Max Gradel joined Leeds United's Academy staff and almost 300 budding footballers at the John Charles Centre For Sport on Wednesday.

The striker visited the South Leeds 2010 World Cup which was organised in conjunction with Leeds United and a host of other partners including the West Yorkshire Police, the Behaviour Education Support Team, and Middleton Cluster Extended Services.

Over 40 teams are competing in the week-long 5-a-side competition and 280 local children are involved. And they were delighted with the United striker made a guest appearance.

"It was my first time seeing the kids at something like this and it was really nice," said Max.

"They are very motivated to come down to this and I'm very pleased to represent the club.

"We had things like this back home in France, but we didn't have players come down. When you see a player you want to be like them and play.

"I'm looking forward to doing this more."

Academy coach Terry Potter is responsible for development and recruitment of young players, and he was delighted with the response of the kids in South Leeds.

"This is a project put together by a number of partners working together, and our headline if you like is 'giving kids a chance,'" explained Terry.

"It brings a lot of backgrounds together which is important for the area, and it gives the kids an opportunity to play in an environment like this.

"One of the things is that 95 per cent of these kids will never get the opportunity to be spotted by a professional club and this gives them the opportunity in this area.

"We've spotted a number of players over the couple of days here and hopefully we will unearth another Jonny Howson or Fabian Delph."

You can see more from South Leeds on LUTV later...