Southend United's future on the pitch looks to be in safe hands thanks to a £276,000 cash injection from the English Sports Council for youth development at Roots Hall.

The Third Division club will now use the grant to restructure their youth programme as they aim to unearth the next Michael Owen or Rio Ferdinand on their own doorstep.

"This money will be used to cement a firm foundation for Southend United's future which will keep this club alive," said Blues' director of youth Peter Trevivian.

The grant will fund the Seasiders' youth development scheme for the next four seasons and, although, the money has been awarded by the English Sports Council, half the final sum has been donated by the Premier League fat cats.

"The Premier League wants to put something back into the grass roots level of the game and help clubs like ourselves to continue producing our own players," Trevivian explained.

"The only way clubs like Southend can survive financially is to unearth new talent and sell them onto to the big boys every few years.

"It's in the interest of all Premier League sides for smaller clubs to maintain a conveyor-belt of young players, which we hope can be produced to a standard good enough to play at the highest level."

Blues will use the grant to revamp their centre of excellence, which will allow Southend to work with and coach the best youngsters in the area aged from nine to 16 years old.

"With this financial assistance we can now improve the quality of coaching, scouting and facilities at our disposal," Trevivian said.

"This will allow us to make the most of the vast amount of young talent we have in our catchment area to Southend United's advantage.

"Even with the limited resources we are working with now, I would say we have four or five boys in our current youth team who have a good chance of going all the way in professional football.

"Who knows what else we can achieve once we have given our whole youth programme a complete upgrade thanks to this grant."

Trevivian - currently negotiating a new contract with Blues which will allow him to oversee the club's youth development project for the next four years - also praised the Shrimpers' chairman John Main.

"Ever since he took over last November the chairman has been like a breath of fresh air around Roots Hall," he added.

"Despite all his financial problems off the field, John has always found the time to support our plans to restructure the youth policy at the club.

"He helped us launch our bid for the English Sports Council funding and he is committed to seeing youngsters flourish at Roots Hall, which gives us a great chance of gaining success."

Big boost - Tom Hill (left) from the England Sports Council hands over the £276,000 cheque to Southend's youth director Peter Trevivian

Picture: ROBIN WOOSEY

Converted for the new archive on 19 November 2001. Some images and formatting may have been lost in the conversion.