(upbeat music)
- If we want to travel to a bigger city,
we have to walk for a day, a week,
stuff like that.
It's very different.
- Where's the supermarket?
- We don't have a supermarket.
- [Mo] Dang!
- You have no supermarket,
how do you get food?
- We hunted.
- We just got an email from performance
who were the experts assessing
a bit of your technique
and stuff today.
I got an email from them
and this is what it reads.
"Hi Nick, good session today,
"good to catch up.
"Abba's a great person,
"he has a desire to improve,
"shown by traveling to England
"and he showed a great
attitude in the session.
"I felt the session highlighted
two key areas to develop
"while he's in England and
with us, with Train Effective.
"Firstly, his non-dominant foot
"and secondly his scanning
and pre-orientation."
When it comes to your non-dominant foot,
that's your weak foot more
than anything it says,
"Abba has a psychological fear
"of using his left foot,
"he's almost scared to show that weakness.
"There's an important
difference in the speed of play
"between passing or shooting
first time with your left foot
"and taking a controlling touch,
"adjusting your body
"and then shooting and
passing with your right foot."
That's like what was highlighted
in some of those clips.
"I feel if Abba spent 10
to 15 minutes each day
"on his non-dominant foot,
"he would improve dramatically.
"And that includes kick ups,
"doing balance work with the ball,
"dribbling, wall passing.
"Also the second key point
"that you can improve on is scanning.
"Everything Abba does
when he's in England,
"is he scanning?
"Is he checking his shoulders?
"It should also be taking real
pictures of what's happening,
"where a player is moving,
"the key time to scan is
once a ball has been passed.
"I also feel like he needs to scan ahead,
"he does lift his head
at times when he dribbles
"but when he doesn't see the picture,
"he's not looking properly.
"Potentially, his strongest
assets are his short passing,
"potential to dribble in tight areas."
I think great as a central midfielder.
"And defensive discipline.
"And we hope to see more of you."
That's the feedback.
(gentle music)
- [Nick] I heard a story
about our friend, Abba.
He used to play on dirt pitches in Burma.
He kinda escaped that,
I guess it's a similar story to yourself?
- Definitely so,
definitely so.
- In Liberia.
- I'm gonna make an
example like Drogba had to.
They all grew up in an area
where they did not have pitches like
what we have today,
including myself.
- Obviously today,
this is not a football,
football, football field
but it's green grass,
- Yeah it's green grass.
It could be much worse.
- Definitely so.
Which is much more better
than where we came from
where we up grew from.
I play with my bare feet
and it was on a very rough surface.
That's very good because
it improves your skill as well.
- [Nick] It's very unpredictable.
- Exactly, your technique,
everything improved.
When you see these guys,
coming in the Premier League performing,
it's not by surprise,
they put their heart to it,
they put their mind to it,
they work for it,
they go for it, is very strong.
We are in the same situation like...
- [Nick] Like Abba.
- Yeah, Abba.
I like his passion as well.
He's fighting his way from such situation,
this is the beginning.
- [Nick] Yeah. All right.
(gentle music)
- Today we're gonna be
mixing up the training.
Physical, technique,
your ball anticipation,
your movement, on and off the ball
and your accuracy in passing.
(upbeat music)
Move it, move it, move it, let's go!
This exercise helps you,
the master Maya dribbling.
I should go through the cone,
this is how you gonna go,
when you see Messi, Ronaldo
and other players going through players
this is what all everybody practice.
It gives you that quick thinking,
how to go through.
(upbeat music)
(laughing)
- [Nick] Abba.
(laughing)
- How you do this thing.
- Please put in the comments,
is this the correct way to do push-up?
(laughs)
Mo, I think he has
another round of push-ups,
Abba why are you turning your back?
Abba why are you turning your back?
(laughs)
He's smiling.
Abba why are you smiling?
Ahoy.
(upbeat music)
- Mo.
- He's too hungry.
- Abba's finished.
- [Mo] You finished?
- Abba said there's no houses,
I can't see any houses.
- Yeah, there are no houses.
Where's the supermarket?
- We don't have a supermarket.
- [Mo] Dang!
- You have no supermarket,
how do you get food?
We hunted,
we grow vegetables.
- [Nick] And how did you
construct the houses?
- [Abba] From the wood.
- [Nick] You would chop down the wood?
- [Abba] Yeah, we chop down the wood,
you see everything here,
you see trees everywhere.
- Oh that's lots of wood there.
- Yeah that's wood for fire.
We make fire from wood,
we don't have electric or anything.
Now we have motorcycle and some cars
but back in when I was there,
there's no motorcycle and no car.
Some sort of a field,
I used to play here.
We try to play every day,
we try to play every day.
- And how is it now being in America?
Where it's completely different,
you're in Indiana, right?
- The main difference, the resource.
- Resource?
- Yeah resources because in
Indiana, in a bigger city
we have everything we need to survive.
- Do you feel lucky being over?
- Yeah, I feel very lucky, very blessed,
it's a blessing from God.
- That's an amazing story Abba.
Where you grew up,
I could never imagine living there.
- What was that transition like?
'Cause I'm assuming that
you didn't speak English
when you came here,
what was that culture shock like?
- It was difficult because
we didn't speak English then,
there were some Chin
people live in the States
it was a bit helpful.
It's hard to learn English,
English is very hard.
English was one of the
most difficult thing
that I learned in the state.
In the state,
you see nice cars,
you see lots of restaurants,
lots of markets,
everything's accessible
like hospital is very close
and everything but back home
we didn't have access to that.
If we want to travel to a bigger city,
we have to walk for a day, a week
stuff like that so it's very different.
By the time I get to high
school around my middle school,
I join a soccer club.
I learned more English
from playing soccer.
Because I have a lot of American friends
and every time we speak with them
they correct our pronunciation.
Also in soccer we have to communicate,
that helps me a lot.
- Did you have a good
high school experience?
Did you have a good time?
- Yes, yes.
I play four years, four years varsity.
- In high school?
- In high school
and I was the captain when I was senior.
- To add to this because
we spoke on the phone
and I was like all right,
this is a guy that has
gone from playing barefoot
to now moving to America
and getting a full ride
college scholarship, right?
- Yes sir.
- And congratulations by the way.
There's so many people
right now watching this
would be awesome to answer question like,
how do you do it?
- I think it's a hard work I think
because when I came to the United States,
I have a dream of playing professionally.
As a kid I want to play professionally,
that's my dream so every
time I play in a club,
I always tried my best.
I always try hard,
hardworking was the
key to college I think.
- [Nick] Abba, you know what we say
in the end of videos?
- [All] Stay effective.
- Oh my God, enthusiasim,
let's pull,
all right let's go,
one more time.
- You're gonna have to--
- [All] Stay effective.
- Yes, all right.
