We went to meet Damien Ovart, director of the Academy, to discuss his daily missions and objectives with him. He gives us an overview of the values and projects supported by the training center, as well as the initiatives put in place to support young talents in their training journey.
Hi Damien, can you introduce yourself for those who don’t know you yet?
Yes, Damien Ovart, director of the Charleroi Sporting Academy since last summer. I studied physical education, then I became a teacher in this field for several years. Subsequently, I arrived at the Belgian Football Federation. I was responsible for coaching training and I also had the opportunity to collaborate with the U16 and U17 national youth teams. Then I had this opportunity to join the Royal Charleroi Sporting Club and I took it.
What attracted you to the idea of joining Sporting?
After my experience at the Federation, what I missed was discovering in depth the daily life of a professional football club. The training center is in the Belgian top 10, so I found it was also a great opportunity to work in a quality environment. We remain a family club where there is proximity and values. We feel that there is a passion behind this club, both from the supporters and the people who are there. The fact that we are in a club with a motto where we don’t want to give up, that matches my personality.
What were your first impressions when you arrived?
I felt the conviviality, so it fit well with the image I had of the club. Everything is well structured, everyone has a role and knows what they have to do, everything is well-oiled and that helps a lot when you arrive. I also felt discipline among the young people and an operating framework that was very clear, and that is something that, for me, is a strength. Now, sportingly, we must try to move on. The club is putting a lot of things in place to give itself the means to move forward and evolve.
As director of the Training Center, what is your role?
My role at the training center level is to define the vision and the strategy, define the strategic guidelines for where we want to go and how we want to get there. So obviously, once you have defined that, it is to supervise operations. One of my missions is also to identify high potentials, because these are the ones we must try to bring to the adult teams: U23 & Core A.
I must also define a clear organization chart with precise functions in order to structure the operation of the training center while relaying information to my management.
Developing young people as people also involves actions outside of football, through academic and socio-educational aspects in particular…
Yes of course. So, the central node is that we are here on a double project which is football-school from U15. We work with different schools to put in place a schedule adapted to our young players. It also allows us to see where the player is sportingly and academically. We notice that there is often a correlation: when things go well on one side, things go well on the other and vice versa. Double project, because the reality is that most of the players at the training center will not all make a living from football in the future. We need to prepare them for all of this.
At the same time, there is the development of the person which involves training that we put in place on racism, discrimination, match-fixing, harassment, etc. These are phenomena for me to be attentive to. We really try to put in place actions that develop our young players as human beings.
Finally, what can we wish you for the future?
What we can hope for, which is very important, is that people keep the same passion. For me, what makes a training center successful is the passion of the people who are there and who work there. I get up every morning motivated with the desire to come here to work and put my players in the best possible conditions.
Go Zebras!
