Speakers including Hope Powell, Luther Blissett and Jermain Defoe discussed facing racism and ongoing fight for equality
A unique celebration took place at Wembley last week. Inside the main banqueting suite of the national stadium, generations of black footballers, their friends and family, and others from the English game, gathered to commemorate the 75th anniversary of the arrival of the Windrush. There was jerk chicken, potent rum punch and much laughter, but the challenges that faced those first Caribbean immigrants and their descendants were not far from mind either.
Luther Blissett reflected on being reunited with his parents as a five-year-old after they, like many who left the West Indies for England, had had to travel without children to take up a new life. He recalled the first time he was called the N word as he grew up in Willesden, north-west London. Finally, he spoke too about becoming the first black player to score for England, on his debut, with a hat-trick.
