New York Giants legend Osi Umenyiora, who runs his Uprise football development programme across Africa, told ESPN that he's looking to recruit athletes in their teens, in order to have them ready for the NFL at a younger age.
Speaking at the recent NFL Africa camp in Kenya, the second such camp on the continent, Umenyiora said that finding older players, many of whom have made it to the International Player Pathway programme [IPP], was a success, but that younger talents would benefit more from joining the NFL Academy.
At last year's camp in Ghana, Umenyiora assessed players in their late teens and early 20s, but said of this year's event in Nairobi: "This year, we focused more on the younger players.