‘I have to get the balance between faith and football’

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Under-21s winger Sahil Bashir is taking part in Ramadan.

Charlie Hanson

2025-03-14T06:00+00:00

Sahil Bashir scored a terrific goal against Braintree Town in the National League Cup. 📷 by Paul Hazlewood.

Despite 4am starts, Sahil Bashir has managed to maintain his fine form for our men’s under-21s.

The 18-year-old has two goals in his last two games, even though he has been fasting from sunrise to sunset, as he takes part in Ramadan.

Running from 28 February until 30 March this year, Ramadan is the holy month in the Muslim calendar, as it marks when the Quran was first revealed to the Prophet Mohamed.

“There has to be a balance always, but faith comes first,” Bashir explained. “I’ve been speaking to the nutritionist and taking the right supplements so that my energy levels are ready for the games and training.

Sahil Bashir is taking part in Ramadan. 📷 by Paul Hazlewood.

“I’ll get up at 4am and I'll have porridge with a bit of fruit in there, and then I'll have a bagel, two eggs, and I'll try to have a litre of water within the space of an hour.

“Your body gets used to it, but the first three days you feel the difference. You're tired, but I feel like throughout this training period for the first two weeks I've been keeping my standards high in training.

“On the faith side, this time keeps me humble and steadfast – that's the main thing for me, being grateful for what I have.”

The winger scored a terrific goal in our 2-1 defeat to Braintree Town on Tuesday, with a late cram of food and drink needed to prepare as best as possible.

“Before a game – as soon as the sun sets – I will load up with dates and a water bottle. I'll down a Lucozade as much as I can, and throughout the games I'll have supplements, [Academy strength and conditioning coach] James Hamilton will be throwing cramp fixing gels at me! I'll have two energy gels at half-time just to keep me going.”

Sahil also has his coaches to thank for his recent form in front of goal.

“All the coaches are always wanting to help you and get the best outcome. They're always there for you no matter when you're not playing, when you're playing, when things are going good for you and things are going bad for you.

Sahil has two goals in his last two appearances for Albion. 📷 by Simon Davies.

“On the pitch, when Mikey [Harris] is telling me to press, it’s that extra encouragement because when the coach wants you to do something, you just do it. Even when I've got on the ball and just hearing him say, ‘beat your man’, it kind of fires me up on it.

“Against Braintree, coming out at half-time, Mikey came up to me and said ‘you're going get a goal, you're going to score’. Within one minute after the halftime I scored and then I looked at him and we just both smiled at each other.”

Bashir will be aiming to make it three goals in three games on Friday, when our men's under-21s take on Fulham in Premier League 2.