Green took the idea to gyms and devised a 10-week programme that helps people learn the basics of boxing and martial arts like jujitsu.
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The programme has attracted coaches such as MMA fighter Ieuan Mackenzie, while a more self-defence focused programme called She is Worthy has been launched with coaching from Commonwealth judo bronze medallist Jasmine Hacker-Jones.
The idea behind the project is not about producing fighters for competition. It’s about promoting the benefits of exercise and healthy living and shifting people out of their comfort zone and into new communities.
“We’re not interested in athletic outcomes, if you will,” says Green. “We have had them and they’ve been a bonus but, to us, it’s always about the outcome in terms of sustainable living.
“A lot of people who are in homelessness stay in homelessness because they feel like that’s the only community that accepts them. It’s the same with addiction – they only stay within the circles of addiction because they feel like the other communities don’t accept them.
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“So what we’re showing is the gym community is accepting them and they start to move them away from the negative environment into the positive.”
An avid martial arts fan himself, Green took inspiration from his father and started practising alongside his siblings as a youngster.
It’s nothing new to harness combat sports to divert negative feelings into positive ones.
Green recalls stories of others finding the sports to put them on the straight and narrow after becoming involved in anti-social behaviour in younger days.
To people who are experiencing homelessness, the endless pursuit of progress in the sports can offer something that life often cannot.
“The biggest thing is the endorphins and the dopamine and the sense of feeling good about themselves,” says Green. “A lot of people in homelessness, they don’t feel like they have an identity. They don’t feel like they are a part of a community group. They don’t feel proud of themselves or anything. But setting a personal best is a reason for them to get up in the morning.
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“Getting up and reminding themselves they’re homeless is horrible, bless them. But when they wake up, they put their Fighting Homelessness jersey on, they feel part of that group, that team. They feel good about being a part of that and they realise they’ve got a goal to set for today.”
The support ethos that Fighting Homelessness champions even comes down to the kit.
Jerseys with the Fighting Homelessness logo on are part of the 10-week programme. They remind people who take part that they are “worthy”.
It’s become something of a catchphrase for Green.
“There’s nothing that we do just for the sake of doing it, because it’s cool,” he says. “Everything we do is about support, even down to a detail like that in the kit, it’s everything, even the word worthy.”
For now, Green is the sole employee of Fighting Homelessness with around five volunteers helping him to cover cities and towns across Wales.
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But he has big plans for the future. Green wants to take on two new employees this year and the next step for Fighting Homelessness is to get accommodation of their own.
Green believes this will help the people supported by the project to focus on nutrition and take away the negative effects that come with homelessness. While that’s the big ambition for 2026, even longer term, the dream is for Fighting Homelessness to get a home of their own: a gym and accommodation in the same spot.
Green tells Big Issue an example he heard from one man that drives his ambition for a base.
“Before he got through the front door, there was somebody smoking spice,” says Green.
“He got through the front door, there was somebody arguing with the staff. He went upstairs and somebody was having a mental health breakdown. He goes into his room, locks himself in, isolates himself, and then all the negativity starts up again. So that’s an uphill battle for us.
“What we want to do is take away that by having our own house, coming back to a house that is Fighting Homelessness and everyone in the house is training, everyone is having a similar goal.”
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