By Aneesa Malik
Mohammed Zafran added to his collection of awards this month as he received the honorary Sir Bobby Moore trophy at Wembley Stadium, thanks to the outstanding work he does for the deprived youth in Birmingham.
The community worker from Small Heath is the winner of this year’s FA Respect Award and was be presented with the trophy at the FA Community Shield match between Arsenal and Chelsea.
Zafran aged 35 explained: “It’s a big honour for me. I set out to put football back on the map from a grassroots level, particularly promoting the deprived areas of Birmingham. I grew up watching Sir Bobby Moore and to get a trophy named after him is a big accomplishment. Also, to get it in front of 80, 000 people- it’s a massive achievement.”
The All 4 Youth football academy has now signed up 13,000 youngsters from areas like Alum Rock, Small Heath and Bordesley Green, over the past 5 years. This recognition highlights the very importance of academies like the one Zafran is involved in. He said: “The kids have said themselves that if it wasn’t for the academy, they would be engaging in social media, playing video games or getting into trouble, maybe doing drugs. The academy keeps them out of trouble, it keeps them active.”
It was in 2010, when his brother-in-law Sarfraz Khan, 23, was fatally stabbed in Larches Green Park, Sparkbrook that Zafran decided to become actively engaged with the youth of Birmingham. Since then, Zafran has been working tremendously hard. Zafran has racked up a flurry of awards including a British Empire Medal, a National Diversity award and he was a Pride of Birmingham winner.
Zafran spoke of a memorable encounter he had with one youngster. “A young lad came to the academy was really aggressive towards me. He said, ‘I’m not going to listen to you, I just want to play football’. So he started playing; he made all the rules and started bullying the other kids, and one day he actually spat on my face. I let him continue playing, but said I would speak to him next week. The following week I told him he was the captain and I gave him the armband. He was shocked. I explained that I liked his techniques and he needed this.
After one of the sessions, I was driving past the car park and I saw him standing there in the pouring rain. It had been over an hour since the session ended and I asked him why he was still here. He said his father had left for work and his mom wasn’t home. He had nowhere to go and he said he was hungry. So I took him to get something to eat and I dropped him off home. When we got inside, he started crying and gave me a hug. He said, ‘my own family don’t look out for me like this’.
After that, he’s gone back to his education, his mother is proud of him and every time I have an event, he’s the first to volunteer.”
In addition to the football coaching, Zafran has helped to set up a women’s academy, which now consists of 4000 girls. It is helping to empower Asian women through practical courses and in conjunction with the council, and will soon be reaching out to young people who are not in education or training.
