Dayle Southwell

In my eyes the issue isn't just about the youth coaches, the facilities or even the funding.

It's about the gap between youth football and professional football.  The gulf in both technical and physical terms is huge!  Generally speaking we give one-year deals to the lads who have just graduated from the youth team and expect them to develop physically, technically and mentally to the level of an established professional. If they're to remain at the club not only are they required to match the level of the existing professionals but to surpass them.  For a side like ours without a reserve team and incredibly limited first team opportunities, that's virtually impossible.

Once we ditch this idea that every player reaches their potential at 17 or 18 then we'll see higher retention of youth players.  Southwell is a classic example of a lad who could have done with another year or so to find his feet as a young professional.  

Southwell looks to have benefited from having to drop down a level and is fortunate that he didn't have to drop too far where he can rebuild his career and more importantly continue his education.  He's in a small minority though as most lads released after a brief spell as a young pro lose heart and drift down the footballing ladder.  Some where never good enough, some we'll never know.

This new TV money does need to filter down into grass roots more.  We need more coaches, we need better facilities, we need to make coaching more attractive and accessible.  But we also need to develop a structure where young players aren't judged until their much older.

Quoted from grimsby pete

Good points but I said at the time we should have kept him,

Then loaned him out for a season,

Does anybody have an idea how much that would have cost the club, ?

It's a figure weighed up against what else that money was used for.  For example, we'll say the money saved on giving Southwell another contract was used to sign Palmer on loan.  Is Hurst right to use it for that?  

Hurst is in a results driven business, instant results at that.  Considering half of the home crowd boo when we're drawing 0-0 after fifteen minutes it's highly unlikely he'll keep his job if he looks to build a long term project is it?

Forget the mega-rich clubs who can afford to have a dedicated youth set-up, a professional set-up and then a development squad.  When finances are tight, you fight fires.  Our fire is getting out of this league, not developing a team for the next generation.  I believe Southwell would have offered something to this squad this season, but I can sure as hell see why Hurst felt the money could be better spent elsewhere in the short-term.

As a side note.  How about this scenario.  

Keeping Southwell this year - rough workings £300 a week, £15,600 a year.  Add 20% employee contributions = £18720.

Or let him go to Boston, see what he can do.....if he impresses we put an offer in for him at £20k?  What did Hearn cost us, £30k?

I agree with the above post to a degree but I see the main problem for youths trying to get into the 1st team is,

No reserve team,

In years gone by young players got toughen up playing for the reserves as well as the youth team,

Lets hope when we get back into the league we will reinstate the reserve team.

I didn't think Southwell showed anything to suggest he was worth keeping personally. The times I saw him he didn't impress. I thought it was the right decision to let him go.

That said, I am delighted he has had such a successful season and wish him all the best.

I wish we would stop all these posts about Southwell.

1. Hurst would not go back in for him, despite his record in the league below, as basically he doesn't want to look like he was wrong (look a c*nt).
How many managers release players and resign them when they prove themselves? Not many.
No manager likes to be proven wrong.

2. I don't think that Dayle would resign for Grimsby even if we was interested again.
If it was me, I wouldn't want to sign back for a team who didn't let me prove myself.

3. He's playing in the league below. Is it a massive difference of standard? I honest don't know.


Lets leave him, Hearn, Jack Lester etc etc to just get on with their careers/lives.

Pete you are not living in the past IMO, truth is that Hurst whatever he wiould say would have him back in a jiffy but he won`t Yorkshire pride and all that, you can spin it all you like and I`m sure his water carriers on here will try, but his scoring record in a league below where incidentally we have been known during his time here, to have trawled for a prolific striker has been excellent.
Got rid of too soon IMO

Didn't he score goals for us when he had the chance ?

Regardles he isn't a town player anymore so we need to move on but can't help but think anyone top of the conf north scoring charts would interest us.

Strange because he never looked like he could make us improve but did score..

Maybe one Paul wrong.

I think the difference between Southwell ( and Cook too ) is that Hurst would have played them a lot more (or at least thought about playing them more) if they had scored more when in the team

I'm not saying that they didn't score regularly but to secure their place in the team they would have had to have been on fire and therefore basically undroppable (if that's a word)

Contrast this with Lenny for example (and this is not a criticism of him at all) who is chosen more or less week in week out because he has other attributes

I think we had a discussion on here once about what constitutes a striker and what constitutes a goal scorer...Lenny fits the bill as a striker because he's there as a target man, holds up play and chips in with goals.

Southwell and Cook (and maybe also Hannah) are more goalscorers and Hurst's approach (or so it seems to me) is that they are a luxury unless they are more than prolific

It's all about style and which players suit the manager's tactics...a situation which we as fans can have opinions about but can't really affect

The bottom line is two ex forwards have moved on and so have we...it Southwell and Cook get back in to the Conference Prem (or whatever it'll be called next season) and find their feet again at this level, then good luck to them.

I'm just hoping we get up via the playoffs and arguments about their respective merits can be put to bed once and for all because by then, we should then be looking forward as a league club and not back over our shoulders at our time out of the league

Quoted from FishOutOfWater

I think the difference between Southwell ( and Cook too ) is that Hurst would have played them a lot more (or at least thought about playing them more) if they had scored more when in the team

I'm not saying that they didn't score regularly but to secure their place in the team they would have had to have been on fire and therefore basically undroppable (if that's a word)

Contrast this with Lenny for example (and this is not a criticism of him at all) who is chosen more or less week in week out because he has other attributes

I think we had a discussion on here once about what constitutes a striker and what constitutes a goal scorer...Lenny fits the bill as a striker because he's there as a target man, holds up play and chips in with goals.

Southwell and Cook (and maybe also Hannah) are more goalscorers and Hurst's approach (or so it seems to me) is that they are a luxury unless they are more than prolific

It's all about style and which players suit the manager's tactics...a situation which we as fans can have opinions about but can't really affect

The bottom line is two ex forwards have moved on and so have we...it Southwell and Cook get back in to the Conference Prem (or whatever it'll be called next season) and find their feet again at this level, then good luck to them.

I'm just hoping we get up via the playoffs and arguments about their respective merits can be put to bed once and for all because by then, we should then be looking forward as a league club and not back over our shoulders at our time out of the league

Well put Tim.

The biggest problem we have in developing 1st year pro's is that we don't have a reserve team. Apart from training ground exercises and the occasional friendly , the youngsters don't experience competitive football on a regular basis. Even if they  could play at 8th or 9th league tier level this would surely be better than just constant training and the occasional cameo role coming off the bench.