Could you be the next George Friend?
The Exeter City Academy is constantly looking for talented new players that we can hopefully help develop into top quality footballers.George Friend was the first player to develop through the system from an Advanced Development Centre to the First Team. George went on to join Wolverhampton Wanderers FC, making his Premier League debut against Manchester United at Old Trafford, and is now captain of Middlesbrough FC in the Premier League; could you be the next George Friend?
The Advanced Development Centre programme is designed to cater for talented young football players from the age of 6 to 15. The player progression pathway allows players to develop at their own speed and progress to higher levels if and when they are ready.
Exeter City work hard to ensure that each and every player from the Academy through to the Advanced Development Centres enjoys their time with us, whilst hopefully developing into top quality football players and well-rounded young men.
The Ethos at Exeter City is to look after the best interests of every young player in our care and to strive to have as many of our young players as possible become professional football players.
The Exeter City FC Academy has as a three-tier progression pathway. Tier three is the Advanced Development Centres. There are nine across the South West and Players are encouraged to continue playing local club football whilst receiving advanced training through our programme.
Tier two is the Exeter based Performance Centre. Players who consistently display hard work and good ability will earn the opportunity to move along the pathway to our Performance Centre when the coaches feel they are ready. Players are again encouraged to play club football whilst attending this programme.
Finally, tier one is the Academy. In the Academy players are registered to Exeter City and they train and play their games against other professional clubs in the South West region.
The Exeter City FC Advanced Development Centres train once a week, generally running parallel to school term dates.
The locations of the nine Centres are:
- Barnstaple
- Bideford
- Bridgwater
- Axminster
- Exmouth
- Ottery St Mary
- Plymouth
- South Devon (Paignton)
- Yeovil