More than 80 young football players, aged between 17 and 23, flocked to the Bahrain Football Association’s (BFA) ground in Isa Town on Thursday and Friday to take part in the Sportnaa Inter Milan Trials Event in the presence of a scout from the Italian club who had flown in specially for the occasion.
One lucky young man, who will be selected from the final short-list of 20 players drawn up at the end of the trials, will find himself flying to Italy to take part in an actual Inter Milan trial soon.
The trials were arranged by Sportnaa Football Agency, whose teenaged founder and chairman Khalid Abdulrahman had engaged in extensive discussions with officials from different European clubs before striking a deal with Inter Milan, who delegated Luigi Sala, one of their talent scouts and a former professional Italian football player, to conduct the trials.
“We started talking to officials from many clubs slightly more than a month ago about starting an initiative like this in Bahrain before coming to an agreement with Inter Milan,” Abdulrahman, 19, told the GDN.
“Now that we have actually held the trials, we believe it was a very good, unforgettable experience for everyone: for the players, for me, for the Kingdom of Bahrain.
“Our initiative benefited immensely from the Golden Generation project, which focuses on young Bahraini athletes, started by Supreme Council for Youth and Sports (SCYS) first deputy chairman, General Sports Authority (GSA) chairman and Bahrain Olympic Committee (BOC) president Shaikh Khalid bin Hamad Al Khalifa, because it opened the door for this event.
“Now, after these two days of trials during which we gradually whittled the number down to our final 20-player shortlist, we will announce, in a week, the name of the lucky player who will head to Milan to take part in proper trials with the famous club.”
Sala, 49, who made nearly 450 appearances for eight different Italian clubs – AC Milan and Atalanta among them – over a nearly two-decade career that started in 1992, told the GDN in an exclusive interview that he was very happy to be in Bahrain.
“Shaikh Khalid’s Golden Generation project is an amazing, very interesting initiative to develop the sport for young kids in Bahrain,” he said.
“So I’m very happy to be here and to try to be of help for this project.”
Abdulrahman said he was extremely grateful to Sala for coming to Bahrain.
“We’re extremely grateful to him for sharing his experience as a football player, as a scout and as a technical director with us,” he added.
“Everyone benefited from his experience. We learned a lot from him about the areas we need to improve.
“And, as for the lucky player who will be heading to Milan for this once-in-a-lifetime opportunity: even if he isn’t selected by Inter Milan, at least he’ll have this permanently on his resume!”
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