Almost three weeks into the job, Dino Maamria is at ease, sat in his manager’s office at Stevenage’s training ground, charting his ambitions for a club close to his heart and telling his fascinating story. It is tale of determination, how, as a teenager from Gafsa, in southwest Tunisia, on the edge of the Sahara desert, he realized his dream of becoming a footballer, and now, having earned his stripes in the non-league game, he is carving out a reputation as a manager. A gregarious character, Maamria, a former striker for Stevenage and the former assistant manager under Graham Westley, makes compelling company over an hour’s conversation, much of which revolves around his unorthodox journey to England, including how Brian Miller, the former Burnley scout on holiday at the time, offered him a two-week trial after spotting him playing against Étoile Sportive du Sahel, a team from Sousse, a tourist resort in the north. Maamria was playing for La Marsa, near Tunis, on the back of another trial, afforded to him after a lorry driver parking up overnight at the nearby wheat factory scribbled his name on the back of a matchstick box. “I was playing, bare feet as a 15- or 16-year-old. Somebody approached me and said: ‘Can I have your name please?’” He has not looked back since arriving at Turf Moor 23 years ago. “From a very young age, I wanted to be a footballer,” he says. “My teacher would have a go at me for saying that because they thought I should be a doctor or something. When I told people I was going to be a footballer, they laughed. I get it, those people who said I had no chance, because at that time there was no chance to go from the desert to the city – to be at one of the top clubs, it was impossible.” The youngest of seven siblings – he has five brothers and one sister – his upbringing was tough (they would run the 20-mile round trip to school in Lalla) – but one of which he is proud. “I came from a very poor background, I was born in a tent … but there is no shame in that. I lived in a tent until I was four, so that tells you where I have come from. We used to share a bed, my brothers and me, we would top and tail. Yes, I was poor but I loved it and I wouldn’t swap it for the world. “As a boy, I lived in a tent with a couple of goats, and one of them I used to call Gary, because of Gary Lineker. It is normal to have goats or camels in the south of Tunisia, where it’s very dry and they can survive the heat and go without drinking for days. We would use the goat’s milk for breakfast. Leo now, my little boy, I tell him about the story and he always says: ‘Daddy I want a goat for my birthday.’ I take him and my daughter, Maya, home every year to see my family and all the rest of it.” His late father, Youssef, worked in the phosphate mines – “a dangerous job that did not pay a lot” – but it was a conversation he overheard between his mother, Zara, and a neighbor, a couple of weeks before his baccalaureate exams, that spurred him. “They asked: ‘Why is he not studying and revising like everybody else?’ My mum said: ‘He is going to be a footballer.’ My neighbor laughed at her, I always remember that and that gave me that drive.” Maamria has always been captivated by football, inspired since he was a seven-year-old hearing history on the radio from the 1978 World Cup, Tunisia’s maiden appearance in the finals. His bold smile broadens as he rattles off their results with pride, particularly that 0-0 draw with West Germany. “We played on dirt tracks, wherever we could, with rocks either side – that was our goals. Tunisia is a third-world country but we are obsessed with football. North Africa is mad about football: Tunisia, Algeria, Morocco and Egypt, there is a big rivalry. Growing up, they were big games. It’s good; Tunisia have got England, June 18 … I am ready for that already.” But who will he support? “I’m quite torn,” he says. “In 1998, I wanted Tunisia to win [when England won a World Cup group game 2-0] but I had only been here three years and it was still quite fresh then, and some of the players were my friends. But this time, I know the English setup, I know Gareth Southgate and I have been around the England camp a bit. I definitely want England to win the World Cup, that’s for sure. Tunisia can’t, they won’t. I am very proud to be in England since ‘95 and I am almost English now.” Maamria is adamant he is more famous in the UK than in his homeland and admits that, while he has embraced the culture, England has “looked after” him, he says with sincerity. A thirst to learn meant Maamria started his coaching badges in his mid-20s while out with a broken leg at Burnley. He worked with Jay Rodriguez and Richard Chaplow, all the time improving his language skills. After Northwich Victoria, Southport and Nuneaton Town – whom he left to return to Stevenage last month – Maamria is relishing his fourth manager’s job and the task at hand at a club 15th in League Two. “I am quite proud because I am probably the first African and the first Muslim to be a manager in the Football League. I am proud of that, but I am not going to sit on that, I want to kick on as well.”The Guardian Sport