"We all need to do better" - Jeremie Frimpong launches plan to help young players who don't make it“I always wanted to be a footballer,” Frimpong tells SPORTbible while taking time out of his busy schedule locked in a Bundesliga title race with“Football was more important than school for me. I had to be a footballer because I just loved the game so much.”
“They were talking about how I couldn’t get into the team and were comparing me to other players in the academy that were doing better than me.“I remember going to that meeting and he was saying, ‘You’re too small’ and it’ll be too physical. That’s when I was thinking, ‘Oh s***’, where am I gonna go?’.
“I knew where my football would take me and had a strong belief and now I can actually do something about it,” Frimpong says, discussing where the idea came from. “It’s giving them the resources and ideas and not only football – whatever you want to be you can do it. It doesn’t mean it’s the end. “Just because you’re not a footballer doesn’t mean it’s over. That’s how small kids think, they think they are finished. I would have thought like that.“He’s going to do the UK side and he’s just going to focus on that part. He works with kids so it won’t be a problem for him. It just makes sense that Ryan is onboard because that’s his work anyway.”The initiative’s focus is on those who have been in academies and covers fields such as tech, property, gaming, and finance.