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Youth football expert gushes over 'amazing' Rangers ace Joe Aribo
We’re delighted to welcome the founder of Kinetic Academy Harry Hudson as our exclusive columnist. Each week the youth football expert will be giving his views on the biggest talking points on wonderkids across the UK…
Joe Aribo has become an integral part of the Rangers squad in recent seasons and plenty of that can be attributed to his education with the Kinetic Academy.
The 25-year-old scored in the Europa League final in May as the Light Blues were beaten on penalties by Eintracht Frankfurt but at the start of his footballing journey, he was without a club.
The Nigerian international joined the Kinetic Academy, founded by Harry Hudson in 2011, and didn’t immediately light up the pitch despite now being a star of the Scottish Premiership.
Hudson is understandably proud of Aribo’s progress through the professional game and rightly uses the Rangers ace as an example for the current crop of youngsters in the academy.
“I’m so proud of him because he’s such a humble young man,” Hudson told The Football Wonderkids. “He came to us as an Under-15 and, to be honest, wasn’t top of our group.
“He hadn’t been at a club before but he was a good grassroots player and even Joe will admit that in the Under-16s and even Under-17s he would have only been in the top 30 or so of our Kinetic team but not top one or two.
“He just kept on grafting and showed an amazing ability to keep on improving and with that, his confidence grew and he started to express himself.
“It’s a phenomenal story and he is one of the players who we hold up to our existing players, not just because he’s playing at a high level but because he was signed as an Under-20 and some players can get desperate when they’re 16 or 17.”
In other Rangers news, the Bears beat Liverpool to the signing of this young star in the making.