The 18-year-old football player has just penned a two-and-a-half-year contract at Barnsley, making him English football's first ever Tamil professional player. Yoganathan spoke with the Tamil Guardian about the journey so far.

From a small village in North Wales, Vimal has navigated the youth systems up through the academy level and has become the first Tamil footballer to play professionally in English football. He is ecstatic 

“It’s a big day for me and my family, a culmination of all the hard work that has been put in over the last 10 years… It’s just the start of a long career to come and I am proud of this moment”

 A four-year-old playing indoor football at Holywell Leisure Centre to playing at academies at Prestatyn and Liverpool, to now signing his first professional contract at Barnsley, Vimal spoke about the support he has received from his parents. 

“They have been amazing, for the last 10 to 11 years they have had to drive me to training and training centres and have always tried to attend my games”

Sri Lanka’s economic and political crisis has reiterated what the island’s Tamils have been saying for decades. Only an independent Tamil state can bring stability to the island.

This weekend, enraged protestors ran through the Sri Lankan president’s official residence and burnt down the prime minister’s home, in scenes which reflected the anger and outrage over the island’s economic collapse. All across the Sinhala south there have been rallies and protests, decrying how the island has fallen into financial ruin.

 In the Tamil homeland however, there are different sentiments to be found. Though the North-East has been hit just as hard by the financial crisis, if not harder given the decades of destruction it has faced, the protests of the south do not resonate the same way with Tamils. There is bemusement at how the same people who overwhelmingly elected a man who platformed on bringing a militaristic rule, have turned on him within a few short years. There is scepticism as to whether these demonstrations will ever lead to any deep-rooted change for an island that has been plagued by cycles of violence. And there is a sense of vindication over what Tamils have known and said for decades. Sri Lanka is not just in crisis - it is a failed state, that in its current form is not fit for purpose. It is time for the Tamil people to be free from it.

Photograph by Gajan Bala