Premier League English football club Bolton Wanderers has officially launched its new sports institute in Sharjah in collaboration with local professional clubs.

The announcement comes at the end of a week-long visit of the club officials, led by Sir Dave Richards, chairman of UK’s Football Association (FA) who urged UAE football clubs to meet the goal of the institute to train students to become world-class professional footballers backed with international qualifications.

Phil Gartside, chairman of Bolton Wanderers Football Club (BWFC) and Sir Dave Richards, chairman of UK’s Football Premier League expressed their satisfaction over of the visit to the UAE.

The visit aimed at offering a valuable opportunity for students to enroll in different programmes to train and study at the Premier League Club Bolton Wanderers FC or locally through one of the professional partners.

James Tucker, education director of Bolton Wanderers Institute of Sport said that the club has signed a MoU with Sharjah Football Club and Sharjah Institute of Technology (SIT).

Under the MoU, students can study different types of sports courses at the BWFC Institute of Sport where they will graduate with an Edexcel qualification as well as its local equivalent. Also, the delegation met with officials from Bolton University.

The players of the Institute of Sport also performed at Soccer Circus in Mirdif City Centre and signed 700 interested students from Najah 2011 exhibition.

BWFC plans to run a number of education camps in the region aimed at identifying local talent for the ProElite Education programme which is a year- long education programme, in which students train in the same way as professional players in the UK at the Premier League Club Bolton Wanderers FC.

Legendary football freestyler Paul Wood displayed his amazing freestyle skills at the Najah education fair which was held in Abu Dhabi International Conventional Centre and Mirdif City Centre. He also visited Superdry store in the Centre.-TradeArabia News Service