Charlie Wellens has signed a professional contract with Manchester United.
Wellens, 17, has signed a two-year deal with the club after a fulfilling season with the Under-18s before the league season was cancelled. Wellens started in all four of United’s FA Youth Cup ties and the academy could yet play their semi-final with Chelsea if the season successfully restarts next month.
Wellens’s father, Richie, came through the United academy, making one appearance for the first-team in 1999, and the Swindon Town manager expressed his pride at his son’s commitment to the club.
“Twenty-three years ago I signed my first professional contract at the biggest club in the world,” Wellens tweeted. “To say I’m proud to see Charlie sign his is an understatement. Well done mate it’s only the start but you deserve it.”
The younger Wellens trained with the United first-team on the eve of their Europa League group stage opener against Astana in September and made his debut for the Under-23s in November.
United academy head Nick Cox said Wellens’ brief promotion to the first-team was an every day occurrence at United.
“I think sometimes we get carried away, by the way,” Cox told the MEN. “Kids training with our first-team is a day-to-day occurrence, it’s just part of the process here, it’s just what happens. At other clubs it might be the exception to the rule. Here it’s the norm.
“It’s easy to get carried away, it doesn’t mean anything. It means that a kid’s got a different learning opportunity, a different environment to train in and an experience that will hopefully help them in their journey, but we don’t get carried away. It’s just a thing that happens. I quite often see it pop up all over social media and it shouldn’t be something that people get too carried away with.”
SOURCE:- allfootballapp
