A TALENTED young football freestyler has his sights set on the big time as he prepares to compete in a world championship.

Reece Sargeant, of Green Lane, Eastwood, is hoping his ball control skills will win him the title in a competition in London in October.

The event is being organised by current world champion, John Farnworth, who found wider fame last year, appearing on the Britain’s Got Talent TV show.

Freestyle football involves performing tricks with a football with any part of the body.

At 15, Reece, a pupil at Deanes School, Thundersley, believes he is the world’s youngest professional freestyler, and already gets paid for promotional work and to appear in adverts.

Reece said: “I used to play football until last year. When I realised I wasn’t good enough to go professional, I went on the internet and saw what John Farnworth could do.

“After that, I just started to practice and practice.

“The youngest person I have found doing it is Ollie Hayes, who is 16, but I am only 15.”

If he wins the competition, Reece get win a cash prize, a contract with Mr Farnworth’s agent and the chance to travel to Asia and the USA to demonstrate his skills at events.

After just nine months of practise, Reece has already perfected a range of tricks and took part in the BBC’s charity Sport Relief event, where he went a mile doing kick-ups.

The teenager’s skills have already won him plenty of fans online – his friend, Wesley Barnes, 14, travels with him to competitions and demonstrations and videos him in action, going on to post them on the Youtube video-sharing website.

Reece also has plans to attempt a new world record in November, by doing keepy-ups for more than 24 hours.

He explained: “The record at the moment is 24 hours, which is held by freestyler Dan Magness. I’m aiming to do between 25 and 26 hours.”