MY name is Kyle and when it came to my Year 11 work experience I decided I wanted to do something a little out of the ordinary so given that my brother in-law, Lucas Akins, is a player for Burton Albion, I decided to ask him if there were any areas that people could do work experience at the club.
He told me there were many areas which was a shock to me as I didn’t realise how much actually goes on at the club behind the scenes. One of the areas that he suggested stood out to me and that area was media.
The reason media stood out to me was because I have always had an interest in technology and therefore, I put two and two together and was curious to see what a career, which was mainly based on technology, would be like.
Luckily, my work experience week fell on the same week as the Carabao Cup clash between the Brewers and Leicester City therefore I managed to get myself down to the Pirelli Stadium and was delighted when I found out I was getting a press badge which gave me pitch side access so I could shadow alongside the media team when they were doing interviews with players, assistant managers etc.
Given that Brewers vs Leicester was such a hectic game, I was able to gain an insight in what it is like to be as part of the media team at such an eventful game with a great atmosphere. The day after the game, I spent my day producing a written interview from an interview with Liam Boyce, where he was talking about how the game has impacted on the Brewers and about his goal which was the only Albion goal on that night. When I completed this interview I handed it over to the media team and it was posted on the Burton Albion website which I was very happy with.
I’ve known Lucas since I was around one or two years old, when he first started seeing my sister, and in all honesty, I can’t remember him not being a person in my life. Off the pitch, Lucas is one of the nicest and most pleasant people you will ever meet and the positive energy which he spreads is unreal on and off the pitch.
Upon meeting the Burton Albion media team, I was delighted with the people I was working with, who were Nigel Powlson, Ash Wilkinson and Richard Holmes. The media team were good fun and wanted to assist me with my work in any way they could which I am very appreciative for and couldn’t thank them enough for offering me this work placement as it has been such a good, memorable experience and it had really given me an insight of what a media team at a football club does on a day-to day-basis.
To finish off I would just like to thank everybody at Burton Albion that made it possible for me to do gain a week’s insight of the media work at the club.