In the U.K. it was an incredibly joyous feeling when the country came together for the Euros. For me, what was even better was experiencing it all from my hometown of Wembley. The home of football.

Nothing beats the feeling of unity. Our England football team did us proud. There are some players that are inspirational both on and off the pitch and I have nothing but admiration for them. So it comes with great sadness that after a penalty shoot out in the final game, our three lions were subject to abuse. Abuse not about their football skills but about the colour of their skin. If we had won, the comments on social media would have been celebratory and joyous but it wasn’t. The true feelings of some hateful individuals came out and I won’t call them England fans because they’re not. True England fans felt incredibly let down by the aftermath of this hate and this shameful behaviour needs to stop.

Here’s a poem written by Adaeze Obasuyi @rooted_branch that sums up the feelings of last week.

Rashford, Sancho and Saka. We stand by you. You did us proud ❤️🙌🏾❤️

This poem is more suited to older children/adult audience.