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Wanderers are heading Stateside in a bid to tap into footballing talent across the Atlantic.
A delegation of coaches, led by Danny Clarke of the club’s International Football Programme, will be cherry-picking top players from the APC Premier Cup to bring back to the UK for a spell at the academy
More than 250 teams aged 11-16 from the US and Canada will be competing in Washington DC. And while the club can offer no guarantees that the next Stuart Holden, Landon Donovan or Clint Dempsey will be unearthed – they are keen to showcase what Wanderers has to offer on a worldwide scale.
“Our main objective is to give players the experience of being in a professional football club environment,” said Clarke, who was released by Wanderers at the age of 14 but returned to work for the club in 2010. “We can’t sell a dream. Some clubs do. It’s false information.
“We’re fortunate to be going to a tournament with 200-plus teams but to say we’ll definitely find a player out of it would be a lie.
“The main purpose is to get the Bolton Wanderers name out there, and to work with EPL Sports Tours to get teams coming back and look at what we have got here.
“But beyond that, if we make a selection through Sport-11, which is the company who set up the tournament we might have the cream of the crop coming to Bolton for a tour in August. If you have 45 players we have selected who come and work hard, will four or five of them be good enough to go and work with the academy? That is a question we can only really answer when it happens.
“Regardless, we want all those guests going away and saying they enjoyed being here.”
Wanderers have forged a link with EPL Sports to organise the trip, and the August tour. The company already works with Reading, Fulham, QPR, West Ham and Everton and have been impressed with what they have seen so far.
“The Whites Hotel is a great environment for teams to come because coaches, players, chairmen, they walk around and interact with people so you feel like you are part of a football club when you are here,” said EPL Sports’ Barrie Love.
“Working so close with Danny is great because he’s a football person and he usually delivers.
“We don’t want to call this a trial but we want players to sample the experience, train with the academy boys, watch a game and go into the cities around like Manchester and Liverpool.
“If one or two of them are good enough, maybe they stay on for a bit longer, or come back.”
The International Football Programme has emerged as a money-spinner for Wanderers in the last 12 months, and chairman Ken Anderson revealed a few more prestigious guests are also on their way.
“The programme is continually growing and we’re attracting a lot of new business,” he told The Bolton News. “We have the Qatar and Estonia national teams coming over in the next couple of months to stay with us.
“People behind the scenes are working really hard to get this done against great competition from other local teams, I don’t want to give them recognition but it doesn’t take much to work them out.
“We’re getting the recognition that the hard work has deserved.
“This part of the business, both from a commercial side and from the hotel side, is bringing in a significant amount.
“Suzanne Speak and her team at the hotel are obviously doing a good job because people keep coming back. As you know, we had the Germany Under-21 team here a few months ago, and we all know they are extremely selective on which facilities they use to prepare for games.”
The IFP has already welcomed visitors from all over the world including Australia, China, the United States, Canada, Nigeria, Sweden, Germany, Italy and the Republic of Ireland as well as providing training camps.
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A delegation of coaches, led by Danny Clarke of the club’s International Football Programme, will be cherry-picking top players from the APC Premier Cup to bring back to the UK for a spell at the academy
More than 250 teams aged 11-16 from the US and Canada will be competing in Washington DC. And while the club can offer no guarantees that the next Stuart Holden, Landon Donovan or Clint Dempsey will be unearthed – they are keen to showcase what Wanderers has to offer on a worldwide scale.
“Our main objective is to give players the experience of being in a professional football club environment,” said Clarke, who was released by Wanderers at the age of 14 but returned to work for the club in 2010. “We can’t sell a dream. Some clubs do. It’s false information.
“We’re fortunate to be going to a tournament with 200-plus teams but to say we’ll definitely find a player out of it would be a lie.
“The main purpose is to get the Bolton Wanderers name out there, and to work with EPL Sports Tours to get teams coming back and look at what we have got here.
“But beyond that, if we make a selection through Sport-11, which is the company who set up the tournament we might have the cream of the crop coming to Bolton for a tour in August. If you have 45 players we have selected who come and work hard, will four or five of them be good enough to go and work with the academy? That is a question we can only really answer when it happens.
“Regardless, we want all those guests going away and saying they enjoyed being here.”
Wanderers have forged a link with EPL Sports to organise the trip, and the August tour. The company already works with Reading, Fulham, QPR, West Ham and Everton and have been impressed with what they have seen so far.
“The Whites Hotel is a great environment for teams to come because coaches, players, chairmen, they walk around and interact with people so you feel like you are part of a football club when you are here,” said EPL Sports’ Barrie Love.
“Working so close with Danny is great because he’s a football person and he usually delivers.
“We don’t want to call this a trial but we want players to sample the experience, train with the academy boys, watch a game and go into the cities around like Manchester and Liverpool.
“If one or two of them are good enough, maybe they stay on for a bit longer, or come back.”
The International Football Programme has emerged as a money-spinner for Wanderers in the last 12 months, and chairman Ken Anderson revealed a few more prestigious guests are also on their way.
“The programme is continually growing and we’re attracting a lot of new business,” he told The Bolton News. “We have the Qatar and Estonia national teams coming over in the next couple of months to stay with us.
“People behind the scenes are working really hard to get this done against great competition from other local teams, I don’t want to give them recognition but it doesn’t take much to work them out.
“We’re getting the recognition that the hard work has deserved.
“This part of the business, both from a commercial side and from the hotel side, is bringing in a significant amount.
“Suzanne Speak and her team at the hotel are obviously doing a good job because people keep coming back. As you know, we had the Germany Under-21 team here a few months ago, and we all know they are extremely selective on which facilities they use to prepare for games.”
The IFP has already welcomed visitors from all over the world including Australia, China, the United States, Canada, Nigeria, Sweden, Germany, Italy and the Republic of Ireland as well as providing training camps.
Source