moe. - Moe? Okay, I want Moe.
- Nice to meet you. - I love this game, man.
Always. That's what I'm talking about.
Oh, Patrice? ( speaking French )
French. We even have French people.
Guys, seriously, first of all,
thank you for being here.
And for me today is special.
I feel really connected and related.
When I come here, it just reminds me of my childhood.
I always say, when you wanna do something in life,
no matter where you come from, you can do it.
I did a trial in Paris Saint-Germain when I was young.
You know what the coach say to me?
He say, "You're too small.
And also because you're from the street,
maybe you going to steal in the dressing room."
People will tell you you can't make it.
They will try to project their own failure on you.
And I want you to believe in yourself.
All right, get into your positions, lads.
- It's nice to be here. I feel good. - Thank you for coming.
I feel home.
And, yeah, tell me a little bit about
when you start that idea.
I used to be a very decent footballer.
I wanted to make it, as everyone's ambition is.
And I just got caught by the wrong crowd.
So by getting caught up in the wrong crowd,
I'm not going out to football no more.
I found the streets was an easy, quick way to make money.
- And then-- - Same for me.
And then before I knew it, prison.
Yeah, football was my dream. Football was my ambition.
That's all I wanted to do.
I was one of the best footballers in the area.
I know everyone always says these things,
but it's absolutely true.
Growing up in Peckham,
I grew up in the toughest state,
called Gloucester Estate.
When you're growing up in an area like that,
you kinda get caught up in the wrong crowd
and ended up joining the gangs.
And then before I knew it, my criminality sort of increased
to a point which led me to be incarcerated.
So I spent eight years of my life in prison.
A lot of young people inside that really inspired me to start the football club
because you see a lot of young players who were so talented.
"Whoa. You are so good at football. Why didn't you make it?"
"I didn't know where to go. I didn't have no option."
And that's what kind of inspired me to say,
let me start a semiprofessional football team
to sort of give young players that platform and not end up like me.
When I came out of a prison, I said, you know what?
I'm gonna start my own team.
It's been a long growth.
It's about giving all these young players
just a platform and a chance.
A lot of them, if we're realistic,
they're not gonna go and make it as a professional footballer.
We know that. They're 60 million people in the UK.
Only 4,000 professional footballers.
So we tell them, "What's your plan B? What's your plan C?"
So if young man says he's got an interest in something else,
we'll contact companies and say, "Look, this young man is interested in your service."
- Wow. Wow. - "Can he come and do some work over there?"
- You know you are an angel for them? - We're trying.
Patrice:
were suffering high levels of psychological distress
21 days after being released from an academy.
Hackney Wick aims to help the 230 players
they see on a weekly basis by offering mentoring programs and educational workshops.
What do you think stops us from talking about mental health amongst our friends?
Some cultures, obviously, men have to be the more dominant alpha male.
You have to, obviously, whatever you're feeling, you have to keep it to yourself.
Patrice:
giving them skills and something to believe in.
So for Nelson Mandela, sport was another one of those
powerful tools of social transformation,
because when it comes to sport,
it is about, you know, skill, it's about dexterity.
He understood the power
of endurance, of perseverance, and of an activity
that really forces you to push yourself to the limit.
All righty.
- Oh. - ( crew chatter )
It's a lot about sacrifice, determination.
And then when you're playing the game,
I mean, a lot of times you'll feel physical exhaustion,
mental exhaustion.
It's about overcoming your physical
and using your thoughts to power you.
So I was born in Senegal in Dakar.
And after one year, with our family we moved in Paris,
and I grew up in a banlieue called Les Ulis.
It was amazing, but it was also tough.
I used to beg money in front of shop
to buy a little sandwich called kebob.
I don't have any reason why I love football so much.
I think it's just like when I was a child,
when someone was giving me a ball, I was just happy.
To be honest, football saved my life.
It was my hope. It was my reason of living.
And when you grow up in the street,
I work on my skill,
I work on my determination,
being passionate about life, and never give up.
That's why I am who I am right now.
That's why when I talk to kids when they're from the street,
I'm like, you know, "You're not different, and you can make it."
Ndaba Mandela:
"Do not judge me by my successes,
but judge me by the amount of times
I fell down and got up again."
Patrice:
came to Hackney Wick two years ago after being released
from East London professional football club Leyton Orient.
So what I've got here are just some photos of me
when I was at Leyton Orient.
This was my first year in to the club,
so I was excited, I was young,
and I just wanted to play football really.
When I was about, 10, 11,
that's when I got my first contract at an academy, which was Leyton Orient,
And, yeah, being released was probably one of the toughest things
because I was there for six, seven years.
And, Dante, what did you feel?
What's your emotion when you feel like they released you?
You feel an injustice? Or you feel think, like, it's the right decision?
For me, it was kind of a shock because I did think I was gonna get a contract.
- But, um... - Oh. Massive disappointment.
Yeah, it was just-- I was disappointed. It hit my confidence.
I didn't really wanna play football anymore, if I'm being totally honest.
All my friends knew I was getting a decision,
and so I had to go to school the next day.
And for me, that was difficult, to face my friends,
to tell them, "Oh, I didn't get a contract."
Because all my friends at school looked up to me
as, like, the best in the school.
And that was something that was special to me, and--
- It hurt you. - Yeah, it hurt me, and it was kind of embarrassing for me.
- Yeah, exactly. - So, for me, it was kind of a thing
where for a few months I was just-- I was by myself in school.
I didn't really talk to anyone about it and I kind of kept it inside.
So, Dante, what's Hackney Wick represent for you?
Dante:
and I feel like I have improved as a player and as a young adult.
I live with my mum. She's a single parent.
- Mmm. - So being the oldest sibling,
it kind of leaves me with that manly responsibility
to look after my siblings when she's not about.
Like, I also work.
So, I just come from a night shift.
Finished at 6 AM this morning
and then came straight here.
Yeah, there'll be times,
like match days on a Saturday, where I'll finish at 6 AM.
I'll go home and sleep for three hours,
wake up, and then make my way to the game.
That's why I appreciate Bobby and the rest of the coaching staff
because they still have the faith in me
to perform on a match day.
They're always supporting me,
asking if me if I need another job.
And I can't thank them enough really.
They've been great towards me.
But I feel also, you won't let them down,
and you're gonna even give the best of you.
No, wow. I have nothing to say. You impress me.
Thank you. I appreciate it. Thank you.
- This was nice. It was nice, Dante. - Thank you, thank you.
Patrice:
is how far he has to travel for their games.
Hackney is the only borough in London without a stadium
which meets the right requirements to play the semipro game.
So Hackney Wick have been forced to ground share
with another team outside of London.
But where's your own training ground when you play games?
- Like, where? - Well, this is where we train.
Our home ground is out in Whitham 40 miles away from here.
- Patrice: 40 miles away? - Yeah.
We've got all these young players having to travel home and away
for every single game.
And then not having enough cars,
'cause we've got so much young players,
not everybody drives.
Some players, they get on a train.
Traveling costs us a lot of money throughout the season.
Patrice: Lucky for them, my friend Jeremy Lynch
is around the corner with a big surprise.
Jeremy is a football freestyler.
one of YouTube's biggest stars,
with a channel boasting over 5 million subscribers.
He was released after a trial at Arsenal,
but quickly found himself an exciting plan B.
So when I was told that I wasn't gonna be signed to Arsenal,
and they weren't gonna keep me on,
just like any youngster, it's devastating.
So, I started doing the football freestyling,
and then really quickly started
to get amazing opportunities
through doing football tricks.
Filming with Cristiano Ronaldo, being in a film.
I went on "Britain's Got Talent."
So, yeah, I mean, things have gone
relatively well for me, and I'm very grateful
now that I'm in a position where I can give back.
- I've got something for you. - Yeah?
Yeah. What do you think about that?
- Yeah, we're interested. - You like surprises?
( overlapping chatter )
Do you believe in Santa?
Okay, guys, let's go.
Let's see, let's see.
For our main act of service on Mandela Day,
Jeremy and I come up with a plan to give Hackney Wick
something that could really make a difference to their lives.
- ( cheering ) - Bro, how are you?
- Nice to see you. - Nice to see you, too.
But, guys, by the way, I'm jealous,
because when I arrive, everyone was like...
( mumbling )
But-- "Aah!" Why?
- Anyway. - That was the first surprise,
- Mr. Jeremy Lynch. - How are you, sir?
But the big surprise is this is yours.
- Come on. - ( cheering )
( chatter, laughter )
Patrice: That's what I'm talking about.
So, you know, 40 miles,
that's why I say it's gonna help you a lot,
and I hope you enjoyed the surprise.
He's an absolute legend. Are you guys happy with the van?
- We love it. - Is it gonna help?
'Cause we know you've been traveling a lot to get to games.
- It saves us the journey. - Massively, man.
What usually happens is we have to find out
how many drivers do we have on a day?
There's not enough drivers, and some people have to catch a train.
And for us, it's about camaraderie.
So if everyone can be on a journey together...
- Yeah. - ...traveling together, it makes it easier.
( overlapping chatter )
There is one last, I'll say surprise.
It's kind of like a team thing that we're gonna do.
So all of us together, if you're up for it...
- Yeah, sure. - You don't even know what we're gonna do,
and you're like, "Yeah, yeah, yeah."
For our final Mandela Day surprise,
Jeremy and I will be captaining our own Hackney Wick teams
to thank them for their hospitality.
Rock, paper, scissors for the bibs? Ready?
Rock, paper, scissors.
Oh, that was late as well!
Hey, hey, hey!
( team chatter )
( cheering )
Patrice:
So I'm asking everyone to go
out into their communities and take part
in their own act of service big or small.
So get up there and get involved.
Ultimately, we win together, we lose together.
But we still have another day where we can train
and where we can become better.
That is the beauty and the magic of coming together
and playing as a team, as a family, as a community.