The Sunday News
Ngqwele Dube, Sports Correspondent
UNITED Kingdom’s Football CV Academy coach, Grant Brown is set to take budding players and development coaches through their paces in a week-long stint starting tomorrow.
Brown arrived in the country yesterday courtesy of BN Academy which is facilitating the training camp.
BN Academy director, Bhekimpilo Nyoni said they have registered 120 junior players from all over the country that will take part in the five-day course.
He said Brown will take the budding players through basic football techniques they are currently implementing in London.
“We visited FCV in Stamford last year with four academy boys and created a relationship with the academy hence Brown accepted our invitation to come and hold this course.
“We have also invited other academy coaches who we hope will learn a thing or two from Brown during his period here,” he said.
Nyoni said they are pleased the course has attracted players from as far as Ghana with another from Botswana while 10 juniors from Bulawayo have also registered for the course that will be held at Belgravia Sports Club in Harare.
He said the course will culminate in two footballers being selected for a training camp at FCV in August.
“It will be an all expenses paid trip except the airfares. We will meet the course fees, meals, accommodation and transport in the UK for those chosen by Brown assisted by a panel of local coaches.
“The camp will run from 13 to 24 August, an intense 10-day period that will see the players gaining extensive knowledge of the game in a short period of time. The youngsters will be exposed to the latest international training methods. They will get the chance to be watched in action by scouts from various clubs that include Leicester, Wolverhampton, Birmingham and West Brom,” said Nyoni.
According to the FCV website, Brown, a holder of a Uefa A Licence, was a central defender in his playing days, in a career that spanned 18 years and just short of 600 games.
“After starting out at Leicester City, where he played 14 times, he moved to Lincoln City, going on to make more than 400 appearances during a 13-year spell.
“After stints at Telford United and Alfreton Town, Sunderland-born Brown joined Grantham Town — which he balanced alongside a Youth Team coaching role at Lincoln,” reads his short bio on website.
“Brown hung up his boots in 2006 to further his focus on his coaching career and, since then, has stepped up into a caretaker manager role at Sincil Bank on a handful of occasions. As the Imps’ Head of Youth since 2010, there’s no doubt that Brown has the expertise to get the very best out of FCV’s future stars this season and beyond.”
Grant joined FCV of 2016 as Academy manager.
