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Kris Twardek, a graduate of the Ottawa South United Academy, has signed his first professional contract with the Millwall Lions soccer club based in New Cross, southeast London. The Lions play in the Football League Championship, the second tier of British soccer.

Twardek has spent the past 18 months in Millwall’s academy and has been playing regularly on the team’s under-21 squad. In a game this past week, Twardek, who is a striker, was taken off the field after being struck in the face and suffering a broken jaw.

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Twardek, who turns 18 on March 8, left his Kinburn home in June 2013 to train with the Millwall under-18 team. Months after making the move, in an interview with the Citizen, he admitted that while the training was intense in London, it had done nothing to dampen his enthusiasm.

“I proved something to myself,” he says. “I can go training for four hours every day, repeated every day for a whole year, and I still love playing the game.”