Football Daily - Bukayo Saka - The Football Interview

Episode Date: November 22, 2025

In this week’s edition of the Football Interview, Kelly Somers speaks to the Arsenal and England forward Bukayo Saka. They discuss growing up and breaking into the Arsenal side, as well as his Nigerian heritage. Plus, he speaks about life away from football and his new-found love for coffee.

This BBC podcast is supported by ads outside the UK. To embrace the impossible requires a vehicle that pushes what's possible. Defender 110 boasts a towing capacity of 3,500 kilograms, a weighting depth of 900 millimetres and a roof load up to 300 kilograms. Learn more at landrover.ca. The Football Interview on the Football Daily Podcast. I'm Kelly Summers, and this season, I'll be interviewing some of the biggest names in football,

asking them the questions they don't normally get asked, as I'm trying to find out more about the person behind the player. The first half will be on football, the second on their life away from the pitch. This isn't just any interview, this is the football interview. And this week, I'm joined by someone who is living his boyhood dream. He's grown up supporting Arsenal, and now he is one of their key players. It's Bukai Osaka. Bokai, it's good to see your smiling face once again.

Let's try and get to know you a little bit better. We'll start with the football. Why football? Football is happiness to me. So from the moment I realised that it existed, you know, it was all I ever wanted to do. Was there ever any chance of it being anything else? Not in my head, maybe in my parents or, you know, obviously they try to, obviously, made sure I had a plan B, which is, of course, sensible,

but in my head, you know, it was only football. What is your first memory of playing the game? Playing in my back garden with my brother and my dad. It was 2V1, actually. It was me against them, and they're both older than me. So you were always the one and they were always the two? Yeah, yeah, but I would never lose. I would not accept it.

Even if I was loot, I would not accept it. I would cry, I would do anything. That tells me quite a lot about your mentality. And it started young. How young are we talking? We're talking maybe four, five years old from that early. And you had that love for the game back then and that competitive edge. Can you remember the first team that you played for?

Yeah, Green for Celtic. What do you remember of playing for them? I remember everything. From the kit to the... What was the kit like? Talk me for it. Give me a picture of it. Green stripes with white stripes.

Had like a Celtic logo. We used to play in a local park. After the game, boots muddy completely. You have to slap them against the trees. the trees, whatever. Proper football, yeah. So I remember everything. It was a really important chapter of my life and I enjoyed it as well. What kind of age were you in, you joined that, I would have been maybe six. At what point did you think, okay, I'm quite good at this. I know you're humble so you won't want to say ever, but there must have been a moment where you

looked around and thought, hold on, and maybe a little bit better. You can be humble and also believe that you're good as well. I think there's nothing wrong with both and they can both be together and I think I had that from young but I just never thought about it I was just enjoying the game and I was good at it so it made it even more fun what position were you back then because obviously we've seen you left back here we've seen down the wing what were you always going to be an attacker I was always going to be a winger I'd say um obviously that was the first position I played on the left wing when I was growing up and then of course it's always been Arsenal hasn't it can you remember when you found out that you were going to be signing here

My dad telling me I got scouted because it was different, you know, you got a scout card. Scouts would have come to watch you at a local team. And also they gave my dad a card, said, call me, we'll set up a trial. So I remember first coming into Hey, Len. How did you feel? I didn't even feel an ounce of fear, you know. I was just like, I'm just going to play football. Just enjoy it.

And I played so good. I think I trialled at the B team. I played so good they put me in the A team. And from there, signed. And, yeah, I'd been, I asked them ever since. Was it always at Arsenal for you? Yeah. Well, at that point of my career, the decisions were more made by your parents, you know, you're just a kid, you don't really, do you know what I'm saying?

Do what you told? Yeah, and my dad made it clear to me, Arsenal's the club, I want you at. And I said, okay, let's go. Good decision from Dad, that wasn't it? Yeah, a great decision. Why did he want you to come here? What was it about Arsenal? No, he believed in Arsenal, believed in the pathway, and it was visible.

You know, you could see players. And obviously, Arsenal won't get at the time, how much he believed in the academy, how much he believed in the academy, how much much he wanted to use the academy, also the class that Arsenal have and the football that they play. So all of that was just perfect for him and he just wanted me to be here. How special is it being an Arsenal fan playing for Arsenal for kids? It has so many young kids dreams. It's just a dream come through, obviously growing up, going to the stadium and watching Arsenal play in so many different games and to now being the one on the pitch, and other people watching you and all the stuff that comes with it, you know, family, you know,

that I used to talk about Arsenal and now it's you, there's so many different aspects of it that makes it so beautiful and I'm just enjoying it every moment still. So did you used to come and watch Arsenal as a kid? Yeah, of course, yeah. And I bet now you must have so many ticket requests for all the games. After boys.

Can you remember, because not every young boy makes it, you all want to, that's the dream, but can you remember a time even going through the academy where you thought, okay, I'm going to make it to the first team? I remember being in a changement one time, we just played a game. Our team was so good. We just smashed the team.

Coach came in, I think it was Greg, Greg Lincoln. And he came in and said, listen, boys, like, look around. It's an unbelievable team, but only one of you is going to make it, maybe even two. And I just remember that day just thinking, oh, my God, it needs to be me. It has to be me. And I guess that's what a lot of young boys and girls don't realize, isn't it? It's such a small percentage that make it. Yeah.

I don't think maybe coaches, they won't tell all the boys, because some boys that can put fear into them. It might make them a bit less confident. But for me, it just made it so clear to me, you know, that this is not like, it's not going to be all perfect and roses forever. You know, you have to work for this. And for me, it helped me a lot. Which coach, your former teammate, would you say,

has had the biggest impact on your career? It's tough to say. I always speak about how much David Louise and Obamian, they both help me a lot coming into the team. The way they welcomed me, you know, for me, I was quite quiet, you know, seat coming into Arsenal. These are like my heroes, you know, players that I was watching from the stands and I get to play with them now. So it's a bit of a different experience for me and I didn't know how to handle it. I don't want to, you know, rub anyone off the wrong way. So I was just preferred to be a bit more quiet. But these guys, they welcome me and I helped me feel myself and gave me advice, you know, and gave me confidence that push, you know, and you could see it when I was on the pitch, you know, the confidence I was playing with. It was definitely helped by them and obviously the rest of my team, as well, that helped me too.

If you could relive one match from your career, what would it be? Because it went bad or because it was a good moment? Probably because, well, you can do bad if you want, but I'd say good, but if you want to do bad. A game where you really thought, I'm at the peak here. I'm not the peak, but I'm playing well. Because you'll tell me you haven't reached your peak yet. No, I haven't. I don't like to think like that.

It's a good question, to be fair. Maybe we come back to it, maybe. Okay, alright. Let's get to know for Kay Osaka, the person a little bit better then. Okay. What's your full name? Kay Osaka. You got middle names?

middle names. You want to know everything? Yeah, yeah. Tell me. It's on Wikipedia. You can go on there. I don't use that for my research, Bukai. Okay. My name is Bukayo, Moses, Ayoyenko, Tamidaiyosako. And that's because of your Nigerian roots, isn't it? Are you proud of those? Yeah. I'm very proud of good, yeah.

Yeah, is that a big thing in your family? Yeah, 100%. With my parents grew up in Nigeria, so a lot of their values is installed in me, so... Talk me through a typical day in your childhood then. Who was at home? Being at home, I just remember, obviously waking up, would have breakfast. My mum would normally have gone to work. My dad was always around.

And if he had to go to work, it was just me and my brother, but they'd always leave us breakfast and hot cross bun. Oh, a hot cross bun. A sausage, like a sausage cut up. Frankfurt. Do you know Frankfurt? Yeah, yeah. Yeah, and some ketchup.

That was my breakfast. Oh, good. A sausage roll and a hot cross bun together? Not sausage. You put a sausage and a hot cross bun together. You cut the hot cross bun. You cut the sausage up. Put it in the hot cross bun, then put ketchup, then close the hot cross bun.

I've got so many questions about that. I'm not sure about that. Unreal. Credit to my dad, my mum. I don't know whose idea it was one of them. You don't still have that now, do you? Not the most nutritious. It helped me growing up though. Yeah, maybe that's the secret and why you're here today, but in my eyes that's a bit weird, but that's fine. Fair enough. What are you like at school? Yeah, I was quite bright at school. I felt, I thought I was able to pick the information on quite quickly. I was good at understanding it, like, all the different subjects that they were explaining and teaching. So yeah, I said that was a good learner.

And your GCSEs, I mean, you've said before what you got, but just remind me what your grades were. Oh, man. I think it was around four A stars on four A's. I can't remember exactly, but it's online somewhere. It's a long time ago. Who's the first person you speak to after a game? Depends how I'm feeling.

Okay, you've won. Who do you pick up the phone to? I'm not really a big phone call person. I would text my brother. Or is there someone that texts you? I get a lot of texts. popular guy and that's what happens when you're playing for Arsenal. I get a lot of texts.

Especially if you win or you score, you know, people want to congratulate you, which is nice, you know. What's an ideal day off looking like for you? What would you like to do if you want to escape from football? Ideal day off, wake up, the morning, go for a walk by myself. Do you like time to yourself? Yeah, yeah. Recently, more than ever, I like, I'd like going for walks, you know,

like with nature, just relax. I think it's so peaceful, it's nice. Come back, have some breakfast, and then probably go into London, just get some food with my closest people, something I like doing, going to, like, restaurants and stuff like that. I have even more energy, maybe some shopping. And yeah, just enjoying that side of things, you know, if it's a full day off.

I always find this question hard when people ask me, but what are your hobbies? My hobbies, football. Recently I like making coffees. I'm into my coffee area, yeah. I think I'm a part-time barista now. I'm trying to learn how to do the art. That's hard.

You good? So hard. So hard. No, but I'm getting there. I'm getting better. What do you normally do? No, I do a flat white. Or you mean what do I draw?

I haven't been able to draw anything yet. Oh, so you're still? Yeah, I'm still, yeah. A junior. I'm going to take lessons soon. I want to check less yet. Interesting. What's your proudest moment of your career today?

I think I'll say where I am now. You know, the circumstances I grew up in and the ups and downs and the challenges, setbacks or whatever that I've dealt with and to still be here today. And in the position I'm in going strong, still focus, motivated. motivated and happy and I think it's probably something that gets overlooked and something that can definitely be proud of. You know, as I get a bit older, you understand, you know, that, you know, sometimes you can't always, you know, be fully invested in football 24-7, you need to have a good balance

and give your mind sometimes to switch off as well and, you know, enjoy the other aspects of life too. At what point did you get to realise that? Was there a moment you thought, hold on, this isn't the be-all and end all? I need to be able to step away to be the best on the pitch. I think it was last season when I got injured. Before then, I was almost like an autopilot, you know, game, off the game, recovery, game.

And I didn't really, you know, taking anything else. But obviously, when you get injured, you can't do what you love. You can't play football. So I was literally in the brace, in the crutches for almost a month. And you have to, like... You can't play football. No, you have to entertain yourself in other ways. So, like, it just opened up.

that part of my brain to different sides of things. And I think since then it's been like, you know, there's a bit more to life than football. It's not just football, but at the same time, football is my life. So it's like just trying to find a balance, you know, because I'm still, you know, the same dedication, the same motivation, but just trying to find that little break and switch off as well at the same time. If you could only achieve one more thing in your life, what would it be? My career.

I think that's obvious, pretty obvious. all the trophies, Arsenal and England, it's definitely something I want to achieve in my career. So if you give me that option, then yeah, I'll take that. And how would you describe the Bukaiosaka sitting in front of me? I've sat down with you before. I remember sitting down with you at Euro 2021. And you feel like not a different player,

but the way you're speaking is with such maturity and confidence now that I think maybe you didn't have before. How would you describe Bokaiosaka, not? I think I explained a bit earlier, like just, you know, the natural evolution. The player and personal I was what was expected of me and the life I lived then is completely to the one now and naturally as you go from there to there

you learn different things, you mature, you grow and stuff like that. So, yeah, I think that's probably the biggest difference. You're still having fun though, don't you? Because I know you're one of the jokes in the dressing room as well. It's the most important thing, I think. Have fun, smile, laugh every day. I think you can't miss that. You can't, you know, no matter what you can't miss that. Okay, thank you for your time today. It's my first to talk with you. Thank you. This winter, Cricket's oldest rivalry is reignited.

England and Australia do battle to compete for the ashes. That is extraordinary. Here live, ball by ball commentary on five sports extra. And get analysis and reaction of every day's play with the test match. podcast. The stabs out of the ground. Test match special at the ashes. Listen on BBC Sounds.