Latest Apprentices

I know that an American soccer playing adventure is the talk of many YTS changing rooms. When scrubbing the boots of the professional players you envy and aspire to be, it can become disheartening so life across the pond playing football at a university with thousands of sun-kissed students sounds more than appealing. ..

Our tour of Holland was a great experience for all the people who were involved, players and staff. As part of our trip we were able to play games against Dutch opposition. We were able to beat all our opponents which were Ajax, FC Twente and Willem II…

Tuesday
Tuesday morning we had a lie in for a pre-match meal at 11.00am and mentally prepared for the game against Vitesse Arnhem at 2.00pm. The day was very disappointing for me personally as I didn’t do anything all day because of an injury. It was also a very disappointing day for the team as we lost 3-0. ..

After the first win of the of the tour the lads morals were high going into the next few days of training. We had a couple days of down time until the next game against a third tier German team, the down time allowed us to not only rest and recover but also to work on our fitness as it is a pre-season tour. ..

Saturday
Saturday was our match day against Feyenoord. In the morning we finished getting our cases packed to take with us on the coach as we were moving hotel straight after the game where we will finish our tour. ..

The next day we woke early for another training session on a fabulous pitch to try and put right the mistakes we had made in the game against Vitesse Arnhem. It was only a short recovery session followed by dinner due to the baking heat…

Thursday
Thursday morning we woke up as normal for breakfast at 8.30am and made our way up to the training ground for a good technical morning session. The temperature yesterday increased and it was very different training in that kind of heat because we aren’t used to it back in England very often. ..

Day 4
It was really hot today with temperatures in the 30’s !
We did a light training session at Gilze, a local amateur club with fantastic facilities. The staff there have been fantastic with us cutting the grass every day and allowing us the use of all the facilities…

Despite an early start all the lads were buzzing on Monday morning when we met at Prenton Park.

We couldn’t wait to fly out and get started so inevitably the flight and the transfer from the airport seemed to take an eternity. Our first impressions of hotel was a universal thumbs up though it was quite funny that we needed a guided tour around it to ensure that some of our party don’t get lost walking to and from their rooms!..

Monday
The first day started very early in the morning as we met up at the ground at 5am to arrive at the airport for a 9.25am flight to Holland. We arrived in Holland at about lunchtime and travelled to the hotel where we were staying. ..

Day 1
We started our journey to Holland early in the morning, 5:30am, from the Riverside Stadium. From there we had a short journey to Newcastle Airport where we departed to Schipol (Amsterdam)…

The season is coming to a fast end and, overall for me, it hasn’t been a bad year at all on and off the pitch. The second year lads – myself included – found out about our professional contracts around two weeks ago now…