A group from Birkirkara F.C. Youth Nursery have just experienced a one week football training camp in northern Italy.

This event is organised annually by Atalanta Bergamasca Calcio, the Italian Serie A football club renowned mostly for promoting youth soccer players, for a six week period during the summer months. This year, amongst the hundreds of youngsters who attended this sporting event held at Castello di Fiemme, Cavalese (Trento), were eleven boys and two coaches from the Birkirkara football school who experienced this venture with great success.

The boys had the opportunity to train under the guidance of professional Italian coaches and be assessed individually during competitive games. Every participant was given training kits to use during the sessions and other sportswear for keeps together with a technical report, photos and other official Atalanta material.

Apart from learning football skills, the boys enjoyed themselves in other social activities organised namely outings and picnics in the mountains, table tennis, table soccer, giochi senza frontiere and swimming whilst also having the opportunity to spend a full day at Gardaland Theme Park.

It was also a unique experience for the Maltese coaches, Franco Agius and Jeffrey Mifsud, who accompanied the whole group during the week and had the opportunity to train and help out on the field with foreign coaches Bonaccorso, Butti, Pandolfino and Biffi – all professional coaches at Atalanta football school.

The boys participating at this memorable event were: Luke Mifsud, Zack Cassar, Gianluca Cardona, Luca Brincat, Sirage Abushkewa, Jeremy Cassar, Ryan Micallef, Ayrton Mifsud, Ryan Scicluna, David Spiteri u Michael Camilleri. Together with coaches and some parents who formed part of the group, such an knowledge will surely remain at heart.