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LaLiga will continue to support the Unleash The Roar! (UTR!) project with the special focus of fostering youth development in the country. After a productive first two years, LaLiga has renewed its commitment for a further three years in a presentation at its headquarters in Madrid, attended by President Javier Tebas and Mr Alan Goh, Deputy Chair of UTR! Executive Committee and CEO of Sport Singapore.
The Unleash The Roar! national football project, led by Sport Singapore and Football Association of Singapore (FAS), was launched in 2021 as a long-term roadmap to uplift the local football ecosystem, and rally the nation behind its shared aspirations for Singapore football.
LaLiga plays a supporting role in this plan by continuing to provide coaches to 12 School Football Academies and the new National Development Centers (NDCs), where they will be implementing the LaLiga methodology and philosophy, as has been done so far. These new NDCs have been a central innovation that has resulted from the agreement in order to create quality daily training environment for players from an early age. As an example of the success of the collaboration between both entities, Ángel Toledano, LaLiga Project Coordinator in Singapore, has also been appointed Head Coach of the
U-16 Singapore Men’s National Team. In addition to this, one of the aims of the extension of this Memorandum of Understanding is to identify new areas of collaboration to contribute to the objectives of the UTR! Project.
“We are very happy with this project. Some of the actions carried out during this time have had a great impact on the boys and girls involved, such as the multi-week training camp in Spain for selected talent. It is an honour to work together with a partner like Sport Singapore, and actions like this proves that the exchange of resources and knowledge for both parties is beneficial for the development of football” stated Iván Codina, LaLiga’s director for Southeast Asia, South Korea, Japan and Australia.
Commenting on how the partnership with LaLiga contributed to catalysing UTR!’s efforts, Mr Marcus Tan, Chief of Sport Development Group at Sport Singapore said, “Over the past two years, UTR! has embarked on various initiatives to strengthen Singapore’s footballing ecosystem, particularly in identifying talents and helping them realise their fullest potential. Our collaboration with LaLiga was instrumental in catalysing some of these efforts. For example, our local coaches benefitted from the overseas learning opportunities, while some of our top young talents were exposed to a higher level of training and competition. These ranged from short stints such as the month-long training trip to LaLiga ACADEMY that 20 boys from across several pathways went on last year, to longer-term programmes such as the enrollment of three of our recently awarded UTR! Overseas Scholarship recipients in ESC LaLiga & NBA. We hope to collaborate in new areas that will contribute to the UTR! project goals and further the development of football in Singapore.”
One of the initiatives already confirmed within the UTR! project for this coming season will be a training camp for a selection of U14 players from Singapore, starting on 5 November. For two weeks at the ESC LaLiga & NBA Centre in Madrid, the Singaporean players will be trained under LaLiga’s Methodology by LaLiga’s elite coaches in the unique state-of-the-art centre that specializes in sports training. Equipped with first-class facilities, it has all the services for the optimal sporting, academic and personal development of young athletes, as well as specialized coaches. The Singaporean team will play against several LaLiga EA SPORTS clubs’ academies and include workshop sessions for coaches, following the successful format that took place in November 2022. In addition to this, LaLiga will be supporting the development of top young Singaporean talents who will be training under LaLiga Academy’s long-term academic-sports programmes in Spain.
“We are convinced that this agreement has been relevant for the development of football in Singapore over the past two years and will continue to be so in the coming times. We remain very committed to this very special programme, bringing the experience gained in the more than 650 projects that have been implemented in LaLiga Academy since 2015,” said Juan Florit, LaLiga’s Head of Football Projects.
