"I hope this is an opportunity for him to reach his dream, to be a famous footballer," his mother told Reuters. "I just have to support him along the way."
Britain has more than two million people with family roots in the Indian sub-continent but only seven Asian players in the country's professional football ranks.
Chelsea's initiative for players under 14 was aimed at finding talented youngsters and tackling the under-representation of British Asians in the sport, the club said.
"There are the typical stereotypes, like Asian people have bad diets, or not the right physical figure; of course, that is complete nonsense. Football is a game for all shapes and sizes," Chelsea's Head of Corporate Social Responsibility, Simon Taylor, told Reuters.
"There has also been a suspicion within the Asian community that football clubs don't take their issues seriously."
BIG ISSUE
Danny Lynch, media officer at the Kick It Out campaign against racism in football, said there were only seven British Asian professional players.
"(It's) a tiny amount given there's approximately 2,000 players plying their trade across the four leagues," Lynch said.
"The lack of British Asians in football is still a big issue and one very much on our radar. The number of British Asians playing at the top level is completely disproportionate to the thousands across the country playing at grassroots level."
In 2004, central defender Zesh Rehman, the son of Pakistani-born parents, became the first British Asian to play in the Premier League when he joined Fulham. He is now at Bradford City in League Two.
"Historically, football as an industry hasn't really embraced the Asian community," Lynch said. "There is a myth that Asian footballers and youngsters who want to play don't have the right attitude for the game, that they like cricket more than football, and that they are physically less strong."
England's cricket team had an Indian-born captain in Nasser Hussain from 1999 to 2003 and in recent years has featured several other players of Asian extraction, with all-rounder Ravi Bopara and spin bowler Monty Panesar in the current test squad playing the West Indies.
Cricket is hugely popular in the sub-continent, where it took root during the colonial era, and has traditionally been seen as the sport of choice for young British Asians.
REGULAR PLAY
"We have a lot of Asian (football) teams in the U.K. but they don't compare and benchmark themselves against boys of similar ages in different cultures," Darren Grace, head scout at Chelsea's three-day event and project manager at the club's academy, told Reuters.
"Asian footballers need to try to play regularly at the highest level they can, whether that be for their local club or for a county team. That will enable them to compare themselves to the best British players," he added.
