YOUNG budding footballers with the need for some assistance were handed bursaries at the Jalan Besar Stadium on Friday Night.

Mr Zainudin Nordin, President of the Football Association of Singapore and Mayor for Central Singapore District did the honours, giving out bursaries to 57 recipients from its Centres of Excellence (COEs) and National Football Academy (NFA) before the match between Woodlands Wellington and Super Reds.

The award will go towards their school and tuition fees, the cost of books and other academic material.

One of the recepients was Nurhidayat Rahim,14, who said: 'I want to make football my career and with this award I can help relieve the burden of household expenditures on my mother.

'Now all I want think about is to train hard to represent Singapore in the final stages of the Asian Youth Games (AYG),' added Nurhidayat, who will be representing Singapore in next month's AYG.

CARE United is S-League's unique charity and community programme and through its Children's Financial Assistance (CFA) scheme, it provides monetary assistance to financially disadvantaged kids from its COEs, NFA, welfare homes and charities.

With the comprehensive football developmental programme developed for Singapore youths and with much coming from FAS' Technical Director Slobodan Pavkovic's new football syllabus, FAS has been paying special attention to taking care of the youth's education while concurrently encouraging the kids' footballing development.

SAFFC COE Under-18 right back Luqman Yusope summed up the feelings of many of the other recepients on getting a bursary: Studying in the poly is tiring work because of the long hours, but football is my passion," said SAFFC COE Under-18 right back Luqman Yusope.

"I put in the effort to study hard and train well so that I can pursue my dream of having a football career and still have something to fall back on when my career ends,' added the Singapore Polytechnic student who is studying aerospace electronics.

'I didn't expect this, but when my coach told me I was getting this award, I knew it was a chance for me to keep chasing my football dreams. It's great that the organisation can support me with my studies and my football equipment like boots too, especially with my family's current income,' added Luqman.

Among the others who were given the award was Young Lions striker Khairul Nizam and NFA Under-17 player Stanley Ng, who made the news recently after winning the Nike Ignite Challenge.

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