1 July 2023

Idris Elba was terrorised by racist West Ham football hooligans as a youngster growing up in London.

Idris Elba is an Arsenal fan and would antagonise the West Ham bullies

The ‘Luther’ star grew up in the East London borough Canning Town which was not far from the Premier League team’s former stadium the Boleyn Ground.

Idris, 50, admits in the early ’80s he would regularly be abused for the colour of his skin by West Ham’s notorious hooligan group the Inter City Firm, but after being gifted an Arsenal shirt, he would deliberately wear it to antagonise the yobs and his love for the North London team gave him the strength to take their racist jibes, despite his dad Winston – who came to the UK from Sierra Leonean – being a Manchester United supporter.

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Appearing on the ‘That Peter Crouch Podcast’, he said: “My dad is a Man Utd fan and my dad and I had this healthy rivalry in our house the whole time because I’ve always been an Arsenal fan as long as I can remember and my dad has always been a Manchester United fan.

“It happened when I was probably about 12 years old, I moved from Hackney to Canning Town and Canning Town is right near West Ham, it’s not far, so on West Ham days all the lads would get on the bus outside our school to head up to West Ham and it was a lot of ICF back then, and they were racist – w***ers really.

“They used to terrorise us at school and I remember I had an Arsenal shirt given to me and I wore an Arsenal shirt and they would scream at me and shout at me and I just felt really powerful in it. I was a big kid for 12 so I can hold my own, you know what I mean. My Arsenal shirt become sort of like my superhero thing. In a sea of burgundy and blue there was my shirt on the bus home.”

Years later Idris got to stand in the dugout with former Arsenal manager Arsene Wenger, which he admits was a schoolboy dream come true.

He said: “Wenger was my assistant coach for Soccer Aid. He’s a lovely guy and he’s a fan of my work as well. I had seen him at Highbury a few times and the Emirates.”