NEWTOWN AFC 2023-2024 – ACADEMY SEASON REVIEW

Our boys academy and girls community programmes both closed for the season over the past couple of weeks so whilst we look forward to a brief break, we wanted to look back at some of the highlights from the past 12months.

Category A Status

The 2023-2024 season was our first full season operating as an FAW category A academy, one of only four academies in Wales to achieve to the status.  Going into the season our focus was to ensure that we were able to fully operate at the level and deliver everything that was in our technical programme, both on and off the pitch.  We feel that we achieved our aim and now look forward to building the programme further next season.

Recruitment 

As always, the Summer period was a busy one with over 60 new players trialling for spots in the academy and this continued through the season with a further 43 players working hard to be offered a registration.  Recruitment has been a big focus for us over the past 18months and I feel we have really driven the quality throughout the academy in that time.  The players must feel a sense of achievement and motivation being part of the academy each and every season and I feel that the work done in this area last season is going to put the academy in its strongest ever position ahead of the 2024/2025 season.

Powys County Football Programme

At the start of last season we partnered with Sport Powys in order to provide a robust county football programme for both boys and girls in Powys.  The programme enables the best players in the county to represent Powys on a national stage and also provides the players with an opportunity to represent the welsh schools national team at U14 and U16 respectively.  The programme was a success, so much so that we will be doubling the amount of teams that we’ll be working with next season to eight.  We’d like to thank Sport Powys for giving us the opportunity to manage the programme and we look forward to strengthening the partnership next season.

Scholarship Programme

Last season saw the start of our U16-U18 scholarship programme in partnership with Newtown College.  The programmes enables talented players with he opportunity to train/play full time Monday to Friday at Latham Park, whilst also continuing their education at the college.  A lot of work and planning went into ensuring the programme was able to start successfully and we’d like to thank Newtown College for their support over the past twelve months.  We feel the gap between the Cymru Premier and the U19 development league is bigger than it’s ever been so having the opportunity to work with our young players on a full time basis is extremely important, and we see the programme as a crucial part of our development pathway moving forwards. Next season will see over 30 players on the programme and we look forward to welcoming them all to Latham Park in September.

Games Programme

It is always our aim to try and provide our players with opportunities to test themselves against different types of opposition, from grassroots to elite teams.  Last season we were able to provide games against the likes of Liverpool, Arsenal, Wolves, Walsall, Shrewsbury, Bolton, Birmingham and Swansea, alongside the FAW games programme.  These experiences not only provide players with a fantastic playing experience but also, more importantly, an opportunity to challenge themselves against the best players throughout the UK.  We look forwards to strengthening the relationships that we’ve built with these clubs over the past two seasons and providing more experiences like this next season.

Under 19’s & First Team Pathway

Our ultimate aim and focus is to ensure that we have a continuous source of academy players progressing through the academy, into the development team and then of course into the first team squad.  Our U19’s development team enjoyed a strong season last, finishing 2nd in the league with Hannoch Boyake and Devon Torry finishing as the two highest goal scorers – Devon finished the season with fourteen goals in his last three games to pip his team mate to the award!  As I said however, the overall aim of the academy is to produce players who have an opportunity to establish themselves within the first team setup, this season four of last years U19’s squad have been offered pro deals – Calvin Smith, Ollie Sharp, Hannoch Boyake and Devon Torry.  We’d like to wish the players the best of luck for next season and gently remind them that the hard work really starts now.

A nice addition last season was the inclusion of U16 Arnie Roberts in the match day squad for the Cymru Premier game vs Caernarfon.  Arnie made his debut in the game and became the youngest player in Cymru Premier history to appear in the league.  Arnie is one of several academy players to be involved with the first team during pre season this year, and we’re hopeful that there will be more positive story’s to come over the course of next season.

End of Season Awards

On Saturday 8th June, we held our end of season awards day which was a thoroughly enjoyable event which included an academy tournament and of course the presentation to individual players who have excelled over the past 12 months.  The award winners were;

Under 8’s

Osian Mitchell – Coaches Player

Archie Evans – Players Player

Under 9’s

Toby May – Players Player

Henry Jones – Coaches Player

Under 10’s

Charlie Marriott – Players Player

Evans Hopkiss – Coaches Player

Under 11’s

Jack Davies – Players Player

Thomas Pengelly-Leach – Coaches Player

Under 12’s

Logan Grant – Players Player

Bryce Bradley – Coaches Player

Under 13’s 

Gethin Griffiths – Players Player

Roman Crippin – Coaches Player

Under 14’s

Gruff Sedgwick – Coaches Player

Finn Williams & Evan Lewis – Players Player (Tied)

Under 15’s

Stevie Walsh – Players Player

Harry Edwards – Coaches Player

Under 16’s

Harri Howells – Players Player

Morgan Hodgkiss – Coaches Player

As always, we’d like to thank all of our fantastic academy staff, parents and players for their hard work and commitment over the past 12months, enjoy your short break and we look forward to seeing you in a couple of weeks.

Our new academy season starts from Tuesday 23rd July, if any would like to express an interest in joining the academy please email [email protected]

Academy Staff