THE Bhoys will be back in town this April when the Celtic Football Club returns to Mount Gambier for its second year of elite coaching clinics.
The RMF Academies, an initiative of the Reagan Milstein Foundation, will be held in Victoria and South Australia, with Centrals Soccer Club once again to host a clinic in the Blue Lake City.
This will see coaches from the Glasgow-based Scottish Premiership team bestow their knowledge onto the up-and-coming soccer stars of the region, with sessions catering for players aged six to 18.
Last year’s clinics were deemed a success and founder of the RMF Kevin Milstein could not be happier with the results in the program’s early stages.
“It was the first time I’d ever run anything like that,” he said.
“The whole idea of starting off the RMF Academies was bringing opportunities to kids who would not normally get them.
“I thought it was absolutely wonderful.
“The feedback was fantastic.”
The sessions include a sub-junior camp for 6-9 year olds, a junior camp for 10-12 year olds and two youth camps, which accommodate for both 13-15 and 16-18 age groups.
A girls only junior camp is also available for players aged 9-13.
With a selection of Celtic coaches making the trip to Australia, the aim for the clinics will be to cater for the skill levels of each group.
“They assess the quality of the kids in the first session and then make the clinics accordingly,” Milstein said.
Following the clinics, up to three players will be selected to attend a one-week Celtic experience in Glasgow, Scotland.
Coburg City Football Club’s Mikiyas Ouliaris (Miki) was last year’s recipient of the once-in-a-life-time opportunity and Milstein said it was a game-changer for the young player.
“When Miki came across he was a bit disenchanted by a couple of the clubs he played at in Melbourne,” he said.
“He was thinking about just tossing the whole game away.
“Then he got picked and went to Celtic and come back completely reinvigorated and he is actually now trying out for an NPL club.”
In addition, this year will see a second opportunity of equal value, as up to 100 players will be selected from April’s clinics to attend Celtic’s Elite Player Program in Victoria this October.
From this program, 10 players from around Australia will be invited to an all-expenses-paid trip to train in Scotland with the Celtic Football Club for a week.
“We will be inviting some of the better players from all of the clinics to come along to the Celtic Elite Player Program,” Milstein said.
“They also run the programs in other parts of Australia and Celtic will be inviting about 10 kids to go to Celtic for a week to be presented in front of 60,000 Celtic fans at a game and also to do the training sessions as well.”
With the partnership between the Reagan Milstein Foundation and the Celtic Football Club originating from Mount Gambier through RMF ambassador Scott Dickson, it was a matter of luck and initiative which saw the relationship turn into this opportunity for young Australian soccer players.
“We have an ambassador in Mount Gambier, Scott Dickson,” Milstein said.
“I happened to be in the U.K a couple of years ago and he was looking over the internet and saw that Celtic wanted to have more of a footprint in Australia.
“He contacted me and gave me the name and number of someone in Scotland to call so I did and that’s where it all began.”
Milstein said the next step will be to continue to develop the program and attract aspiring players from all over the country.
“We’d love to be able to draw kids in from different areas to come into Mount Gambier and build the program,” he said.
