The Birmingham youth sports academy (BYSA) was started by two brothers Iqbal and Anwar Khattak in small heath park as a way of involving their nephews in the sport, their nephews informed their friends which increased members within two months to over thirty children.
Due to the overwhelming success of this weekend football friendly the f Birmingham Youth Sports Academy (BYSA) was founded in 2002, moved from the park to Small Heath Leisure Centre.
Since then the BYSA has been to Manchester United Old Trafford, Barcelona Spain, and Manchester City Etihad Arena.
In 2010 the BYSA entered the Shapla League with a team made up solely from children who had been trained on Saturday mornings at the BYSA, gaining promotion at the end their first season up to the Shapla Premier Division.
This season just gone the BYSA picked up its first piece of silverware in the Shapla League winning the League Cup, in an excellent game against Ward End United running out 4-3 winners with the trophy presentation held at Villa Park.
2013 saw the BYSA celebrate its 10th anniversary in which time it has trained over a 1000 different children from a variety of cultural backgrounds.
The occasion was marked with a charity dinner at our new HQ in Aston where senior BYSA members and their family and friends enjoyed an evening of festivities hosted by new chairman Zaheer Afzal. The chairman Mr Zaheer Afzal a barrister is very proud of the organisation and excited about its future.
Asian World spoke exclusively to the organisers and asked them why the BYSA has become so successful.
Do you have any case studies of participants who have attended the coaching sessions and because of their experience their life path has changed quite dramatically?
We have many stories we have had a lot of children who were running with gangs and getting into trouble our dedicated volunteers who have been on top of each member within the BYSA mentor them and discipline them and provide 24 hours advice and help to them, we also promote education we have many children who have moved on into sports careers and become teachers/coaches, also some who have gone into business and others who have gone to university and get there degrees and become solicitors, engineers etc.
Tell us about the recent tournament BYSA have won and the future for the group?
The BYSA has just won the Europa cup in the shapla league for this year and finished 3rd in the league, the academy was formed to promote the 11 aside football and the professional side to being involved in a team this is a great start for our members and to experience Sunday league football. Most importantly we aim to break the first Asian footballer and to try and make links within the professional clubs and hope to become a centre of excellence so regular scouting is done within our born and bred children to live the dream as we say.
People who have given up their spare time and have dedicated it to BYSA?
Zaheer Afzal (chairman), Iqbal Khattak (vice chairman), Hazrat Islam (secretary), Omar Quelch (Academy co-ordinator), Riaz ul haq khan ( academy Head coach), Anwar Khattak (welfare officer) and the Dr Rab Khan (educational officer). A big thank you to all our sponsors who have supported the academy and we hope this continues in the near future.
By Emb Hashmi
