A group from Birkirkara FC Youth Nursery have just experienced a one week football training camp in northern Italy between 7 and 16 July.

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 Val di Fiemme, Cavalese (Trento), were 16 boys, three girls and two coaches from the Birkirkara football school who experienced this venture with great success.

The children 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 kids enjoyed themselves in other social activities organised, namely outings and picnics in the mountains, table tennis, table soccer, giochi senza frontiere and swimming.

During the week, the kids also had the chance to watch the first team of Italian football club Sampdoria during a session of their pre-season training at Moena – what an exclusive treat!

Prior to attending the training camp, the group spent an afternoon in Milan where, apart from visiting cultural places namely Il Duomo, La Galleria and La Scala, also had the time to stop at the San Siro Museo and Tour and even spend some significant moments at the Inter and Milan luxurious dressing rooms to take photos.

Before leaving Italy, the group also had the opportunity to spend a full day at Gardaland Theme Park and party till sunset.

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, Fumagalli, Butti, Pandolfi and Biffi – all professional coaches at Atalanta football school.

Eurosport Ltd of Birkirkara provided leisure kits for all the participants who together with their coaches and parents, spent an unforgettable nine-day adventure which will surely remain at heart.