Camden and Islington United women’s manager and community engagement leader talks growing up in Islington, building a community club, and fighting misogyny in football
Joel Williams nearly called it off. It was a rainy November morning, back in 2021, and he stood on Whittington Park football pitch in Upper Holloway, ready to deliver a training session to two players who had signed up to a new women’s football programme. He gets a call. Has training been cancelled?
“I’m like: ‘No, still on,’” Joel chuckles, reliving the fledgling days of his role as Camden and Islington United (CANDI) women’s first team coach. “Maybe one of them turns up and so I’ll do a one-to-one session.” He’s soaked through to the skin. “Sometimes I had a cold, but I had to keep going.”
It is that kind of determination that has led to an 85-player strong women’s football club – made up of three separate squads. The first team are in the sixth tier of the women’s football pyramid, but have faced a fruitless campaign so far, winless in their debut season after 13 games. Sounds tough.
“Football is just the vehicle, football’s just the tool and the mechanism.”
“Tough’s an understatement,” Williams says, exhaling. “[Its] a combination of things – we have got quite a few young players, we took over another club that was going to fold, and it’s our first year doing 11s, so we have learned very harshly on the job.”
“But there has definitely been progress,” he adds. “This is long term, and all the learnings we’ve gained from this season will hold us in good stead next year when we go down.”
CANDI have found themselves plonked in a league alongside Premier League Brentford’s burgeoning women’s team (14-0), and other established sides like Bromley (9-0) and Dulwich Hamlet (4-2). It’s not a fair match up – these teams have stadiums, facilities, and investment, whilst CANDI play at Regent’s Park and must foster a pay-to-play system for their players.
“Regardless of the results, when I look at the growth and the variety of ages of players – we’ve got 17-year-olds playing on the same team as 55-year-olds. Sometimes I scratch my head and I’m like: ‘What? Is this real?’ There’s a real sense of camaraderie that exists in the women’s football programme.”
That programme is just one string to Camden and Islington United’s bow, the amateur football club that harmonises community togetherness and competitive sport. CANDI have another three men’s teams and a local community engagement programme, of which Williams is the lead.
He is also a north London native – from Essex Road, Grimthorpe House, Tottenham to Archway; he grew up on these streets and knows the challenges people in the area face.
A difficult relationship with his father meant Joel was often out the house. “He was very traditional in his parenting methodology, and he was traditional in what success looked like,” Williams says.
“Now I’m older, I can see he only parented in the way that he knew. But it wasn’t the parenting style that got the best out of me. I never wanted to be at home – that’s why I was always playing football, or always at youth club.”
That (now defunct) Essex Road youth club, Urban Hope, is where Williams credits his motivation to help his own community. “At home, I was being told I wasn’t good at anything. “Then I was going to this youth centre and my youth worker, Ben, was like: ‘You’re sick: believe in yourself!’”
Ben built his confidence and got him on the right trajectory. “There’s tons of kids, growing up on the same streets, going through similar stuff, that just need one person to believe in them and see something that their network doesn’t, and it’ll change their lives.”
CANDI hopes their community programmes can have the same effect. Williams heads up the team that delivers three separate football sessions for 8–14-year-olds, including a girls-only session at Castlehaven Sports Pitches, Camden.
Walking football for middle-aged residents and food bank deliveries are also on the menu, along with workshops for young people to know their rights when it comes to stop and search tactics deployed by police.
CANDI wants to grow these initiatives into bricks-and-mortar base for the community. “Our dream is to have a hub where we can be based. So, we can do everything from one place, where we can support vulnerable adults and homeless people with showers and food. Have breakfast clubs and stuff like that, but also have a pitch where everybody knows: that’s where our home games are.”
It sounds like the club goes beyond just football. “100%,” Williams says automatically. “Football is just the vehicle, football’s just the tool and the mechanism.
“The board understand the power of football and how it’s used to build relationships and grow communities, and that’s what we want to do. We want to make the world a better place. This is our way of doing it.”
CANDI made headlines last month when their men’s Sunday league team boycotted their Sunday Wembley Cup semi-final against opponents Munter Hunters FC. The night before the match, an unknown social media account (labelled only as MHFC) began tagging CANDI in posts, at first just trash talk, with ‘MHFC’ players discussing the game. “As the night went on, and they got more intoxicated, they started posting more,” Williams explains. “Taking pictures with girls with captions railed on it. The final clip was them with girls – but groping them, and a bit of upskirting shown in it. They tagged us and said: ‘CANDI we’re coming for you.’ That can’t run.”
“We set up the club to be the antidote to all the negative stuff in football – the misogyny, racism, homophobia, and transphobia. This was against everything we stood for.”
CANDI complained to the London Football League and the governing Amateur Football Alliance, who initially said monitoring grassroots sides’ social media accounts didn’t fall under their remit. CANDI, holders of the Sunday Wembley Cup trophy, decided to pull out of the match, and reached out to the media. The FA subsequently postponed the game and have begun investigating Munter Hunter FC’s conduct.
“We set up the club to be the antidote to all the negative stuff in football – the misogyny, racism, homophobia, and transphobia. This was against everything we stood for.”
How did the women’s team respond? “They were super thankful and appreciative,” Williams says. “People talk the good talk, but people don’t always walk the good walk. The team said they were super proud to be a part of a club that is active in its allyship, and it made them prouder to represent the club and be a part of it.”
Williams himself oozes pride for his club and the journey they have been on. He recalls one kids training session that made him step back and realise the progress they had made. “You hear the laughter, and you hear the celebrations of the goals, you see the parents sitting on the sideline, engaging with each other. It was a real snapshot of what the club is about. Kids turning up, and it’s pissing it down with rain.”
Do the heavens always open when you step on the pitch? Williams smiles. “You want to be here so badly; you don’t mind getting drenched for an hour.”
