Southampton and Nigeria midfielder Joe Aribo says playing cage football growing up in London made him the player he is today.
Following a hugely disappointing Premier League relegation campaign at Southampton last season, a trip down memory lane can still put a smile on Joe Aribo's face.
The Nigeria midfielder is visiting the artificial pitch in Mitcham, south London, where he grew up.
Surrounded by a tall green chain-link fence, Aribo says playing football in the cage made him "the player I am today".
"In the summer, I'd be here from the morning until night time," the 29-year-old explains to BBC Sport Africa.
"I'd probably have a one-hour break where I'd go to the shop, get some drinks with my friends, and then straight back to it.
"It's just one of the best times of my life."
So what did he learn from the hours of roll-on, roll-off encounters?
"First touch, close control, dribbling," he says.
"My game is dribbling, trying to face up my opponent and get past him. And I've learned that all here.
"Cage football is different to football on a normal pitch because there's just not a lot of room to manoeuvre.
"In the cages it's not really tactical. No one sticks to a position, it's everyone running everywhere, and you've just got to build awareness and understand how frantic it can be."
That disorder, perhaps unsurprisingly, also manifested itself in other ways.
"Physically it was rough," he says.
"That's why, as a professional now, if I go down I don't stay down. Because I grew up in a place where, if I got kicked down, I have to get back up."
Family backing and 'resilience'
Born in Camberwell, just south of the River Thames in London, Aribo and his family moved further out into the capital's southern suburbs when he was six.
The youngest of three siblings, Aribo's brother Paul used to accompany him on the short walk from their Mitcham home to play in the cage in nearby Lavender Park.
"I wanted to be a footballer," he admits.
"I wouldn't say that being down here made me think I'd be one, because I understood that you kind of had to be in the right places, being in academies and in a good set up."
But unlike fellow Lavender Park alumnus Callum Hudson-Odoi, who spent a decade developing in Chelsea's academy, Aribo's route to the top had a different flavour.
It was a football charity, the Kinetic Foundation, which first showed faith, helping him earn a deal with non-league side Staines Town, for whom he made his senior debut in the sixth tier of English football as a 17-year-old.
A move to English Football League side Charlton Athletic soon followed, with Aribo spending four seasons with the Addicks before big-money moves to Rangers in Scotland and then Southampton.
He puts his success down to resilience," he says.
"I think if you asked my siblings, my parents, even my friends, they'd say they saw a different kind of drive in me.
"I knew what I wanted and I didn't give myself another option. I just had to believe in myself."
With parents from Nigeria's Yoruba ethnic group, Aribo's Super Eagles debut against Ukraine in September 2019 was a moment of particular pride for the close-knit family who came along to watch Aribo being interviewed on his old patch.
"I'm 100% sure it's a lot deeper for them, just because they grew up there and all their friends are from there, and family," he adds.
Aribo says it has been "an honour" to pull on the green and white shirt, especially the "iconic" number 10 jersey previously worn by the likes of Jay-Jay Okocha and John Obi Mikel.
But last year's Africa Cup of Nations (Afcon) final defeat against hosts Ivory Coast, in which Aribo was a substitute, is something he remembers as "really upsetting".
"Sometimes you might think all that time was wasted. But you learn a lot from it also and I think that's what we did," he says.
"It was an amazing feeling being involved."
London's Super Eagles
Aribo is one of a number of players either born or raised in London who are now representing Nigeria and played in that Afcon final.
Fulham pair Calvin Bassey and Alex Iwobi, Nottingham Forest's Ola Aina, Semi Ajayi of West Brom and Atalanta's African Footballer of the Year Ademola Lookman also featured in Abidjan.
"I think it just shows that there's so much talent in the cages," says Aribo.
"You see a different culture with London boys. And just having that around [the Nigeria squad] is good."
Lookman is a player he knows particularly well, having featured alongside him at Charlton.
The 27-year-old forward was the only African to feature on last year's Ballon d'Or longlist, but Aribo says he is not surprised by his friend's impressive rise to the top of world football.
"I've always known how good he is and how good he could be," reveals Aribo, who was a second-year pro when Lookman was in Charlton's under-18s.
Laying the foundations of a new cage
Aribo's love of the Lavender Park cage is so great he has now started his own charity to help upgrade it.
The Aribo Foundation's first project will see the pitch re-laid, while there will be new goals, new security and possibly even a set of changing rooms.
"It's just so dangerous," he says of the holes in the pitch and litter scattered across its surface.
"You want to make it a lot more comfortable for people. It's first and foremost giving back to the community."
Aribo hopes to start renovations later this year, working with owners Merton Borough Council.
He thinks having it ready for next summer in the UK would be "perfect timing", allowing youngsters to enjoy the same kind of long evenings he loved as a child.
"It's made me into the player I am," he re-emphasises.
"And it would not have been the case if I did not have this opportunity in the cage here."
Category: General Sports
