Coach Advocates Grassroots Sports Dev

The coach of MCWJEF Soccer Academy of Port Harcourt, Mr Ndubuisi Ihejirika, has appealed to the Rivers State Government and multi-national companies operating in the state to encourage the development of grassroots football.

Ihejirika who made the call in interview at weekend described football as one of the best employers of labour globally stressing that a lot of youths have seen it as being lucrative.

He also said that after his graduation from the university he decided to go into soccer coaching because of the love he has for the game, adding that today he is proud that his academy has churned out a good number of players playing within and outside the country.

“When I gained admission into University of Port Harcourt, Ocean Boys FC of Bayelsa State invited me to play for them, but I opted out because of my admission into the university.

After my graduation, I decided to go into football management in order to give myself a direction.

According to him MCWJEF Soccer Academy, encourages grassroot football minting out that the academy proudly boast of players of the professional leagues both in Nigeria and overseas and also happy that we encouraged so many players to play for national through our soccer academy.

He said that football is a sport everybody wants to watch, adding that many people would encourage you.

“Based on this, we want the government and multi-national companies operating in the state to encourage the youths to shun all forms of gangsterism and other social vices in the society by encouraging them into football and other sporting activities.

“Like the competition that is going on at Number Six Field, we want the government and the appropriate authorities saddled with the responsibility of recruiting players to come and watch these local competitions where they can discover these young budding talents because it is from the grassroot you can discover young talents to replace the ageing one in our state own teams.

“If they come to this local place they can get young players to blend with the professionals because grassroot is the heart of football”, Coach Bisi lamented.

Gold Monday