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Salford City’s players didn’t expect a trialist who’d not kicked a ball for nine months and who’d contacted the club through their website to leave them all standing.

But in December’s bleep tests observed by Paul Scholes and Phil Neville, that’s what happened.

“I thought: ‘Wow, this boy can run!’,” recalled Neville at seeing Sadiq El Fitouri.

“I was even more surprised when he told us his background story. After being released by City he’d fallen out of love with football until contacting us.”

Libya-born, Old Trafford-raised and a student at Stretford High School, El Fitouri played in their trophy winning school team which reached a national final.

“His grades were slipping below As and Sadiq’s father stopped him from playing football during the under 14 season,” remembers one of his youth coaches. “He still came to watch during this time and his grades soon went back up again.”

With school completed, he won a contract at City with his two best mates, but all three were released. Agents tried to help the Libyan born player who grew up as part of a large family near Shrewsbury Street. The agents were lucky if the managers at third and fourth division clubs took their calls.

After a footballing hiatus, Sadiq, 20, started training with Salford, who already had a right-back.

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“Then we had a practice game, 11v11,” said Neville. “It was absolutely freezing. Sadiq went down the wing, went past a player like Cruyff then stroked the ball into midfield. I’d been drawn to him since that bleep test but the more we watched him in training, the more I thought: ‘He’s a player’. After four times I thought: ‘This lad is definitely a player’.”

Salford changed manager with the popular, perma-tanned Maltese Falcon and Macclesfield Town legend Phil Power losing his job. Neville and Scholes briefly took charge for a game against Kendal Town.

“We both said he had to play,” added Neville. “Within 35 minutes we’d both seen enough for him to show us that he was far too good for this level.”

Neville thought about recommending him to Bury’s manager David Flitcroft, Scholesy suggested Oldham Athletic, the pull of both men’s roots evident.

“We both decided that the best judge of young talent and ability was Warren Joyce at Manchester United,” added Neville. “I rang Joycey who told us to bring him down. Sadiq trained well over a week and did well enough to earn a contract.”

(Image: Eddie Garvey)

“Sadiq is quiet, respectful and humble,” said Neville. “He’d been rejected and that, not surprisingly, gets a lot of young footballers down. He thought about giving up football and spent too much time playing on computer games, but he never stopped running each morning. He never gave up on his dream.”

It took just three weeks from contacting Salford to getting an 18-month contract with United.

“We’ve got a few players at Salford who have been let go by clubs,” explains Neville. “All they wanted was another chance. They would try training with other clubs but if you’re not a six-foot giant or go around shouting or being aggressive then it’s easy not to get noticed. We noticed Sadiq, pointed him in the right direction and now he’s got a contract with United. We hope to do that with other players.”

Neville still speaks to Sadiq daily, offering support and advice.

“It can be daunting. He’s gone from being unemployed to training with the biggest club in the world.”

Within 24 hours of Sadiq signing for United he’d been contacted by six agents looking to represent him, several of whom had never even seen him play.

El Fitouri wasn’t under contract with Salford so the EvoStik division one leaders won’t get a fee.

“We’re doing it because we want to,” said Neville. “Of course we may put players on a contract in the future, but we’ve been involved in Salford six months and already one of our players has earned a contract with a top team. That gives us a massive buzz.”

Sadiq El Fitouri’s got a long way to go, but he’s in a great place to learn. Wouldn’t it be wonderful if an Old Trafford boy ends up playing first-team football at Old Trafford?