Premier League Kicks at 20 | Manuel's story

The founder of the Top Baller footballing platform explains how the Premier League programme inspired him Premier League Kicks is turning 20! This month we are celebrating the 20th anniversary of a programme that for two decades has used the power of football and sport to inspire young people to reach their potential in high-need areas of England and Wales. More than 600,000 young people have come through Premier League Kicks, which is funded by the Premier League through the Premier League Foundation and is now run by 93 clubs across the Premier League, English Football League and National League. To mark the anniversary, we are speaking to former Premier League Kicks participants to find out what they are doing now and to discover how the programme made an impact on them.Manuel Silva, Arsenal "I've got two simple words for Premier League Kicks... thank you. It changed me in so many different ways and I'm grateful for what it's helped me become." As the founder of the Top Baller 1v1 footballing platform, Manuel has travelled the world and hosted activations and tournaments with superstars such as Lionel Messi and Vinicius Jr. His roots are in Wembley, north London, where he started going to Premier League Kicks sessions with Arsenal in the Community when he was 11-years-old. Here's how the Premier League programme helped develop Manuel's love of football. "Growing up in Wembley was amazing. Brent is one of the most multicultural boroughs in London. Just in my school alone, more than 100 different languages were spoken. It was unbelievable. I'm so grateful for everything that it gave me. The Premier League. It's More Than A Game"There were also a lot of different distractions and unfortunately many people that I knew might have gone down different paths. "I remember finding out about these free football sessions. I'd get there early and I'd fight for the number 14 bib because that was the number worn by my favourite player. I'd wear that Arsenal bib and feel like Thierry Henry. "I was there for about three years when I was going through a specific period, transitioning to high school, wanting to play more football but not being able to play more football because of the barriers to entrance, which for me were fees. "It allowed me to do the thing I love doing the most and stopped me from doing other things, which probably would have been more silly."Whatever you had going on with your life, whatever struggles you had growing up, once you got there and got to the pitch, you forgot about everything. It's like all your problems became invisible. You just focused on having a good time. "The programme and the coaches created this positive environment and the players thrived from it. It was really welcoming. "If somebody complained because you lost the ball, the coach would always bring it back and say, 'it's all about positivity over here'. It was very different to the teams I was playing for at the time. "I have been a part of various Premier League Kicks events and the one thing that has resonated with me was that all of the current and former participants that I have met spoke about their coaches in the same glowing way that I'm speaking about them. Clearly they're doing something right."Life throws different perspectives at you. Everything that you go through creates the person that you are today. Could I say that I'd be the exact same person that I am today and everything that I've done without Premier League Kicks? No, because it was a fundamental part of my journey. "I'm grateful that I kept my head straight and I kept doing what I was doing. It continued to inspire me and create this love for football. There was the love for the game through playing it, then through coaching and then through media. "I would not have got to this point and created Top Baller without Premier League Kicks, or Hammersmith College or university. Every part of my journey played a part. The programme played an instrumental part because that was the age when I was going into high school and there could be so many more distractions. "When I think about Premier League Kicks, I just feel happiness. Regardless of what I've got going on, I'll always make time for it. Anything that I can do to continue to push the programme and help it grow. People need to know about it." What to read next...