Academy Vs Notts Forest

Notts Forest..who?

Quoted from lew chaterleys lover

And Exeter are still in league 2. It is nice to have the £3 million obviously, minus the cost of running the Youth set up of course. Investment in the first team squad, with one or two promising youth players is great. Relying on a youth system to save us and produce a first team to be proud of is unlikely in the extreme.

But that £3 million could be instrumental in keeping the club solvent. This was a model that Dario Gradi practised at Crewe for years - every decent player that thet developed and sold kept the club financially secure.

I'd take £3m over two seasons in return for 3 homegrown players! Exeter might still be in League 2 but they've done much better than us with a historically lower fanbase, and their ground is getting upgraded piece by piece. I'd be very happy if we took a few leaves out of their book.

Quoted from forza ivano

Good points on both sides.there's a long list going back 30 years of youngsters coming through playing a couple o f games and disappearing into obscurity, Graham hockless anyone?

Terrible example as Hockless didn't come through our yoof system

There are several young players who's careers were blighted by being force on too early,David Soames,Jonathan Rowan,Darren Mansarram,to name a few..

So....did anyone go ?

It was a good day. Only really know how the younger age groups got on, where there were some really good games against very good opposition. Don't know any actual scores other than u11s and u12s, where at both ages the Town boys won.

Quoted from friskneymariner

There are several young players who's careers were blighted by being force on too early,David Soames,Jonathan Rowan,Darren Mansarram,to name a few..

Mansaram, yes.  Expected to play as the lone striker in a struggling Championship (as it is now) side was borderline cruel to the lad.  I saw him in the reserves the year before he broke through and he was a completely different player.  Confident, intelligent, strong, quick and deadly in front of goal.  In the first team he just looked like a rabbit in headlights, totally shot of any confidence.  Definitely one of those cases that we'll never know but I think it's difficult to argue that he would have benefited from a more gradual introduction into the first team.

Soames and Rowan?  Not sure about that.  Soames was blighted with injuries whereas Rowan was a few months shy of 20 when he made his debut and nearly 21 before he was regarded a first teamer.  

I don't think there's a tested method for when you play young lads.  John Oster, albeit a once in a generation type talent, was more than well equipped for the professional game at 17.  I look at some of the young lads we've got on our bench who are a year or two older and they're nowhere near that level yet.  Equally so someone like Mattie Pollock looks as if he will be able to more than be a physical match for anyone in the professional game.  

The difference between Town and far bigger clubs when it comes to youth development is time.  Bigger and richer clubs can afford to develop their players beyond the age of 18, hence why the big clubs give contracts to everyone beyond 18.  We, on the other hand can't afford that.  Whilst the young professionals might not break the bank, when it comes to a first team budget the pressure is on to make sure it's spent to benefit the first team.

Paul Hurst was a classic example of this.  Year on year he would hold back a little bit of his budget for a few loan signings towards the end of the season with the sole intention of giving the squad a boost for the final push.  Ultimately a lot of those signings were bloody useless (Anthony Straker, Christian Jolley, Dougie Wilson....).   It used to frustrate the life out of me that we spent wages on these guys when we could have given another year to some of the talented youth team lads who weren't quite there at 18 but might have been worth a gamble to see how they developed up to 20.  

The response seems to be that the lads we release never go onto anything better.  They end up at Clee Town, Grimsby Borough, Brigg, Grantham, Armthorpe etc. I don't think this is a reflection on the ability of the lads, not all of them anyway, but more the fact that they've nowhere to go but to the semi-professional levels.  Once they drop down to that level they're training less, they don't develop at the same rate they would at a professional level, they pursue other careers, they develop vices....some will bounce back.  There's plenty of stories of players getting released from professional clubs, going non-league and coming back even better.  But for every Jamie Vardy there are hundreds of Joe Lightowler's.  

From the outside looking in it looks very much like Jolley has committed to the fact that he wants a steady supply of youth team graduates making the step up into the professional set-up each and every year.  He's probably ring fenced part of his budget to accommodate that too.  He knows that not all of the lads who get a professional deal will end up having a significant career with us or in the game, but those with a degree of talent and appetite have had the opportunity to see how they fare with the men.

That, to me, is a great approach.  We struggle to recruit, that much is bloody obvious to anyone.   If you can't bring players in from the other side of the country, why not try everything to develop the potential talent you've got under your nose?

Quoted from Mariner16

Notts Forest..who?

Only Notts Forest fans are allowed/supposed to bite at references to Notts Forest.

Quoted from diehardmariner

Soames and Rowan?  Not sure about that.  Soames was blighted with injuries....

Aye, he never started a league game for us!