Quotes from Kevin-Prince Boateng

My mum and dad used to listen to a lot of R&B and soul, so this was the way I grew up. Hip-hop, of course. But then as I grew older, I started listening to everything.

I know that Spurs are a team who like to play offensive football.

For me, it is amazing to be in England. To be in London and playing for Spurs will be great for me.

Stadiums can be places where people of different colour come to support their teams, or they can be seen as stagnant areas where healthy people will be infected by racism.

There were three people I always wanted to meet: Michael Jackson, Muhammad Ali, and Nelson Mandela.

At my club, Portsmouth, my foot pains were diagnosed as a strain of the syndesmotic ligament.

When I played for Ghana, I learned how to fight malaria. Simple vaccines are not enough. You also have to dry out infected areas where the carriers proliferate. I think that racism and malaria have a lot in common.

Racism is real; it exists here and now. You can find it on the streets, in your office, and in football stadiums.

Everybody has struggles in life, and mine was to come out of a tough area in Berlin. It helped me a lot on my way to becoming a professional footballer, to being an idol and a good role model.

We are in the year 2013, and racism is still amongst us and is still a problem. It's not simply an argument for the History Channel or something that belongs to the past or something that only happens in other countries.

Everyone thinks footballers have a great life and drive great cars, but sometimes you have to pull the veil away and look behind.

At my age - 31, nearly 32 - the No. 9 role is perfect for me. But it is important to adapt to whatever the team and the coach need.

I'm not the kind of person who goes into the dressing room and says: 'I'm the Guv here.' But maybe I give off the aura that I'm the kind of person who can be a big player.

I've earned a lot of money, seen everything, and have a wonderful family. What else can I do?

There are many different types of racism from people of different colours and nationalities. There is no vaccine to fight this and no antibiotics to take. It's a dangerous and infectious virus which is strengthened by indifference and inaction.

Just like in everything else, there are people in football who you don't particularly like.