{"id":655435,"date":"2026-05-08T06:44:15","date_gmt":"2026-05-08T06:44:15","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/655435\/"},"modified":"2026-05-08T06:44:15","modified_gmt":"2026-05-08T06:44:15","slug":"free-long-island-soccer-academy-removing-all-socioeconomic-barriers","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/655435\/","title":{"rendered":"Free Long Island soccer academy &#8216;removing all socioeconomic barriers&#8217;"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>Soc\u2019 it to \u2019em!\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>Launching a free youth soccer academy on Long Island was an easy pitch to Bolla Market CEO Harry Singh.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>The Garden City-based businessman is happily funding the initiative with American Soccer Club to give local talent a chance to shine without families coughing up big bucks to be noticed in pay-to-play systems.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>\u201cWe\u2019re removing all socioeconomic barriers \u2014 to get kids that we think are being missed right now that may not even be affiliated with youth clubs,\u201d Fighting Tomcats general manager Jim Kilmeade told The Post.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>\u201cWe think there\u2019s quite a few out there.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n<p><img style=\"aspect-ratio:1.77777778;display:block\" fetchpriority=\"high\" decoding=\"async\" width=\"1024\" height=\"576\" src=\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/05\/Screen-Shot-2026-05-08-at-123157-AM.jpg\" alt=\"American Soccer Club NY GM Jim Kilmeade (left)&#10;\" class=\"wp-image-39317615\"  \/>American Soccer Club NY GM Jim Kilmeade (left) Fox News<\/p>\n<p>The team\u2019s mission is to find \u201cthe next\u201d Joe Scally, a nod to the Lake Grove superstar playing in Germany for Borussia M\u00f6nchengladbach, who was just named to the Bundesliga team of the week.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>Joining the academy\u2019s staff will be huge names in the game, like Bob Montgomery, who ran the New York Red Bulls youth academy for over a decade, and also former U.S. national team captain Perry Van Der Beck.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>\u201cThe only way to identify, develop, and launch players to the highest levels of soccer in the U.S. and internationally is via a fully funded youth academy,\u201d said Kilmeade, who is eager to make LI a recruiting hot spot in the coming years.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p><img style=\"aspect-ratio:0.99483471;display:block\" loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" data-modal-image=\"39317616\" width=\"587\" height=\"590\" src=\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/05\/AP26090202316693.jpg\" alt=\"Harry Singh\" class=\"wp-image-39317616\"  \/>Harry Singh<br \/>\n hoo-Me.com\/MediaPunch\/MediaPunch\/IPx<\/p>\n<p>Singh, whose company is a jersey sponsor for the Tomcats, too, gladly invested in local youth soccer purely because \u201che loves Long Island,\u201d the GM added.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>A launch date for the academy is still in the works, and returns home to LI on May 16 to face Newport at Lavalle Stadium in Stony Brook.\u00a0<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Soc\u2019 it to \u2019em!\u00a0 Launching a free youth soccer academy on Long Island was an easy pitch to&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":655436,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[440],"tags":[49,48,36767,561,82,148829],"class_list":["post-655435","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-soccer","tag-ca","tag-canada","tag-long-island","tag-soccer","tag-sports","tag-us-soccer"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/655435","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=655435"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/655435\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/655436"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=655435"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=655435"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=655435"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}