The Premier League - 2019/20

I just don't think the owners see any worth in developing young players over a period of time. They want to be in the top league and trade players like a kid does with football stickers.

Part of me wants to drop a division or two to start again from scratch, build with a number of our academy kids, a few young buys and several old heads. But all that will happen when we go down will be a mass of transfers to get back into the Premier League as soon as possible and the merry-go-round will start all over again. That is our identity - we're the Panini Sticker Club of English football, but we'll never have a complete set.

 

Oh it's ridiculous we've nobody coming through, not even anyone seen as worthy of getting a place on the bench on a regular basis.

I just hope the change of emphasis in the recruitment, ie. taking 18 to 20-year olds from Premier league sides rather than from lower down the leagues, is part of a long term plan to bring younger players through. We do seem to have several players making an impact at U18 level so perhaps something is going on after the scrapping of Harefield and it's just a question of being patient before the first ones get their chance.

But unless we start giving game time to players we bring in like Quina, Dele-Bashiru & Wilmot let alone those we're supposedly developing then it does look as if those running the club are blind to the benefits of having a decent youth system.

Edit: It's also easy, for me at least, to become short-sighted and not see any good work going on when the main focus of a football club - the 1st team - is doing so badly. All my frustrations come out and my patience disappears. I just hope I see some progress in the U23s when I go next season to at least indicate a semblance of a plan at that level.

 

T'was of course merely a joke.

 

You didn’t enjoy watching West Ham vs Chelsea then? Did the disappointment of a relegation rival winning mar what must have been an entertaining game for fans of West Ham and teams outside the bottom 4 and Chelsea (I didn’t see it myself)?

But yeah, most of the other games have been low-scoring or one-sided affairs. The Championship and lower-league play-offs seem to have been more exciting and unpredictable (not that I wish we were back down there).

 

I presume Richard Thomas is still in charge though he doesn't appear in the staff profiles on the club site, Barry Quin seems to be the only one mentioned for the U23s & U18s. Having continuity at the head of the youth set up would help it carry out long term planning.

 

Do you think it will ever change? All the time and effort taken by clubs just to have them stolen from under their noses.

 

I didn't see the WHU/Chelsea game, sadly. I watched the Man Utd/Bournemouth match and despite it having seven goals I just found it slow and lacking. Some cracking goals but not as good a game as this one tonight.

 

That wouldn’t reassure me because it would reinforce the fact that for most of the season they were neck and neck with us (or at worst, only a few points better) and they were looking like one of the opponents we were looking to get three vital points from, but now we’ve gone backwards and they look head and shoulders above us in every department.

 

Our defeat to Southampton not looking quite so bad at the mo given their form.

 

Think the problem with our youth development is that we are still seen as a little club and we have no clearly defined catchment area so lose out when attracting young talent to the likes of spurs, arsenal, West ham and even qpr

Those we do develop get stolen like jadon sancho

None of this helped by lack of clear pathway to the first team..... We just seem not to give youth a change... Careers of Penarenda, Success, etc gone backwards

 

One of the pundits were saying something like that’s the beauty of the Premier League, Southampton beating a team who trounced Liverpool three days earlier. I suppose we don’t count

 

I enjoyed watching the Southampton v City match. It just shows what we're missing. Everyone to a man was strong, resolute, fighting for the cause. It really underlines what a bunch of pansies we have at our club. We never put a shift in like that.

See, you can beat City. All we ever do when we play them is lay on the floor begging for mercy.

The downside to City losing this is they will take it out on us...….they will store up their wounded animal feelings for their annual record away win at Vicarage Road.

 

A Southampton team that lost 9-0 this season, and looked completely lifeless at the time. Of course, their players/coaches took collective responsibility for the issues, and turned things around.

Meanwhile, over in Watford.....

 

Saints defended excellently, we’d certainly buckle under under that sort of pressure.

Southampton have clearly kicked on and are a much better side than us now, but that said, as bad as we look now imagine where we’d be with a 20 goal a season player like Ings? Even a 10 or 15 a season striker would make a big difference.

 

Exactly. I was at the Southampton away game and their defence looked awful. The reason they eventually won that game and many since was Ings. He is exactly the sort of striker we should have signed over the past three years or so but we never seem to be in for them.

 

That and a free kick goal. Of which we haven't scored one for over 4 years.

 

Burnley were today granted Category 1 Academy status and here's an article with their academy manager.
https://trainingground.guru/articles/burnley-academy-promoted-to-category-one

Better standard of opposition, more games, more attractive to higher end players and savings in transfer fees seem to be the plus points.

Yes it's expensive to get to Cat.1 and maintain but when League 1 & 2 clubs want £10-£15m for decent prospects already in their starting XI it makes one wonder the value of the way we're doing it.

At the bottom of the article is a list of all 25 clubs with Cat.1 academy status.

 

I seem to remember it was a shared vision between Dyche and the owners of the club.

They knew they couldn't compete in the transfer market with most of the Premier League clubs and those with mega rich owners when they were first promoted so went down the self sustainable route. It meant they were content to plough a lot of their tv money into developing the club when they were initially getting promoted/relegated and also why they stood by Dyche.

It takes guts to have a long term plan such as this and to stick to it when you get relegated.

I can only imagine it builds a club ethos too, a solidarity. Hell, it may even mean players don't switch off two thirds of the season in whether they're safe from relegation or not.

For all the good that it has done there are rumblings Dyche is unhappy at not having a bigger budget to work with now. It'll be interesting to see if he stays or if he feels he has earned the right to spend more, if that's even a thing.

 

But the big boys can't do it to a Cat 1 status side right?

 

Spurs players fighting with each other

 

And that’s the issue. Cat 1 offers a tiny bit more protection but the outlay needed is many magnitudes greater.

 

Exactly.

It's pointless unless you're one of the very biggest clubs, because the very biggest clubs will still be able to steal your prospects for virtually nothing even if you are also a Cat 1 club. Why bother spending the money?

 

You're making an assumption that every single talented youngster in an academy will automatically leave for a 'big' club. Who's to say the big clubs will even want them?

I'd hazard a guess that Southampton would be relatively pleased with the way their academy worked. How come no big clubs came in for their talented youngsters while they were still there?

To not do it for these reasons is a convenient excuse. Our club can't develop the young talent it brings in from abroad. I'd suggest they haven't got a clue what to do with our academy players.

 

Southampton will be in part helped by having no bigger clubs anywhere near them geographically (not that it's always the most important factor).

 

Don't have a massive problem with our 'youth' policy, yeah I'd like to see more academy boys progress to the first team, but you do kind of think what's the point when our best young players can get poached for peanuts. I do think we've brought in some very talented players from all parts, it's just we've done a very bad job of getting them to graduate to first team level, especially in the Premier League rat-race, I'm sure that our youngsters, wherever they're from, wherever they were developed, would get more of a look-in in the Championship. I do wonder if we'd have given more chances to our young players had we been comfortable in mid-table, or whether they'd not even be considered ready for a token few minutes?