Aspiring Bermudian footballers have been urged to “think big” after being reminded that Ronaldo — arguably the world’s best player — also comes from a small island.

Regillio Simons, a former top-flight striker in Holland, spent last week encouraging the island’s young players not to scale back on their football dreams during the Bermuda Summer Football School at Goose Gosling Field.

The Ajax youth-team coach hopes his “good players come from anywhere” mantra strikes a chord with Bermudian players and believes Ronaldo’s success story is proof that anything is possible with drive, ambition and talent.

Ronaldo, the Real Madrid forward, is from the island of Madeira, an archipelago in the North Atlantic Ocean, southwest of Portugal, with a population of about 268,000.

The 31-year-old, who won this summer’s Euro 2016 with Portugal, had the honour of having Madeira International Airport named after him last week.

“Good players don’t come from a certain place, good players come from anywhere,” said Simons, who played for Fortuna Sittard and Willem II.

“Look at Ronaldo, he’s from Madeira. There’s still a chance for someone to come from Bermuda but you need to get that mindset to develop and grow, and don’t think too small.

“I have spoken a lot with Kenny Thompson [the BAA director of football] and he said ‘that’s the problem, Bermuda players think too small’.

“Players must not think ‘I’m the best in Bermuda so that’s it’. They have to keep developing constantly and must look outside of Bermuda.”

Simons returned to the island for a second time along with his son Xavi, who plays for Barcelona’s legendary La Masia academy and is considered one of the best players in the world for his age.

Joining him in Bermuda are Regillio’s older son, Faustino, a coach at UE Cornellá — the No 1 amateur club in the Catalan region — who have a partnership with BAA, and Ajax youngsters Jenno Campagne, 13, Solomon Bonnah, 13, and Hakeem Agboluaje, 8.

“It’s good for the local guys as they see what happens with their contemporaries at big clubs in Europe,” Simons said. “These players also have their faults and often they have the same faults as the Bermuda players.

“That shows the local players that they still have a chance if they also work hard.”

With his 13-year-old son being touted as a star in the making, Simons admits he is careful not to place to much expectancy on Xavi and tries to protect him from “some of the negative sides of the game”.

Interest in Simons increased after he was named as the top player at the prestigious La Liga Promises tournament, held in Miami in January.

Born in Amsterdam, the midfielder is named after Xavi Hernández, the former Barcelona captain, and was three years old when his father’s career ended and the family moved to Alicante in Spain.

From there he joined Villarreal’s youth system before moving to Barcelona’s academy when he was seven.

“I want to keep him as a child for as long as possible,” Simons said. “If he’s going to see football like work it will be difficult.

“It’s great in Bermuda because people respect the players and the level they are at, and leave them alone.

“In Catalonia it gets crazy sometimes and as a parent that worries me, especially with social media. It’s a mad house, so I try and protect him wherever I can.”

Thompson started the camp, organised by BAA as an extension of the club’s WOSPAC (World Sports Academy Barcelona) programme, last summer.

He believes the involvement of more foreign players this year has helped ramp up the camp’s intensity.

“From the instant the international players arrived the intensity of the Bermuda players has gone up,” Thompson said.

“The whole idea is for our players in Bermuda to interact directly with players their size and age who play at a very elite level.

“It’s a total interaction between the players in Bermuda and the elite players, on the pitch and off the pitch.

“You can talk, talk and talk to the Bermuda players about what it’s like at the elite level but they must feel it to understand it and that’s what we’re trying to do.”