Academy Vs Notts Forest

Quoted from diehardmariner

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 lew chaterleys lover

That is a well argued post, and exactly as you say if they are not ready at a certain age they are jettisoned.

The other factor of course is that a lot of players look fabulous at 14, 15 16 years of age. Then suddenly they lose it; usually because at the younger ages they were faster, stronger than their peers. Suddenly the other kids catch them up in terms of physique and what was so easy a year or two before now becomes much more difficult.

I have seen young players in the youth set up in the past who could not trap the proverbial bag of cement, but were bigger stronger and faster. A couple of years later they are nowhere to be seen.

If the youth system was based on ability on the ball, a sense of what the game is all about and a complete acceptance that physical attributes in the young age group mean absolutely nothing when they reach maturity then I would back that.

There are many reports of even England youth teams who were great at 16, falling by the wayside to such an extent that only one or two made it into the professional game. I suppose the point I am making is that very very few players who were fantastic at 16, go on to make a career in the game. This is for a whole host of reasons - injuries, lifestyle, commitment or lack of, apathy or whatever.    

In a more general sense it is blindingly obvious that young players physically mature at such different rates is absolutely crazy to have them in the same team. At school, when I was 14 I was about 4ft and 5 stone wet through, a complete child, yet was in the same team and against boys who shaved every day, were 6foot and about 14 stone and this was still the same set up many years later in all the local lads football teams but I am not sure what it is like today.

This is, therefore, a conundrum for clubs like ours. Do we spend money on a youth set up, which may win things at a very young age, but is statistically proven to provide very few first team players, or do we pick up well thought of players who are let go by bigger clubs who have got to an age when their ability can be relied upon, but are not quite good enough for the club they have left - for example Ryan Bennett.

A lot depends on what sort of player the manager is looking for; how long he stays and whether the youth set up is here for a generation with specific aims or will disappear into the ether when a new manager comes along.