A documentary on concrete football in the suburbs – where players such as Riyad Mahrez learned their game – gains traction on the back of passion and nostalgia

Over the past couple of weeks, a 50-minute documentary about street football in France has been quietly racking up views on YouTube. Ballon sur Bitume (Concrete Football) opens a window into the culture that has nurtured some of the most celebrated talents in international football and shows how community and talent have joined forces on concrete pitches to overcome adversity in urban arenas.

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Leicester City’s Riyad Mahrez, one of the voices in the piece, explains how the environment helped to develop the skills he is renowned for. “When you’re living in the housing estates, you play outside all the time,” he said. “Our parents aren’t that strict and so they let us play and playing all day every day really helps you improve your dribbles and technique. I think that’s why the best technical players come from the streets.”

French street football is part of a wider culture in the housing estates known as les banlieues. You only have to see the music video for MHD’s Champions League to see there is a special kind of energy out here, although that is not always the image seen of these young people.

Les banlieues have gained notoriety for their problems and are known for their high numbers of immigrants as well as people with low socio-economic backgrounds. Ballon sur Bitume looks at the stories that celebrate the passions of the young people growing up there.

“Zinedine Zidane was the first Arab guy from the suburbs in Marseille who was playing at such a high level,” Jesse Adang, who directed the film with Syrine Boulanouar, tells the Guardian. “He’s a hero for people like us. [Hatem] Ben Arfa, too. His story is crazy, he stopped playing for a while and he trained with street football during a period to keep his level up and now he’s at PSG. You can see that people love him for that when he comes out on the pitch.”

Adang explains that footballers who started in the streets are products of an environment that toughens them up with trash-talk and prepares them for the challenges of playing at professional level. “They just want to get into your head and throw you off,” he says.

Mahrez develops on this in the documentary when he says street football can be rough. “The ribbing, trash-talk, there’s certainly a psychological element to it. Sometimes in the tournaments you can hear them shouting things like ‘kill him’. We grew up with that. That’s why when you become pro and you’re up against an opponent, you know you have to just make the pass and make the difference.”

The documentary gives viewers a tour of the neighbourhoods where international stars and local heroes have been born. From meeting Mahrez in Sarcelles, we are taken to Aulnay-sous-Bois, where the France striker Adrien Gasmi comes from.

Facebook Twitter Pinterest French street football is part of a wider culture in the housing estates known as les banlieues. Photograph: Hélène Hadjiyianni

Gasmi is clearly well respected by the young men in his area – and this comes through, despite them not wanting to sound too sentimental about it. When one of the young boy says “he’s beautiful, he made me dream”, there is a pause before the group of friends fall about laughing and tease him.

Adang says: “I wanted the documentary to be as ‘street’ as possible. That’s why we didn’t want to have a voiceover or someone explaining it on screen; we wanted a connection from the guys speaking and the audience. That’s why I think a lot of young people have recognised themselves in this documentary.”

All of the characters speak with a passion for the game and share a nostalgia for the days when they were playing it. The piece has already had more than half a million views on YouTube and it continues to pick up a diverse audience partly, perhaps, because the documentary is like a window into a world that is not very easy to access. It also bridges the gap that exists between not only cultures but generations, too.

“We originally wanted to speak to young people but then it spread to everyone,” Adang says. “Halfway through the edit I was like, we have something that could talk to people who are 50 who don’t understand what we are living, who don’t understand our culture, and we wanted to take the opportunity to show them that street culture is not all bad. We have some great people.”

They include players such as Yacine Brahimi, Ousmane Dembélé and Serge Aurier and local champions such as Ferhat Cicek, who works hard to make sure that football is available as a way of channelling negative energy. “It’s a great way to stay on track,” he says. “It helps you let off steam because you’re angry inside. You’re failing at school and no one helps, you have money issues, your family can’t make ends meet … but on the pitch you’re free … from the problems and the barriers.”

I met Cicek at a Nike football event in Paris this year and saw how he used football to encourage discipline and direction in young players – but he is quick to point out that the sport does not hold all of the answers. “I tell the kids from the beginning that they won’t go professional,” he says in the documentary. “They’re allowed to aim for that but being focused only on that is a mistake. We don’t want them making the same mistakes that we made.”

The need for positive role models is clear and while not everyone can grow up to be a footballer, these are the characters who many young people can see role models in, which is more than can be said for politicians.

Facebook Twitter Pinterest Les banlieues have gained notoriety for their problems but Ballon sur Bitume celebrates the passions of the young people growing up there. Photograph: Hélène Hadjiyianni

“President François Hollande said he doesn’t understand the players’ mentality right now, he thinks they’re too much into money and that he can’t see himself in the players because they have no sense of honour,” Adang says.

It is true that those involved in the street culture have a certain swagger about them – and that some people might find it intimidating – but the documentary makes an effort to show there is ambition, positivity and talent to be found there, too, despite the difficult circumstances.

“This documentary is very important for us at this time, especially with all the shit going on right now in France, the US, everywhere,” Adang adds. “We want to show something positive from the suburbs, from the streets. We want to show people who don’t know people like us, who don’t know how to act with people like us, that we are humans too, that we have feelings. We cry, we laugh, we are like them. It’s a different culture but we’re not that different.”