![\"FC](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/07\/1e2b6987c3fb6034af0206ba4ebd1384.jpeg\"\/)
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FC Porto brought their World Camp to Feildians Athletic Association in St. John’s for a week-long training camp. (Darryl Murphy\/CBC)<\/p>\n
This isn’t your average summer soccer camp.<\/p>\n
Young soccer players from the Feildians Athletic Association Athletic Association had the chance of a lifetime this week in St. John’s, training with elite Portuguese professional soccer club FC Porto as part of its Dragon Force World Camp series.<\/p>\n
Anticipation for the camp built quickly. Open to Feildians club players, registrations filled up in just 25 minutes, said Feildians coach Sipho Sibiya.<\/p>\n
“We want to be able to put Newfoundland on the map, especially Feildians Athletic Association, where I’m a part of now,” he told CBC News.<\/p>\n
WATCH | Two young players are getting the chance to train in Portugal: <\/p>\n
Running from 9 a.m. to 3 p.m. for five days, the players spent the week doing training drills, developing skills and playing games.<\/p>\n
Two players, William Coughlan and Georgia Cavanagh, have been selected to attend an all-expenses-paid trip to\u00a0Portugal and train with FC Porto’s Youth Academy.<\/p>\n
Building on history<\/p>\n
FC Porto’s visit to St. John’s builds on a long history between Portugal and Newfoundland.<\/p>\n
![\"William](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/07\/ce4efb45f8b70c4829e18d222495b78b.jpeg\"\/)
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William Coughlan and Georgia Cavanagh have been selected to travel to Portugal for the FC Porto Youth Academy. (Submitted by Sipho Sibiya)<\/p>\n
Portuguese fishermen who fished on the Grand Banks off Newfoundland were known to play soccer, or futebal, by the St. John’s harbour.<\/p>\n
“Now that I’ve known the history that Portugal’s had with Newfoundland, it’s even a greater collaboration to tie that piece together as well,” said Sibiya.<\/p>\n
World Camp coach Guilherme Silva said he’s enjoying what the St. John’s community has to offer and is interested in the history between the two places.<\/p>\n
“I’ve been enjoying it a lot. The culture here \u2014 people are really humble,” said Silva. “I’ve been enjoying a lot, working with these people and getting to know the culture itself.”<\/p>\n
‘An entire new perspective on soccer’<\/p>\n
For the young players, it’s been a week of development and a chance to experience a different type of training.<\/p>\n
![\"World](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/07\/b226572c19c7761a785553940a413ce1.jpeg\"\/)
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World Camp coach Guilherme Silva says he’s been enjoying his time in St. John’s. (Darryl Murphy\/CBC)<\/p>\n
“They gave us a new opportunity, and like, an entire new perspective of soccer, you know?” said 11-year-old Alin Ahmad.<\/p>\n
The opportunity to train abroad is an exciting one for the players, especially those with aspirations to play professionally.<\/p>\n
“If you could ask one of them, they would tell you they want to play pro,” said Sibiya.<\/p>\n
Sibiya hopes the\u00a0players chosen for FC Porto’s Youth Academy\u00a0will learn a lot, both on and off the pitch.<\/p>\n
“I just hope they get the sense of what training is about. You know, the training being day-to-day, eating with the players, getting the coaching that they would get in a pro level.”<\/p>\n
“And just to see what the culture is like,” said Sibiya. “Portuguese culture or just football and the culture \u2014 it’s a way of life over there.”<\/p>\n
Declan Stokes, 10, is already looking forward to the camp returning in the future.<\/p>\n
“I hope Porto will come back next year to do it again.”<\/p>\n
Download our\u00a0free CBC News app<\/a>\u00a0to sign up for push alerts for CBC Newfoundland and Labrador. Sign up for our\u00a0daily headlines newsletter here<\/a>. Click\u00a0here to visit our landing page<\/a>.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"FC Porto brought their World Camp to Feildians Athletic Association in St. John’s for a week-long training camp.…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":8312,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[440],"tags":[49,48,8734,8733,8736,8739,4550,8735,561,8740,82,8738,1722,8741,8737],"class_list":["post-8311","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-soccer","tag-ca","tag-canada","tag-fc-porto","tag-feildians-athletic-association","tag-feildians-athletic-association-athletic-association","tag-guilherme-silva","tag-silva","tag-sipho-sibiya","tag-soccer","tag-soccer-players","tag-sports","tag-summer-soccer-camp","tag-training-camp","tag-william-coughlan","tag-world-camp"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8311","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=8311"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8311\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/8312"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=8311"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=8311"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=8311"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}