Reigning champions Valencia CF and Villarreal CF will participate in the JSSL tournament in 2024

The 2024 edition of the prestigious JSSL Pro Academy 7’s tournament will once again feature a select representation of LALIGA EA SPORTS clubs: Valencia CF and Villarreal CF. Los Ches will participate in the U-16 male and female categories, while the Yellow Submarine will participate in the U-16 female category. The championship will take place from March 28 to 31, and the finals will be played at the Arena Stadium in Singapore.

Both Spanish clubs are models for their work in grassroots. In fact, Valencia CF is the reigning JSSL Pro Academy 7’s champion in 2023, both in the men's and women's categories, which earned them the title of the tournament’s Best Pro Academy. Recently, a CIES Football Observatory report published in October ranked Valencia CF's Academy as the fourth best in Europe in terms of the number of players trained. For its part, Villarreal CF won the Europa League in 2021 by championing a firm commitment to the youth academy, as demonstrated by the construction of two high-performance sports cities in recent years to ensure the high-performance training of hundreds of young talents.

Both Valencia CF and Villarreal CF also have a strong presence in Asia through their international youth projects. Villarreal CF has academies in Kuwait, India, Malaysia, Philippines, South Korea and three in Australia, as well as camps in Thailand and Japan. Meanwhile, Valencia CF also has academies in South Korea and Japan.

LALIGA for its part, under the global project LALIGA Academy through which it has developed more than 750 grassroots football projects in 55 countries since 2015, maintains in Singapore its collaboration agreement until 2026 for the national project "Unleash The Roar!", together with Sport Singapore and the Singapore Football

Association, which was born in 2021. In addition, LALIGA collaborates on grassroots projects such as this JSSL Pro Academy 7’s.

Asia’s largest youth football tournament

JSSL 7's is the largest youth football tournament in Asia, with more than 450 teams and 6,000 players and coaches from all over the continent. This year marks its tenth edition, having previously hosted teams of the stature of Liverpool, FC Barcelona, Atlético de Madrid, Arsenal and Manchester United. Through its ranks have passed young players now established in European football such as Harvey Elliott (Liverpool FC), Anthony Elanga (Nottingham Forrest), or Jesus Vazquez himself, who played in JSSL in 2018 with Valencia CF, and is currently playing his third season in the first team with remarkable performance.