Premier League stadium run brings hope to young footballers

A charity founder plans to run to every Premier League stadium in England to raise money for young footballers in Africa.

Max Keens, 31, from north London, will cover 20 miles (32km) a day to reach every pitch from Newcastle to Brighton.

TV producer Mr Keens co-founded Project Africa after a volunteering trip, which builds football pitches for children across the continent.

Three are already being built in the Democratic Republic of Congo and Kenya.

The route for Mr Keens' challenge will start at St James' Park stadium on 1 June, crossing through Burnley, Luton, Bournemouth and Brighton before reaching the London Stadium in Stratford.

He said each football pitch costs around £4,000 to £5,000 to build, adding that the charity's aim was to help these young footballers with their future prospects.

"Our aim is to build as many pitches for communities and charities in Africa that use football to teach, as well as for the children there whose main love is football," he said.

"If a child plays football there for a few years and becomes a teacher, for example, through the teachings that the coach has given them, that's the aim.

"As much as they will have football teams there, they are more than that, they are for children who can't afford to go to school so they will come and train but the coaches will teach them things from HIV awareness to tying a shoelace."

He added: "We speak to loads of different coaches, loads of different charities and NGOs [non-governmental organisations] around Africa and we get a sense of their aims and their dreams for the community and whether our work can be sustained."

Mr Keens said the idea behind the charity was born after he went on a volunteer trip to Africa to teach children English and coach them in the sport.

There, he met the two trustees for the charity Project Africa, Leendert Coene and Andreas Schobersberger.

"We were coaching the kids on very gravelly car parks, they were concrete football pitches. The kids didn't care, they would slide tackle and everything," he said.

"I sort of threw the idea out about building sustainable grass pitches in Africa where children can not only improve their football abilities, but also enjoy the sport without the idea of getting injured."

With a month to go before beginning his challenge, he said: "I wanted to do something a bit more adventurous and something that is unique to us."

Mr Keens said he was "not nervous" about the challenge because he had not "fully comprehended the magnitude of it".

"I've played football all my life but I've never been a runner and have never had the fitness of a runner," he said.

"There's not a chance on this earth that, unless I break my leg or something serious happens, that I won't hobble my way through it.

"Even if it takes me eight hours one day to reach the checkpoint, I'll do it."

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