Yan Dhanda: ‘I was racially abused as a child but I never let it affect me’

The Swansea City midfielder is one of the few Asians playing professionally in this country and he wants to inspire others to do the same There is a word that all Asians hope never to hear but many cannot avoid. The P-word. It came Yan Dhanda’s way when he was very young and playing football with friends in a park near his family home in Tipton, and while the details are sketchy he remembers easily the shocking nature of the abuse. “It was from random people who’d either be playing with me and my friends or against us,” he says. “They’d say things like, ‘he’s a Paki, he’s never going to make it [as a footballer]’. I’ve also heard it a few times since – ‘Paki this, Paki that’, again from random people. But it never affected me. It just made me want to prove those people wrong.” Continue reading...