Missouri State University Associate Head Coach Michael Seabolt lauded LFE’s Assessment Trials as a great opportunity for American Universities to create links with UK academy players and attract them to considering a soccer scholarship.
Seabolt has attended the annual event for over a decade and has welcomed more than 25 former apprentices to the NCAA Division One team, situated in the Midwest of the USA.
“We’ve had a long relationship with LFE and these trials,” he said. “We’ve had a bunch of players who have come over and done really well for our team and even one of our assistant coaches is a former LFE product.
“The football team becomes their family. As coaches, we try to be mentors and build relationships but the players become a family. Our guys just had a golf outing as a team last week and they’ve got end of year formals that they do and we have nothing to do with that, that’s just the boys being a great team and looking after each other.
“They’re going to University and they’re getting a degree. Some of them take that really seriously and push on and get business degrees and those sort of things, then some maybe want to do a little bit of an easier path, but most of them are able to get through – we’ve had great success.
“Not every player wants to leave home but for those that do, we offer facilities that are second to none, educational environments that are fantastic and then the life experience that you have by challenging yourself and going away from home…you can create a new path for yourself. That’s a special opportunity.
“I was lucky enough to live overseas when I was a teenager and I see our guys thriving in that same experience, so it’s a unique and special opportunity and I think you grow a lot if you take it on.”
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