Leyton Sixth Form College in east London played host to 45 youngsters from across the capital last week, when groups from Arsenal, Tottenham, Chelsea and Fulham came together to take part in the Premier League 4 Sport (PL4S) Regional Club and Coach Academy event.
The event aimed to increase both the quality and quantity of young coaches and officials by using the profile of PL4S to highlight best practice from existing coaches while attracting potential new contributors to the programme.
"Since it started in 2009, the innovative Premier League 4 Sport (PL4S) project has helped tens of thousands of young people get involved in sport in their local community"
The event contained the newly designed Youth Sport’s Trust Junior Club Manager training course for young participants as well as a masterclass for coaches from the majority of PL4S sports across London. In addition, each participant was given the opportunity to try their hand at something new during a multi-sport challenge, while meeting new people from the other clubs.
Club mascot Gunnersaurus also joined the day to help give out medals and certificates, while Arsenal in the Community Manager, Freddie Hudson, who took part in the London 2012 Olympic Torch Relay last year, brought along the Olympic Torch for people to be photographed with.
Since it started in 2009, the innovative Premier League 4 Sport (PL4S) project has helped tens of thousands of young people get involved in sport in their local community. The programme is now looking to build on the legacy of a hugely successful 2012 Olympic Games in London and last year introduced four new sports - basketball, handball, hockey and netball.
One of the young netball participants from the event commented: “It was a really fun day and I’d like to try more different sports as well from now on and maybe have another event like this in the future to meet other Arsenal participants that do PL4S activities.”
Elaine Smith of England Netball and the Arsenal Netball PL4S programme added: “This was a great day. The young people learnt a lot but especially for the netball coaches we had, seeing coaching sessions from other sports has given them lots of new ideas. We would definitely want to do this type of activity again."
The event proved to be a great success and the young people will now go back to their PL4S satellite clubs and work with coaches to help improve their own sessions and encourage more young people to take up a PL4S sport.
For more information on Premier League 4 Sport, contact Ross McKinley on rmckinley@arsenal.co.uk
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