Arsenal and Save The Children team up with Martin Keown for refugee camp visit

This week, I’ve been out in the Za’atari refugee camp in Jordan with Arsenal and Save The Children. There’s a base camp been set up there for Syrian refugees arriving to escape the shelling and shooting. There’s 150,000 families there now with another 7,000 arriving each week.



Arsenal have a partnership with Save The Children so I was out there doing some football coaching on the pitch the charity have built in the middle of the camp. It was a very moving and powerful experience, meeting these kids who have come from the battleground to the playground. The children I was working with were between 12 and 16 years old and what they have been through is unthinkable. Many have seen their families blown apart and seen things no-one should have to see.

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Giving something back: Martin Keown has spent time at a Jordanian refugee camp as part of Arsenal's work with Save The Children. He met with, and offered some coaching to, the children who are housed there

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One boy who I talked to told me that he spent each day in Syria wondering how long he as going to live. Now in Jordan, he said he wakes up thinking about having fun, playing football and seeing his friends. Life for these guys was only about survival of the fittest but now the charity is trying to help prepare them for coming into a normal society.



A lot of them have issues with aggression and other behaviour because of what they have been through but football can help with that. Playing in England, you can lose perspective on just how big a tool football is in people’s lives. It creates discipline, respect and an element of fun. You see how it brings people together and works as a tool to put basics back into their behaviour and get their lives back together. For some, their natural way to resolve conflict is to pick up a gun and shoot. This will hopefully help to change that.



Inspired: Arsenal have a big influence on the children in the area and work tirelessly to provide for them

It made me realise too how much football helped form my personality by giving me structure. Your personality comes out on the football pitch - are you a creative player, a workhorse, a brave defender? They are all football made here and despite basic sanitary conditions, are lucky enough to have satellite dishes powered by car batteries so they could watch the Champions League this week. They are all crazy about it. They were so grateful too for the shirts and balls Arsenal took out for them.



VIDEO Keown visits Za’atari refugee camp in Jordan

It was a truly humbling experience coming out here and listening to some of the stories of hardship from children so young. The strength and resilience that they show, having been through so much, is an inspiration.



Save The Children, the UN and the Jordanian authorities are doing a great job providing food, water and learning materials for these children. Obviously, there’s plenty more to be done.



Next week Arsenal will launch an appeal for Syria at the club’s Foundation Ball.



Martin Keown







