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By Neto Baptiste
Young and aspiring goalkeepers across Antigua now have access to an academy solely dedicated to helping them hone their skills while preparing for the next phase of their goalkeeping career.
This, after former national goalkeeper Janeil “Board” Simon, announced the formation of the Janeil Simon Goalkeeper Academy, specifically geared towards preparing the next generation of goalkeepers here in Antigua.
Speaking recently on the Good Morning Jojo Sports Show, Simon revealed that the academy, though yet to be fully launched, is open to all despite age or gender.
“At the present moment, the full academy hasn’t launched as yet. What I’m doing now – I’m doing personal training, preparing you for school league, preparing you for the ABFA season, and just preparing you as a goalkeeper, knowing that you have a place that you can come and enhance your skills. A lot of times, people don’t realize goalkeepers have a number of different things that they need to work on, so I guess the whole aspect of what type of goalkeeper you want to be, you want to be a shot stopper, you want to be a full complete goalkeeper,” he said.
“Right now, you have to be aware of what’s going on in the modern world because head coaches now don’t have time to coach goalkeepers. They tell the goalkeeper coach what type of goalkeeper they’re looking for and it’s my and other goalkeepers’ responsibility to get them up to speed,” he added.
The former SAP goalkeeper who has won several goalkeeping awards on the local and collegiate fronts, said the academy will focus on all aspects of the specialized area, including coaching.
“Let me say now, also that this academy does not just cater for goalkeepers. We also cater for goalkeeper coaches because we struggle with that also, so this is an opportunity for coaches that want to excel in this field. This opportunity is for you to come along and learn it. At the moment I’m operating at the ABFA Technical Center on Mondays, Tuesdays and Wednesdays from 5:30 to 6:30 and most of my coaching is tailored to your specific needs. But again, we working towards the upcoming season so it gives you enough time to come and do your training and after, you can join your club,” he said.
Simon was cut down in his prime by a series of freak accidents spanning a badly broken left-arm during an ABFA Premier Division match in 2005, to losing vision in his right eye following a weed-eater incident just three years later.
The national goalkeeper/coach said that during his time as a player, the competition amongst goalkeepers was strong, adding that his aim is to rebuild that stock.
“I think that we have a good core of young goalkeepers across the nation, especially now in the national team but on the local base, I think that teams and schools are struggling with maintaining good goalkeepers. I can remember in my time, we have a bunch of young goalkeepers that I personally compete with, like Neto, Trevor Techiera, to name a few. Now, I think that we struggle with that early coaching between the age, I guess, when they start to play up to 15, 16,” he said.
Persons interested in enrolling in the Janeil Simon Goalkeeper Academy can send an email to [email protected] or call 773-4378.
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