Still got nicked by Arsenal at 11 already, so wouldn't have made a difference. However much you jest about the issue, and claim we must be doing something wrong by not producing any players through the academy or giving our youth a chance, it continues to be true that every youth team player of ours who might become good enough to play for us in the Prem gets nicked by one of the big clubs before there's the opportunity.
A few hundred thousand more in compensation I think, at a minimum investment cost per year which wipes out any benefit. Some players might be more willing to reject a big 4 club if they're at a Cat 1 academy with better training facilities etc. but the main reason a player would stay is seeing a clear route to the first team (which despite our terrible defenders, we still don't offer).
If we actually had any youth team defenders good enough to play for the first team they'd get their chances, but we don't.
Its a bit of a self fulfilling prophecy though isn't it. There is no pathway here for young players here so they leave, meaning we have no no-one actually good enough to give first team chances.
You need to have specialist staff and facilities for Cat 1. That would lend itself to being more attractive to players and also help their development. I think we are officially category 2, which means you don’t have to do that much. Which is why we chuck our younger players out on loan as soon as possible. We probably have a shed with a table for Richard Johnson and call it a development hub. We say that the likes of Dennis deserve to play with better players in relation to the first team, it’s the same principle with the youth team. Either do it properly or not at all. Unless the view is that we happily allow a player with potential to leave so the people in charge have already made excuses as why not to bother.
No, it's the good players leaving which creates the prophecy. Us having to play the likes of JP, Ngakia and Morris this season shows there are minutes there for young players at the club and opportunities for them to grab them if they're good enough. However, the draw of the bigger clubs' academies will always be too much for the best prospects. Also, tying this in to our discussion in the other thread, the quality of youth players who would actually benefit us is generally the calibre of regular England youth internationals - however, the rare occasions we get a player of that level they get nicked. These are then the exact same kinds of player who a few years down the line you also bemoan that we're incapable of getting on loan. If we had a Guehi or Gallagher in our academy, they'd get minutes with us! For the youth players we have who could be good enough to play first team football in the foreseeable future, there is nothing to lose for them to join a bigger club's academy when the opportunity comes, because worst case ourselves and other similar clubs will also still be keen to sign them on loan to give them minutes later on.
I very much doubt us moving to category 1 will prevent Arsenal/Chelsea/Spurs/Man City from creaming off our best prospects. I also don't think "we happily allow a player with potential to leave" - it's just impossible for us to stop. With Brexit it's also now even more difficult for a club such as ours, as it's much more difficult for top academies to fill up their academies with top prospects from Europe, so they need to take more domestic youth players instead meaning fewer prospects for us. Our sending youth prospects on loan to get first-team experience is also standard practice for clubs, whether it be ourselves or someone like Chelsea or Man City.
Not sure I'd include Morris with those 2 - he is only involved because we have 3 full backs out of action and played in a meaningless game. There should be chances, but we seem to heavily prioritise the recruitment of old, experienced players over signing young promising players. Those that we do sign - we seem to do a terrible job of developing. Wilmot, Quina, Lukebakio, Penaranda, Cucho, Suarez, Estpunian etc - our whole youth development strategy also seems to just be recruit cheap and then bung them on loan and hope they develop. Im not saying that there haven't been issues with some of these players and some of responsibility is their own, but I think the idea of sending these young lads off to a different club in Spain or Italy every 12 months with very little supervision or contact is a really bad way to go about developing players and integrating them into our first team. Agents dont exactly have a long list of promising players who have come here and developed over the last few years to tell their clients about do they. Its basically just Richarlison.
I think the notion of getting talented young players in on loan from big sides etc is another that is sadly stunted by the working practices of the owner…. If you have a sought after, talented youngster on your books and want him to go out, get game time and learn….are you really going to send him to a club who don’t invest a great deal of time in developing young players on-site (as in we send them out elsewhere) and who more-often-than-not sack the coach who maybe wanted to bring them in after a few months? It’s just disruptive and the risk of wasting the players time would be deemed as high. I can see why they wouldn’t trust us or entertain loan bids from us. You’d obviously look to get them somewhere far more settled.
That's a whole different issue. It does often make sense for us to prioritise the signing of players who'll help us with immediate survival though given our aims and often precarious position. My concern though is more that we often either sign players who are too young to make an impact when we might use them, or too past it already. Our 3 signings this Jan seem signs that we might've learned something in this regard however. Wilmot - wasn't good enough Quina - wasn't good enough Lukebakio - was good enough, but preferred to stay in Germany Penaranda - wasn't good enough, plus his loans were to get a work permit Cucho - his loans were also to get a work permit and he did develop, now that he has a work permit he has been given plenty of chances. However, jury still out on whether he's really going to be good enough Suarez - his loans were also to get a work permit and he did develop; unsurprisingly preferred to stay in La Liga rather than the Championship Estupinan - excactly the same as Suarez. The Pozzos did the Spain loans things previously so they could sign young players from abroad for cheap in to their network, then get them work permits as quick as possible which wold also help to increase their value. Joao Pedro is a player signed with a similar profile to Suarez, Cucho etc., but because of the changed work permit rules we didn't need to ship him around Spain first before he could play for us so he's been given chances sooner. I expect it will also be a similar story with Yasser Asprilla from next summer.
Wilmot - championship quality defender (like most of our CBs), but he at least has room to improve. Incredibly young to write off for a player in that position. Quina - Not sure it is a lack of talent, but a lack of application from him and some confusing decisions to freeze him out of the team. I still think his development could be handled better but he deserves a lot of the blame himself. Lukebakio - why was he restricted to 10 minutes of game time over 6 months while Carillo was playing poorly most weeks? Not surprised he wanted to leave, by all accounts other players were telling him they couldn't understand why he was not getting game time. Penaranda - Again, not sure it is a lack of talent but a lack of application. Not sure we could have changed that, but dont think the constant loans helped. We totally ****ed the work permit by moving him to Udinese for no reason. He would have been able to come 2 years earlier if he had just stayed in Spain. Cucho - The closest thing to a success out of this group. Estupinan - He was eligible in previous seasons - we just chose to loan him out. He gave an interview saying as much. I think its more just a case of not making these players feel like Watford players. They are just "pozzo" players and never offered the chance to integrate in pre-season etc. Suarez - Similar to Estupinan but maybe more of a success than a loss and just bad timing on the relegation. Absolutely no issue with experience like Kamara, Samir etc. my issue is with experience like Kucka and Gosling. Players who are so far past their peak and only headed one way.
The way this is written/reported, in the context of it being from 'ghanasoccernet', is hilarious. The headline says 'England-born Ghanaian teenager', which grabs the attention, only to see that the banner image of the article is the player in question in an England jersey Amidst that slight confusion, it is only with the very last sentence that it is clarified: Ah, right - so he's just English then. Englishman, born in England, who plays youth football for the English national team. (This is not a comment about generational immigration and feelings of belonging to multiple cultures, etc, in the slightest, it's just quite funny from a reporting sense - a bit like the parent in 'Our Big Fat Greek Wedding' who says everything ever was originally invented by the Greeks - in no footballing way is there any serious reason/justification to describe him as Ghanaian)
False - Estupinan wasn't eligible until summer 2020; so a lot of it was just bad timing on the relegation: http://sportwitness.co.uk/watford-recall-estupinan-atletico-madrid-transfer/ Suarez got his just before Jan 2020, when he was already on loan, so the same: http://sportwitness.co.uk/i-look-forward-playing-england-watford-owned-player-got-paperwork-sorted/ .... Wilmot - yes Champ quality defender, but we are in the Prem - he's not even Stoke's best prospect; they sold Collins to Burnley in the Prem and Souttar is better. The odds are stacked against Wilmot being good enough for Prem. Quina - he's not shown enough everywhere he's gone so far, not Watford's fault. Lukebakio was still young and raw when he arrived. The game time on loan really did his development good, but he preferred to stay. Penaranda - again you really can't blame Watford for this - he's flopped everyhwhere he's gone. Gosling was a good signing, even if only a short-term one, in that he helped us get over the line in winning promotion. Kucka was completely daft, sure, but maybe the Pozzos have learned a bit from it judging by this Jan window so far.
I’m just not at all convinced we couldn’t have got Gosling for at least a year less that we gave him. Did exactly what we needed him to do but was never gonna be good enough this year. But I can accept giving him a years PL security as a sweetener. But 2 years was another stupid call from us.
Another point about having an academy is raising these kids the Watford way, well Watford doesn’t have a way unless you call going some bizarre place in Europe on loan and see if your successful then you’ll probably get your chance somewhere once we’ve lined our pockets with profit. Plus the poxbury’s don’t scout local they’re trying to prove the world they can find the next Sanchez. Say we have that decent cat 1 academy producing the odd handful of players, this is what gives you that identity local boys in some cases that the fans relate to. We don’t have any of that which for me is part the problem. From having one of the most successful youth projects in the country under GT and TW to nothing is depressing but that’s part of the pozbury model I guess. Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk
You absolutely can give Watford some of the blame for Penaranda, he was doing great for Granada at such a young age, and could have got a Spanish passport a lot earlier had we loaned him out there again, but we inexplicably loaned him to Udinese where he hardly played, which also meant that he couldn't get his Spanish passport until about a year ago. Gosling did help us over the line last season, but you could argue that he's hindered us being able to bring better players in for this season
Again, this isn't necessarily our 'Pozzo model' or lack of club structure - I'm sure the club would love it if they could save a bunch of money by producing local youth players ready for the first team. Plus our academy can't be a complete failure when they've managed to produce some excellent technical footballers who are youth internationals, like Galvez was from what I saw, and who I'm guessing this guy must have been to represent England and do well. But every prospect who might come through gets taken, that's the crux of it.
I do wonder if having a Cat 1 academy (and the investment in coaching etc that goes with it) would help us to keep these players though. Brighton, Saints, Villa, Leicester, Derby, Birmingham City etc seem to be able to hang onto a good number of their talented youngsters - at least until they are of age to make senior appearances and they move for real money. Whereas, we are losing players at 16-17 for a pittance because that is what the EPPP system permits.
Just watching the AFCON, if we’re still in the market for a CB there’s a man mountain playing for Nigeria who has had Salah in his pocket all night. Didn’t quite catch his name, something double barrelled.
That’s it the return on youngsters coming through isn’t worth it for them. Even if the big clubs couldn’t swoop in and ambush anything with potential. Not saying what the Pozzo do is wrong just it’s starting to wear thin on the identity of our club. We are now that ginger kid that gets picked on for having no soul. Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk
He’s been pretty bad every time I’ve watched him. Presumably would be as a Samir replacement. Udinese after a lot of CBs at the moment; linked with Jhon Chancellor at Brescia and Stephen Welsh at Celtic as well.
Newcastle looking at Beto from Udinese now. Not sure how that works out if he's on loan there. He's having a good season for them in fairness.
I think they tried to beat us to the signing of Karnezis in the past. Not sure if they are aware who owns Udinese.
Filip Benkovic having Udinese medical now as well as them being in talks to sign Mari from Arsenal. I find it slightly odd that they ship us their CBs and then recruit 2 more from the PL.
