One of the most rewarding parts of volunteering at Scottish Refugee Council is the having the opportunity to learn about the good work that dozens of small community groups do across Scotland. United Glasgow Football Club is a rather unique example of these community groups.
The club grew out of ad hoc matches between equality workers, anti-racism campaigners, asylum seekers and refugees. After seeing the matches’ popularity grow, founder Alan White set out to organise a more structured way for asylum seekers to access football and enlisted Euan McLeod to coach the club. In the two years since they were set up the club have become a prominent feature of Glasgow’s Scottish Unity League.
Success
In February this year, the club received funding from Big Lottery Fund’s Young Start Fund to run ‘Kick Off Together with United Glasgow’, a programme of social inclusion and community activities. The great successes of the club have come in doing what the name suggests – uniting people through football.
Many of those who train with the club at Firhill are simply football fans whose eyes have been opened to the struggles faced by refugees and asylum seekers. “There are guys in the team who 6 months ago might never have met an asylum seeker who now know stuff about it, who consider people from Zambia and Somalia friends of theirs,” Alan said.
It’s just good to see that mix. It’s good for the asylum seekers as well because they get to meet every day Glaswegian people who aren’t going to see them differently’ – Alan, United Glasgow Chairperson
Continuity
Meeting, talking and playing alongside asylum seekers does much to put teammates in their shoes. However often their absence is even more telling. The stop-start reality of the asylum process is evident from the faces that periodically appear and disappear from the line-up. “There have been times when one of the players hasn’t been to training for a few weeks and it has turned out that they have been put into a detention centre” said Euan. Amid this uncertainty United Glasgow are trying to build some small piece of continuity.
Future
‘Kick Off Together with United Glasgow’ forms a large part of this effort. As part of the programme, disadvantaged young people study and train alongside asylum seekers through 40 hours of college study and 40 hours of sports training. Upon completion of the course they are awarded with coaching and first aid qualifications. One refugee, Thomas from Zimbabwe, has already become one of the club’s coaches.
Alan and Euan hope to build the club up to the point where it can continue long after their playing days are gone. Furthermore, they hope that the opportunities the club affords to asylum seekers and refugees can help them to settle into and become a part of their new community. Like many other groups across Scotland, they are doing just that.
