Athletes Story — William Clem
Meet William Clem. William is 19 years old and is a professional football player playing for FCK and the U21 Danish national team. Both Williams uncles have been professional football players – Christian Clem played for the Norwegian national team and Knut Clem played in Lyngby. William started playing when he was five years old in BSV where a dad called Søren Kaastrup trained the team. The coach level was high and the results started to show.
At U10 BSV hires a coach named Ahmed El Ali to become the team coach. At U12 William Clem gets the offer to join both Lyngby and FCK. William choose FCK. William changed school to Johannesskolen, where FCK has their own school that allows players to practice during school hours. “It was so nice to finally have a school allowing me to concentrate on both football and school. I really enjoyed those years”. William hurt his knee at U14 and was out of the game for half a year. “You have to be patient to do this. And you have to fight your way back from injuries”. William gets a contract at U15 with FCK and stays there until U17. At U17 the national team coach Søren Hermansen calls and asks William if he would like to play for the national team. Ahmed El Ali – the now professional football agent signs William Clem when he turns 18 years and negotiates the contract with FCK allowing Clem to play with the first team. “Growing up I dreamt of becoming like Thomas Delaney. Thomas played both for FCK and the Danish national team. Right now I focus on playing my best for FCK, so that I might someday be able to play in a top 5 premier league club.
My best advice to players is to be patient and believe in the process”. William Clem took the straight road to becoming a professional player at a very young age. Actually an impressive 5 players from Williams BSV team ended up playing for the superliga in Denmark, 2 for Randers, one in AAB, one in FCN and William for FCK. William is currently playing for the U21 national team and playing for FCK and just received a legendary award “Granen” from FCK for being this years FCK talent. Mohamed Daramy and Thomas Delaney among other players has earlier received this award.
