Footballing teens get a second shot at their goal; YOUNG TALENTS PUT THEMSELVES BACK IN SHOP WINDOW AFTER DREAMS GO SOUR.

Byline: Steve Bradley

YOU were the golden boy of schools football.

You had the poise, the skills, the confidence, and a lucrative professional career was a cert. Everyone told you so.

Top-flight trials aged 11, and nothing but glowing references.

The Theatre of Dreams, the Promised Land of the Premier League - the language of the game is dominated by phrases that point to a career of success.

Your success.

Even as a non-league player you can find your efforts being glamourised, or patronised even, as a surprise FA Cup run turns you into a "plucky underdog" or the like. All win, win, win.

But what of the former teen sensations, still not yet 20, who suddenly find, on the whim of a coach perhaps, that they've been cast aside? Probably you, according to the statistics.

The stuff of nightmares, indeed. In one fell swoop, the whole shebang looks like nothing more than a weird fantasy. So it was that 66 footballers assembled on Wednesday night for assessment trials at the Banks's Stadium, home of League One Walsall FC, to put themselves in the shop window.

All had been released following their two-year apprenticeships with league clubs and hoped to pick up the pieces, watched by dozens of scouts.

It was an unforgiving climate, as they formed into hastilyconvened XIs, never having met before, for a series of 50-minute games in the sheeting rain - all under the auspices of League Football Education (LFE), the partnership between the Football League and Profesional Footballers' Association (PFA), which oversaw their apprenticeships. Former Cardiff and Norwich midfielder Roger Gibbins, now south-west regional officer for the LFE, said: "A lot of these boys will go non-league now, but others may get a week's trial, or a pre-season opportunity with a league club, which is better than nothing."

As part of the two-year apprenticeship, running since 2004, more than 600 youngsters each year are placed with a League club, paid for by the LFE, and study for a BTEC National Diploma in Sport, a Level 2 Coaching badge with the PFA, and an NVQ in Sporting Excellence.

Hopefuls on display included central midfielder Jack Dobson, 18, newly released from Walsall.

He said: "My second year was going really well before Christmas - I was in the reserves regularly, but I got ill with glandular fever and I was out for three months. When I got back to full fitness, decisions were made, and obviously I wasn't successful. I was very unlucky. I was a bit upset - well, very upset. I thought I had done enough to come back at least for pre-season - but it's all about opinions."

Walsall-born striker Cameron Broadway, also 18, had just been shown the door by Shrewsbury Town, leaving him unable to share in the joy of their promotion to League One.

He said, ruefully: "They said 'we didn't think you had enough to push on to the next level'. So this is another chance for me."

Forward Courtney Richards, 18, was given his bad news by Coventry City's under 18 s coach Lee Carsley and assistant academy manager Richard Stevens, having scored 15 goals in 33 youth team appearances.

He said: "I'm not really sure why I was released. I was having my best season in football and I thought I had a good chance of getting a contract. It was hard to take at first but in football, things like that happen."

Rejected players have bounced back via the LFE trials in previous years.

Liam Kelly, released by MK Dons, is now doing well at Kilmarnock, Bagasan Graham is flourishing at Cheltenham Town after QPR let him go, Jack Werndly arrived at Glasgow Rangers after Norwich released him, and Crewe Alexandra cast-off Gareth Evans was picked up by Macclesfield Town, before moving to Rotherham United.

Four trials held last year by the LFE led to 475 enquiries about players. Around 25 per cent of the lads go straight to non-league clubs.

Lyndon Simmons, scout for Premiership new boys Southampton said: "You just don't know what you might find.

"You could turn up and say 'he isn't bad'. When I was Everton we got two in from these trials. We didn't sign either of them but we got them in for pre-season to have a look at them."

Bristol City's head of youth recruitment Trevor Challis said: "We're looking for boys to go into our development squad.

"Just because someone from, say, Coventry doesn't like a boy doesn't mean we won't."

Over from the States, with the potential lure of scholarships for the more academically-minded young cast-offs, was Matt Nelson, head coach of the team at Appalachian State University in North Carolina. While playing for the university, footballers study for degrees in subjects like sports management or health promotion, while potentially putting themselves in pole position for the 18 Major League Soccer clubs, or second-tier slots with United Soccer League or North American Soccer League sides.

Also checking out the games was Walsall boss Dean Smith, who had himself released a couple of the lads.

He said: "I've got scouts here watching. If anybody catches the eye, there might be a chance to bring them in for pre-season and have a look at them.

"This is a great way for them to be noticed - there was nothing like this when I was a young player."

Burton Albion's head of youth Mike Whitlow had more reason than most to be optimistic about the trials.

Released by Bolton Wanderers as a youngster, he moved to non-league Witton Albion, but was snapped up from there by Howard Wilkinson's Leeds United.

In a distinguished career, the left-back played 397 League games for various clubs, including a second stint at Bolton.

He said: "It's a good showcase.

Without this a lot of young lads wouldn't get another chance. Being released was a shock to my system - to be told I wasn't good enough. Fortunately enough I went into the nonleague scene and I grew up rather quickly, then came back strongly."

CAPTION(S):

New hope: Former Walsall apprentice Jack Dobson. Proving a point: John Barton gives a pre-match team talk at the Football League Assessment trials at Walsall FC.

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Title Annotation:	Sport
Publication:	Birmingham Mail (England)
Geographic Code:	4EUUK
Date:	May 12, 2012
Words:	1031
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