Young Red's Midfielder Makes It Pro ....

The Red's have released youngster Jamie Sheldon, to allow him to further

his career abroad and sign a professional contract with NK Interblock, who

are based in the Slovenian city of Ljubljana and play their football in the

Slovenian 'PrvaLiga' (First Division) more commonly known as '1.SNL'.

The side have a young squad including many Slovenian U20/U21

internationals plus an U20 international from Cameroon and they reached

the 3rd Qualifying Round of this years Europa League where they were

knocked out 0 vs 5 on aggregate by Ukrainian side FC Metalurh Donetsk

(the same stage that Aberdeen, IFK Gothenborg, Hadjuk Split and

Legia Warsaw reached). Another English born player at the club is Ben Gill

(previous clubs include, Arsenal, Watford and Cheltenham Town) who is

now 22 years old and he and Jamie are the first and only English players,

to date, ever to play Slovenian League football. The football in the Slovenian

'PrvaLiga', is technically higher than League 1 in the UK, but not as physical

and they tend to try to play the ball on the floor through midfield and Jamie's role within the team will be to play "in the hole" as a classic number 10. It's a real opportunity for Jamie and will hopefully launch his career. The photo shows Jamie training in Slovenia last week before the squad head off to Italy this week for warm weather training as part of their mid season break before they resume the second half of their season in three weeks time. The experience of playing full time abroad will be invaluable for Jamie and it will mature him both as a player and as a person and everyone connected with Redditch Utd Football Club would like to wish Jamie every success for his future and who knows maybe one day we will see Jamie back in the UK playing football at a higher level.

Redditch Utd's manager, Gary Whild, said of Jamie, 'He's done great for us and really developed as a player since the start of the season in what is a very tough league for a young lad to learn his trade, he has a great attitude to the game and has contributed regularly to the team and his goals have been an added bonus. Yet again we have proved as a club that we can bring in good players and help develop them into better players, capable of playing at a much higher level and the record speaks for itself with the likes of Scott Dann (now at Birmingham City), Mark Creighton (now at Oxford Utd), Exodus Geohaghan (now at Peterborough Utd), Aman Verma (now at Leicester City) and James Dance (now at Kettering Town) all listing Redditch Utd Football Club on their C.V. Financially as a club, at present, we are not in a position to secure the services of such players on a contract but at least we are getting recognition within the game as a club that helps develop players'