County call-up for St Vincent footballers
FOUR of St Vincent College’s young football students, who are learning their trade at local team Gosport Borough, have been called up to represent Hampshire Colleges.
Team captain Callum Mann, defender Troy Wingfield and forwards Kian Towse and Joao Ferreira joined the squad of eighteen players sand were involved in recent matches against both Kent and Sussex.
The 16 to 19-year-olds are currently on the two-year St Vincent Elite Football Academy programme, run in conjunction with Borough’s centre of excellence, study maths and English alongside at least 12 hours of football coaching a week.
Coach Pat Suraci said: “The boys are all doing really well this season. Callum has been training regularly with Gosport Borough first team, Troy our tough tackling defender has made more blocks and tackles than any other player in the team while Kian is our top assist maker for college goals and Joao is currently our second top goal scorer.”
Six college football players recently made their first team debuts for Gosport Borough in a solid 3-1 victory over Clanfield in a Portsmouth Senior Cup game at Privett Park, which was held in early December.
Debuts
Callum Mann, Will Ayre and Tom Rolls all started this game; whilst all of Troy Wingfield, Kian Towse and Joao Ferreira came off the bench to make their debuts in the second half.
Mr Suraci said: “All players gave a brilliant account of themselves in their first outing in the senior side with our college playmaker scoring the third goal for the Boro’.”
“All of these opportunities and successes for our college players have come from the hard work and dedication they’ve shown in training day in and day out in our college programme.”
The college’s team has now won a total of twenty-one games in a row and are top of the Hampshire Colleges League Division One. The boys are also through to the semi-final of the Steve Perkins College Cup, which they hope to retain after last seasons’ triumph in the competition,”
The course gives the youngsters a grounding in how professional and semi-professional clubs operate and provides a platform to go on to be players or coaches. Readers can find out more information on this and other programmes by visiting www.stvincent.ac.uk.
PICTURED: Young players celebrate one of three goals in December victory over Clanfield at Privett Park.
