On December 19, the official Chelsea website published an interview with number 19 player Jadon Sancho: he tells us about his journey in football, which started on the streets of London and is now back on track.
“My friends and I just loved the game,” Jadon said.
'Everything used to be just fun. You want to demonstrate skills to other people watching or playing. We played mini games for two hours and I had all the tricks, nutmeg people. I would call myself a street football player.
“It was a rough place, a lot of bad things happened, but that's what made me who I am today: the robustness of where I came from, embracing it and growing up faster.
'I'm still close to the friends I played with at that age. That's where I'm from, so I'll never lose touch with them.”
Jadon is descended from Jamaican-Guyanese descent on his father's side, while his mother is Scots-Irish. It is, he smiles, a 'pretty good mix', and he believes the different cultures he experienced growing up have helped him as a person and as a footballer.
Jadon lived with his mother and attended Crampton Primary School, a goal kick away from his flat. It was not surprising that he was on the school team, but getting involved in organized football on the weekends was more difficult.
“My dad always found mini-tournaments in the area,” Jadon remembers.
“I just went there and showed up without a team, and usually there was always someone missing players, so I just went to that team. Player of the Tournament was always a big thing for me. I tried to do the maximum, use my skills and score a lot of goals.
'Over time we became more serious about clubs coming to look at you. Every Sunday we went to Sunday League tournaments. It was fun. Around seven or eight o'clock a few clubs came to me and in the end I chose Watford because I felt comfortable with the way they treated me.'
At the age of 11, Jadon was given the opportunity to attend Harefield Academy, which had a partnership with Championship club Watford and where the children received all their education and training. His family supported the idea and were keen for him to avoid the pitfalls of becoming a teenager in South London.
'I was obviously very disappointed [with moving away] because all my friends were there,” he admits.
'The first year was very difficult for me because I left home for the first time. I was very young. The first year was terrible. Every chance I got to go home, I went home. The whole point of going to that school wasn't to get home, it was to focus on football! In eighth and ninth year I started to understand why I was there, and I started to concentrate more.
'I found it more difficult off the field, but on the field it was my playground. Every time I touched the ball I was happy.”
In between classes, Jadon trained daily and played a match on Sundays. He had to adjust to spending so much time with boys who were not his childhood friends and with whom he often had little in common besides football talent.
His parents and friends of those who had been so helpful in the past came to see him play. His talent was so great that he usually played two age groups higher at Watford.
“It was definitely worth it,” Jadon looks back on those years away from home.
“Looking back, if there was a younger me I could talk to, I would definitely advise them if they lived in the same area as me to look at the bigger picture. Go chase your dream instead of getting distracted.”
When the prodigious striker was 14, Manchester City made their move. Within a year he was playing for the Under-18 and Under-21 sides.
By now, Sancho was considered one of the best young talents in world football, so his decision to leave City in 2017 and sign his first professional contract with Borussia Dortmund made headlines.
“It was a big risk,” he acknowledges. “I knew it was a risk I was willing to take because I believed in myself.
“I was willing to do whatever I could to prove everyone wrong. At the time it was seen as a strange move. The year before I went I was at the European Under 17 Championships when we reached the final and lost on penalties. I got Player of the Tournament. So there was a lot of talk about why I left. People said I shouldn't have done it, but I didn't really listen to everyone.
'It was when City bought [Riyad] Mahrez and Leroy Sane. For a young player like me, I felt this was the right time to move on. I felt I was ready to play in the first team. It wasn't that I didn't want to wait and play under Pep Guardiola, one of the best coaches ever, but in my mind I felt I was ready. I had a feeling they had other plans. That's why I made the jump to Dortmund.'
Jadon's father accompanied him to Germany for a few months to help him settle. By the end of that season, the 17-year-old had played a dozen Bundesliga games and scored once. The following season, 2018/19, he went from strength to strength. His consistent performances in the Bundesliga and Champions League earned him the first of 23 England caps to date.
This summer, Jadon joined Chelsea on loan from Manchester United, with whom he had signed three years earlier. For the first time as an adult, that meant returning to London.
“I still think it's a bit strange, but it's always nice to be home,” he laughs. 'My family is close, my friends are close.
'I always supported Chelsea as a child, thanks to Frank Lampard and Didier Drogba. And spoke to Enzo [Maresca] Before I came here, he was determined to work with me. He showed me his plans for where he thought I would fit into the team and told me how I could move the team forward. That brought me here. He made me feel comfortable. I liked his energy during the FaceTime call we had.
“This team has a lot of great talent,” Jadon added. 'It's weird being one of the older players! There are a lot of young boys here. I have a lot of experience and I can show and help some of the young people coming through. And they can help me. We can achieve something great if we all stick together and work hard together.”
Back at his estate in Kennington, kicking a ball around, young Jadon could never have imagined what the sport would bring him. It has defined the man he is today.
'It means everything to me. It's my life. Without football I don't know what I would do.'
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