My family sacrificed to bring me where I am now, says Saka
Arsenal’s Hale End Academy product Bukayo Saka has revealed for the first time that his older sibling, Yomi Saka was an aspiring footballer at Premier League side Watford before opting to go to university instead of pursuing a professional career, reports allnigeriasoccer.com.
During his pre-school years, Saka used to be involved in practice games with his father and Yomi, who is now attending a university in Reading.
“From the age of three or four I would be playing football at home in the garden with my dad, and my older brother, Yomi,’’ Bukayo Saka told arsenal.com.
“It was always like that. After school, we would eat and then it was straight into the garden to play football. We would play for hours.
“My dad and brother would want to go back inside but I never let them. We kept playing until I won. I’m serious, you can ask them! As long as they were winning, I wouldn’t let them back inside.”
While the England U19 international primarily plays as a left-winger and can also be deployed as a makeshift left-back, Yomi was a defender by trade.
“My brother played as a defender for Watford until he was about 14.
“Weekends in our house were always about football. My dad would usually take me to Arsenal – I joined when I was about seven – and my mum would take my brother to Watford,’’ added Bukayo Saka.
Even though Yomi gave up his dreams of becoming a professional footballer, he’s delighted with the progress of his brother, Bukayo.
“I still live with my parents, but we’ve moved away from Greenford now, closer to the training ground, and my brother has moved to Reading to go to university.
“We are still really close though, he was one of the first to text me after the FA Cup game at Bournemouth when I was a man of the match,’’ the Arsenal number 77 said.