A former footballer who was brought to the UK as a child and forced into male prostitution, is now working with the Premier League to raise awareness of the growing number of teenage players being tricked into leaving Africa for Europe.
Al Bangura, 27, who played in the Premier League for Watford, was 14 when his parents told him to become the leader of the secret society his late father had headed in Sierra Leone. He refused.
"I said I didn't think this was something I wanted to get involved with. I want to play football and I'm going to school so I don't want to do that," he says.
So he travelled to neighbouring Guinea where he met a French man, who pretended to be his friend and promised to help him fulfil his dream.
"I didn't know he had another different intention - to get me into the sex trade," Bangura explains.
The pair travelled to France and on to the UK. Once there, the man left him alone in a building.
"All of a sudden I saw two or three guys come around me, trying to rape me and make me do stuff," he says.
"Because I was young and I was small, I just started screaming. They probably thought I knew what I was there for - obviously I know what I came over here for, I was here to play football.
"I was just crying and proper screaming and I tried to make my way out - I was cold, I was crying, I was shaking, I didn't know what to do, I was all over the place.
"I made my way outside. I didn't know where to start, I thought it was the end of my life."
He requested help from a Nigerian man, who told him to go to the Home Office and claim asylum. Because he was 16, he was later given a two-year right to stay.
"It was so emotional, because after a few months I'd kind of forgotten about what what I'd been through, it had been sad but I ended up coming to a good thing.
"I started meeting people, started playing football and I got the opportunity to join Watford when I was 16 and things just started building up for me," he explains.
"It's quite emotional to talk about it now, I'm happy I've got over it, but it's sad for me."
Source : bbc