Braintree Town Academy is set to take a significant step forward in providing a pathway for players to move into the Iron’s senior first-team squad.

From September, the academy will be offering degree-level HND courses alongside the BTECs that it has currently got in place. It is an important step as it will allow the academy to enrol older players – over the age of 19 – who have been released from professional clubs and whose footballing and physical development is much closer to the demands required at National League level.

Academy manager Mark Sansom (pictured) is excited by the prospects of the new courses as he and his staff aim to produce players who can step into the Iron’s senior squad.

The Braintree programme is one of just a handful of football academies across the country able to offer the HND course, and Sansom is looking to attract young players who have come out of professional clubs, as well as allowing existing students to progress further than has been previously possible.

“We’ve been cherry-picked as an academy to do this, and I’m extremely excited about it,” said Sansom. “From our point of view, it enables us to bring older and more developed players into the academy.

“We’ll have players coming out of pro club scholarships who can progress towards the Braintree Town first team, and they will also influence and develop our younger players.

“We have been speaking to about 20 boys coming out of pro clubs so far and have five or six of our current students looking to go on.

“So the take-up has been good so far, but we are just starting to get the word out there that this can be the perfect pathway.

“We’ll start delivering it from September this year where we’ll offer an HND in Coaching and Developing Sports.

“At the moment we offer level two and three BTECs but this will be very different as it will be a foundation degree that will allow students to continue for two years beyond BTEC level three and will then give them access to any university course across the country to finish a degree with a final year.

“Up until now we have had students playing up to under-19 level, but now boys and girls can join us at age 16 and do five years to build towards a degree.

“But we are looking to bring in the under-21 age group players who will have been through scholarship programmes similar to ours but with pro clubs and then been released at the age of 18.

“We’ve been speaking with clubs including Barnet, Colchester United, Southend United and Dagenham and this new move allows us to bring in players from clubs like these.

“We are exclusive in what we can offer and the clubs we have been talking to have been extremely impressed with what we are offering as we will have two days of education a week and three of football development.

“And by bringing in this extra age group, we will be bringing in players now who are much closer to first-team (Braintree Town) football because of where they have been and in the longer-term, we can develop players over five years to coach them from age 16 much closer to first-team level.”

The academy’s younger sides will continue playing in the National League Under-19 Alliance next season, while the new older group will play under-21 football at Ryman Development League level, with students then free to play senior football at weekends.

Sansom added: “The players will get guaranteed minutes during the week at a good standard and they’ll be able to also play at a higher level on Saturdays for senior clubs which could be Braintree Town, Braintree Town Reserves, Witham Town or somewhere else.”

Iron first-team boss Jamie Day will also be casting his eye over the cream of the academy talent at a special coaching session where established students and newcomers joining from pro clubs for the new HND programme will have a chance to impress and earn places in the Iron’s pre-season plans.

Sansom said: “Jamie is very appreciative of what we are looking to build here from an academy point of view.

“He is very much used to that from his time at Welling and he wants to pull on all the club’s resources that he can.”

Sansom said anyone wanting more information about academy courses or soccer camps and development centres being run around Braintree and Witham can find out more at www.communityiron.co.uk