Vassell comes home to inspire next generation

Former England striker Darius Vassell has been helping to inspire the first crop of students at the EVO-STIK Northern Premier League's ground-breaking academy.

The 34-year-old former Aston Villa, Leicester City and Manchester City forward kicked off his career at Romulus and he was back at the First Division South club this week after accepting an invite to meet the staff and students at the NPL Football Academy.

Under former England manager Sven Goran Eriksson, Vassell scored six goals in 22 internationals and appeared at the 2002 World Cup in Korea and Japan and Euro 2004 in Portugal.

According to the NPLFA's tutors and coaches, their students were delighted that Vassel, pictured with student Korei Newman, had popped back to his old hunting ground where he scored a record 46 goals in the Birmingham Boys League before signing for Villa's youth set-up and going on to make his first team debut in 1998.

An NPLFA spokesman said: "Darius spent an hour discussing his time in the game from the beginnings at Romulus to the highs of playing for England and was on hand to give the students advice and answer any questions that they had. We would like to thank him for taking the time to come down and speak to our students."

When the NPLFA was sanctioned by the Football Association last summer, the EVO-STIK Northern Premier League became the first league in English football to launch a youth league and academy combining football with further education.

Along with Leek Town, Mickleover Sports, Newcastle Town and Radcliffe Borough, the Roms are one of the NPLFA's five pilot clubs who opened their doors in September to the first intake of students aged 16-18 studying for BTEC Level 3 Sport diplomas on two year courses while playing in the new NPLFA Youth League.

Three more clubs - Witton Albion, Lancaster City and Belper Town - have already signed up for next season since the start of the current campaign with the NPLFA set to continue expanding and welcoming more clubs on board.

Follow the new academy's progress at nplfa.co.uk, twitter.com/NPLFA and at facebook.com/NPLFA.

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