The emotional story of a Welsh soldier and why it led him to going on TV
A Welsh former soldier has spoken about the touching reason he appeared on ITV1's Deal or No Deal, leading to host Stephen Mulhern saying he had "never seen such emotion" before on the show. Matthew Evans, 41, joined the Welsh Guards in 2000 and served for 21 years until September 2021 when he was medically discharged with complex post traumatic stress disorder (PTSD).
During this time he went on many tours including to Northern Ireland, Bosnia, Iraq and Afghanistan three times. The PTSD started in January 2020 when Matthew, from Merthyr Tydfil, suffered flashbacks to a 2009 and 2010 tour to Helmand Province in Afghanistan. Matthew ended up being hospitalised twice; first at a civilian hospital in Peterborough, as he was suicidal. He said: "At the time where it all started, I was suicidal and it was the early stages of PTSD and I just didn’t know how to regulate anything.
“I was self-harming. It was my way of dealing with what I was going through. I can look back at it now and talk about it. Me self-harming was a release, the pain was a release from the exposure I was reliving." Read the biggest stories in Wales first by signing up to our daily newsletter here.
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Matthew was then moved to a military hospital in Basingstoke, where he began to be able to return to normal life. However after 21 years in the army, this was difficult. He said: "I think the hardest part is, for any solider, when you’ve done that length of time, even leaving the army, it is hard transitioning to civilian life.
"You’ve been in a close-knit community, you’ve been around mates for so long and when you leave it is like everything is all alien to you and you got to make friends again. You’ve got to learn to be a person again. You can imagine, you’ve already got that, but you’ve also got complex PTSD to go along on top of that. Mental health is a lonely place anyway and to be out of the army and have complex PTSD was even more lonely." Although he still struggles with his PTSD, he said: "I’m still seeking help now. I still struggle every day. I still take a lot of medication daily to help me through the day."
Matthew was able to use football coaching as a way to live with the illness. One of the reasons he went on Deal or No Deal recently was to win money for his football coaching scheme, Valleys Football Academy. Speaking about how football coaching helped him through his PTSD, he said: "I was just fortunate, football coaching has been a massive massive release for me and I think when you are suffering with PTSD, or any mental health issues, I think it is important to find something really positive to cling onto every day, that keeps you going through the day and you’ve got something to look forward too… it is like a release for me."
The football coaching is also linked to Matthew's family; he is married to his wife Roshelle and they have three children together, Morgan, 24, Joe, 19 and Ollie, 12. Speaking about his family, he said: "It was Ollie and my son Joe that really got me into football and coaching football to start with. It was more of, how can I support them, get them better, mentor them at football.
"We love watching the games on telly, we love watching the football. It is so rewarding going out there and seeing players and children develop and where Ollie comes into that is, he really helps me. When I'm football coaching I'm in my own element, nothing negative comes in, it is focussing on football and focussing on coaching so that really helps. We have grown really close as well, we have become really close."
It is raising awareness for living with a mental illness that inspired Matthew to go on Deal or No Deal which was filmed in September 2024 and aired in January 2025. He said: "It wasn’t just the raising money that was the main thing, for me, its people who are on the outside who are struggling to look and see that there is a person that has suffered with mental health, has had PTSD.
"That although I may look like I’m not struggling, I am struggling but I am there. Not getting on with it, but I am overcoming my obstacles, my challenges and I am doing what I want to do and that is the key message. If someone out there is struggling they can see someone, look at me, and go well he’s struggling and look at what he is doing, then it can help and inspire someone to seek out help. If I can inspire a soldier or anyone that is struggling with mental health to just openly talk about it then that is the bottom line with it."
He still gets emotional watching his episode of Deal or No Deal, on which he won £31,190. He said: "It was crazy… I still get emotional watching it, it was just surreal. It was an emotional moment then, it is an unbelievable amount of money." Now, running Valleys Football Academy, Matthew hopes to encourage children into the sport and keep raising awareness, he said: "I’m not a role model or anything like that… I want them to know I’m still struggling but I also want them to know that I am able to do things as well."
