Young boy featured in El Shaarawy signing video found safe

A young boy from Athens, who was featured in the club's video to announce the signing of Stephan El Shaarawy, has been found safe.

The 11-year-old, who cannot now be named for legal reasons, becomes the eighth child to have been found after featuring in one of AS Roma's transfer announcement videos.

Working in partnership with the International Centre for Missing Children and the Greek charity The Smile of the Child, Roma featured the boy in the video used to announce the signing of Italy international Stephan El Shaarawy at the end of January.

The video, which featured a number of missing children from all around the world, was viewed over 350,000 times across Twitter, Facebook and Instagram.

The club began the social media initiative in the summer of 2019, looking to harness the worldwide interest in transfer signings to raise awareness of the plight of missing children across the world.

The club partnered with Telefono Azzurro (Italy), the National Centre for Missing and Exploited Children (USA), Missing People (UK), Missing Child Kenya and the International Centre for Missing and Exploited Children (worldwide) to ensure as wide a reach as possible.

Previously a girl in Italy, three teenagers from England, a young boy from Belgium and two children from Kenya had all been found safe after appearing in transfer videos published by the club.

The teenager from Italy was found in October last year.

“Finding and bringing a missing child home to their family is always an amazing day for us," Caroline Humer, Vice President of Programs at the International Centre for Missing and Exploited Children, said at the time.

"We are so grateful for our partnership with AS Roma and for their willingness to highlight this global issue by displaying photos of missing children. We also want to thank their fans for their support.”