STUART Gates is determined to bounce back from his Chelsea rejection by forging a career for himself as a pro footballer.

And the former Barton Peveril College youngster wants to do it with Saints.

On his 18th birthday yesterday, the nation found out what Gates had been told last Monday - that he had failed to win Sky television's Football Icon 2 reality show and with it a year's contract with the Premiership champions.

Instead, central defender Carl Magner was picked ahead of him by a panel which included Chelsea boss Jose Mourinho and former Saint Jamie Redknapp.

Basingstoke lad Tom Gates, a left back, was third.

But Gates, a striker, is refusing to get downhearted - even though he was tantalisingly close to the ultimate prize out of 30,000 16 and 17 year-olds who applied back in the summer.

"Perhaps it's for the best I didn't win," he told the Daily Echo.

See today's Daily Echo for full story