SWAG Discovery of the Year Jordan Opoku will play in the Netherlands this season.

FEYENOORD have loaned out the young midfielder to feeder club Excelsior for the coming season.

Opoku is the first player to arrive in Holland from Feyenoord's football academy in Ghana.

Though the 20-year-old has graduated to the European stage, Feyenoord feel he is not yet ready for the rigours of top-flight football.

Instead, they have loaned him out to Excelsior who will be able to offer Opoku Gouden Gids Divisie football this term.

Graphic Report

Jordan Opoku, the winner of the 2002 Sports Writers Association of Ghana (SWAG) Discovery of the Year award is leaving Ghana this evening for Holland to begin a professional career in the Dutch league.

Opoku, a product of Feyenoord Fetteh, has gained promotion to play for the youth team of Fetteh’s mother club, Rotterdam Feyenoord. The promotion of Opoku into the youth side is in recognition of his exceptional skills and talent which have seen him feature for the youth side of the Dutch club on several occasions.

According to officials of Feyenoord Fetteh, all formalities have been completed for the young lad to begin his career with the Dutch side. He is the first product from the academy set up four years ago, to turn professional. “If he impresses as he has always done, Opoku will feature for the regular side in no time,” the Techinical Director of the Gomoa-based soccer academy said.

Opoku, who has been knocking hard on the doors of stardom gained instant recognition and approval from the Dutch side two years ago when a team from Fetteh toured the mother club in Rotterdam. His skills and instinct at creating and scoring goals earned him many great respect and several invitations to feature for the Dutch club’s youth side on regular basis.

Just days after returning from a similar trip, the SWAG award winner joined his teammates to compete in the first ever Mylik tournament held at the Accra Stadium and it was during that competition that he was adjudged the best player and went on to be named the SWAG Discovery of the Year.

In an interview with the Graphic, Opoku who was beside himself with joy said he sees the honour done him by SWAG as a stepping stone to greater heights. “Indeed, I idolise Abedi Pele and I want to emulate his success in his career as much as I can.

“I think he began his career by winning the SWAG Discovery of the Year and went on to win the Footballer of the Year and crowned it with the Sportsman of the Year Award as well as winning the African Footballer of the Year three times.