User:Youngfootballersaus/sandbox

Harrison Woodall

Harrison Woodall is a 16 year old footballer who currently plays for the u18s and u20s sides at Gold Coast Knights FC in the NPL Queensland. He was born on the 20th of August 2002, in Milton Keynes England. After stints in the youth academy of Arsenal, Milton Keynes and Northampton Town at a young age, his family moved to Australia where he began to tone his craft growing up. He wasn't always in the NPL system, and spent several years under the wing of Academy of Football Australia (AFA) where he won several Gold Coast Premier Leagues and went back to England with the side that competed in the Nottingham Cup where his side finished top of their group and after holding a 1-0 lead lost the final to FC Tokyo. The team shocked several respected English sides including Nottingham Forest and Walsall youth sides.

In 2018, he singed his first NPL contract for Gold Coast United u16s where he began the season as a full back. He impressed in the first half of the season but 8 rounds into the calendar he unfortunately suffered an arm break and missed out on the majority of the rest of that season. When returning to the side, he found himself under NPL winning coach Sean Lane, who assessed his ability and determined that he was best suited to a role as a winger. This change altered his footballing career, as he bagged 8 goals in the final 4 games of the season. Sean Lane left United at the end of the season to take up a role at Knights as an under 20s coach, where he asked Harrison and many other boys from the u16 united side to trial and potentially play for. Harrison excelled in the talent ID camp and was contracted in the u20s side for 2019 despite being only 16.

In pre season for the u20s Harrison was loving life with the Knights, scoring 3 goals against the champions cup all star side and another 3 against eventual Gold Coast Premier League champions, Burleigh Soccer Club. After 10 games in the u20 season, Harrison struggled against the older opposition and despite having a great pre-season only managed one goal and two assists. He was dropped down back into the u18s side where he again excelled in his own age group and scored 15 goals in his first 10 games, and eventually 20 in 18. His performances saw a return into the 20s side where he scored in his first game back, and then assisted the winner to keep his sides top 4 hopes alive.

These performances saw him earn his first team debut in a friendly against A league giants, Western Sydney Wanderers FC, where he played the final 8 minutes and had a shot on target in what was a 5-0 loss for the Knights. He shined in the time he was on and was a sight to watch, which is how we found out about this young talent.