England Soccer Tour -Anthony Troiani (Year 8) 

England Soccer Tour - Anthony Troiani (Year 8)

In July of 2018, representatives from Westham F.C. came out to Australia. They looked at 3000 children from across Aust & NZ.  From those 3000 children, they took 380 children to National Camp held in Queensland in September last year. Anthony was invited to this camp but did not have to go because he was later selected to go direct to the UK tour. 

In terms of the tour they took a total of 37 kids from Australia and NZ. Four children were given direct places on the UK tour, the rest had to be selected from the national camp.  Anthony was one of the four.

It was a fantastic experience for Anthony.  There were five coaches travelling with the group.  Two of them were employed by West Ham to find them players/talent. Three of the coaches had actually played for West Ham and also in the Scottish league.  The other two run Academies, one here in Australia and one in NZ.  The coaches shared their wealth of experience regarding what it takes to play professionally with the boys which was excellent for them to hear and take on board if that's the direction that they want to go in the future.

Anthony also had the opportunity to see six quality games which was fantastic for him to see. The atmosphere was fantastic.  Leeds V Reading, Aston Villa V Nottingham Forrest, Chelsea V POAK, Manchester City V Bournemouth, Hearts V Motherwall and Rangers V Aberdeen.

The first week of the tour was primarily training every day with a range of different Academies; West Ham, Wolverhampton, Hugh McAuley, Glasgow Rangers and Hearts.  A very full on week with lots of travelling between places.  Fantastic coaching sessions; they coach very differently over there.

The second week was a little training, but mainly games.  The conditions there were very different - freezing, wet and frozen pitches most of the time which meant that the ball handled quite differently, so it was quite a bit for the kids to manage the change in conditions and all the travel but overall they were very competitive which was really good.  The Academy squads over there were very, very good. The boys won some games and lost some as well.  However the Academy coaches made very complimentary remarks (which is apparently very unusual) about our squad.    

Anthony in particular did really well and sparked a little bit of interest from West Ham and the Glasgow Rangers in particular.  

He received some additional one on one training while at West Ham which none of the others on tour received which was interesting.  We were told by the Westham academy coaches that they particularly singled him out because they considered him to be the best technical player in the 12-14 squad and they wanted to mentor him and give him some things to work on, for him to improve.    

He had a cracker of a game against the Glasgow Rangers academy and after the game the Glasgow coach came to find him specifically and told him how impressed he was and well he did and to keep going with playing.

Anthony has been advised that Westham have already offered him a place at National Camp in Queensland this year at the end of September (which is an intensive residential training camp that they come over for.)  He has received feedback about his abilities and has been advised that they would like to keep an eye on him and see if he takes on board the things they have taught him whilst he was there.  All in all great learning opportunity. 

Mr Nick Cheary

PRIMARY CO-CURRICULAR COORDINATOR

ncheary@bps.sa.edu.au or 0410 686 496