This football tournament backed by Man City’s Pep Guardiola helps homeless people reach their goals

“It was scary but I ended up taking that leap, did my six-month rehab and I’m almost 13 months clean. My life is a million miles away from what I was doing. Beforehand I was a scared young boy, now I’m an alright young man,” 21-year-old Isaac told the Big Issue while pitchside at a five-a-side football centre in Manchester.

Just 20 minutes later, he was telling England and Manchester City star Kyle Walker his story of redemption from being homeless and addicted to drugs as a teenager to turning his life around and going to college to become a social worker.

That’s the power of the Partnership Trophy. The annual football tournament brings together 30 teams of people experiencing homelessness in The Salvation Army’s ‘lifehouses’, supported housing, outreach programmes and drop-in services across the UK to the pitch.

The 13th iteration of the tournament has the backing of Manchester City manager Pep Guardiola through his Guardiola Sala Foundation. The humanitarian charity has supported the competitions for five years, covering the cost of footballs, caps and reusable water bottles as well as stress balls, bags and transport for the teams.

That’s why Walker came down to the Goals centre in Manchester’s Cheetham Hill to see how the tournament boosts morale, improves wellbeing and mental health. He was quickly mobbed.

Isaac managed to catch the City skipper’s attention on the pitch as The Salvation Army arranged a group photo and Walker was captivated by his story of recovery.

Isaac was just 13 years of age when he first started taking drugs and drinking alcohol. That led to an addiction that saw him homeless in his native Blackburn.

The Salvation Army gave him the platform to turn his life around. A trip to the Lake District saw him build up the courage to enter rehab.

“I met a guy who had gone to the same hostel as me who was telling me how he was clean. I just started asking questions out of curiosity really. I don’t know if I wanted to stop using at that time but I started asking questions,” said Isaac.

“We ended up getting on quite well and I went to my local drug office and said, ‘I want to do rehab’. It was a really scary experience for me but this was my higher power moment where I got to where I am today. I didn’t know a life without drink or drugs because, even in all the chaos, I was comfortable in it. I knew what I was doing and it was all I’d ever known.”

Getting the support helped Isaac get his life back on track and now he is in college studying to be a social worker to help people in the same position he was in.

He’s also volunteering at the Phoenix Hub connected to The Salvation Army in Bramwell House, Blackburn, supporting people experiencing homelessness in the Lancashire town.

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“I’ve got my family back in my life. I’m not hating the people who I love the most. Life’s alright today. My head’s quiet, I can sit with myself now. It feels amazing,” he said.

“I want to specialise in adverse childhood experiences. I think that plays a massive part in someone’s life – science really proves it. I’ve got goals and ambitions today and I’m able to achieve them and that’s the big thing for me.

“Volunteering fills my spirit. For a lot of years, I’ve taken. I just took and took and took. Now I want to give back without gaining. It takes me out of myself.”

The day of football is a chance for Isaac and some of the 3,000 people The Salvation Army supports around the UK to get away from life’s problems through the uniting power of football.

It’s something that former Celtic and Arsenal striker John Hartson can relate to.

Hartson attended the event as a special guest of The Salvation Army and presented the winning trophy to The Orchard from Bradford.

He told the Big Issue he could empathise with some of the hardships the people he met on the pitch face in their lives.

The former striker battled a gambling addiction when he was playing football at the highest level and ended up fighting for his life in hospital after his career when he was diagnosed with testicular cancer that spread to his lungs and brain.

“Since I knew I was doing this gig a couple of weeks ago, I’ve been excited to do it because I take something from it as well,” said Hartson. “A lot of the guys can get away from one or two problems that they’ve got and come and enjoy the day – everybody likes football. You can see them running around and just for a couple of hours they can feel free and that’s very important to their mental health as well.

“I’ve been through it a little bit myself with my cancer battle and my gambling addiction – I’m now 13 years clean from gambling – and I, obviously, went through divorce which personally is not nice as well. 

“It’s a case of trying to get the guys thinking positive, everything is in the mind really. A lot of the people here have been through 10 times more than myself. I just like to come to these things and bring a positive attitude around the place and hopefully that will give people inspiration and hope that they can come through their battles.”

For John Wood, from Sunderland, football is a chance to escape life’s troubles when he plays once a week.

The tournament is a celebration of that, even if his side didn’t end up lifting the trophy.

“The results haven’t been great but it’s been good. It’s something to take your mind off things and it’s a good release,” said Wood.

“It’s a day out with the lads. We are like one family. You have to stick together.”

Wood has been in a Salvation Army lifehouse for seven months after he split up with his partner of six years.

He has a “chequered past”, as he described it, and the toll of drug addiction and getting into trouble saw him leave his family home and two children to end up on the streets.

The 36-year-old also suffers with muscular dystrophy that meant he opted to play in goal during the tournament. It puts the value of playing football in even greater perspective.

“I’ve had it all my life but it gets worse and worse as you get older so it’s good that I’m doing this rather than sitting around the house because it’s use it or lose it basically,” said Wood.

“I used to play three or four times a week but with my health conditions now I can only play once a week. It’s a good way to reset the week.

“Mentally I’m doing a lot better. I just want health, wealth, happiness, the same as everyone else. I want to be someone my kids aspire to be like rather than what I used to be like.”

While homes and the means to keep them are vital to ending homelessness, the Partnership Trophy also underlines that helping people rebuild their lives is just as important as putting a roof over someone’s head.

And football can play a small but important role in that journey.

As Nathan Slinn, deputy director of the homelessness services department for The Salvation Army, put it: “This is my favourite part of my job. It literally is about just seeing people interact with each other, talking with people, seeing that relationships are being built, because it is all about relationships. 

“When people feel valued, they feel loved, they feel connected and that’s when positive change can happen.”

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