Youth Development in the UK

gosplan

Great piece by David James recently in the Observer, not sure if it got any mention here.

David James wrote:

I hate to say it, but the future of English talent in football looks grim. We have created a system that hoovers up and spits out vast numbers of kids, without developing them into great players. It is a numbers game of shameless opulence – why invest in developing a player when you can just buy more in?

Not that this has halted the demand for more kids to be introduced to the system. At even the youngest age level, football is becoming a factory production line. Clubs are snapping up eight-year-olds – I heard that one of the Big Four have as many as 250 on their books. I was pretty shocked at that – and wasn't sure if it was true – until I asked around at Portsmouth and discovered that we have 180 under-nines.

So thousands of young kids are being affiliated, from a very early age, to big clubs. And when our group of 180 make it to 16 years old, all of a sudden they are competing not only with 179 British kids, but with players of the same age that clubs recruit from abroad. How demoralising.

This trend of buying young talent from overseas is pure laziness. Why are we reaching across the Channel every time we need a quick-fix teenage sensation? Is there such a gulf in talent between England and the rest of the world?

A reunion with my old Watford youth-team coach, Tom Whalley, at Wembley the other week reminded me what youth football used to be about. He would pick me up from my house in Welwyn Garden City and take me to training because my mum didn't drive. Even Rio remembered him. Years ago, Rio came off in a match against Watford youth and Tom said: "You're going to be a great player one day." Rio said he never forgot that comment, it made him feel fantastic.

Tom is a landscape gardener now. Football has changed and the youth system doesn't seem to look after its players in the way that he thinks is important. He says it's more like one big supermarket, churning out footballer ready meals.

We seem to have the balance wrong. Yes, we want young footballers to develop their skills, but we also want them to have a childhood and enjoy the game. When I was a kid I read Bob Wilson's autobiography. After every match, Bob's dad used to ask him: "Did you enjoy the game?" regardless of the result. That's what we should be teaching our kids, not career advice on how to become the next Wayne Rooney. Football shouldn't feel like a job to an eight-year-old.

Couple that with our inability to teach our kids the basic skills and you can see the mess we're in. Youth coaches keep telling me young footballers can't perform the basic elements of the game any more. They can do all of Cristiano Ronaldo's tricks, but they can't pull off a defence-splitting pass like Stevie G.

I spoke to some of the England lads and they say they are surprised how often their clubs identify a superstar kid one week and forget him the next. To me that doesn't feel good. Every player has their own development timeline. Football is littered with examples from Rod Thomas at Watford, "the next Pelé" aged 14 – playing for Carlisle United aged 23 – to Ian Wright, spotted playing park football aged 21.

But when clubs attempt a shortcut, hoarding talent by increasing their squad sizes to ridiculous figures, as in Liverpool's 62 professional first-team players, they may as well throw in the towel on the development side of the game.

That may sound harsh, but why then have Liverpool produced so few great English players in recent years? Who has come through since Steven Gerrard and Jamie Carragher? Two players in 12 odd years is a very low success rate.

Arsenal have Jack Wilshere, which gives you some hope, but that's just one English lad in a huge academy structure. At Portsmouth I can't name a single current first-team player who came through the youth system. If you're one of these 180 eight-year-olds, how will that make you feel?

With big clubs increasingly making a habit of loaning out their players to smaller clubs, football is ever more supermarket-like, opening up Tesco's locals, messing with local talent. If the loan system worked I wouldn't mind, but how can a club with 62 first-team players seriously keep tabs on all their loanees? And if they're not actively tracking their development, then what is the point of a loan? As for reserve teams, well, you're better off playing for anyone's first team than a Premier League club's reserves. It's meaningless.

What's the answer? Academies and youth programmes should be set up by the FA and the Premier League without direct affiliations to clubs. Kids should be concentrating on learning to play and enjoying the game up to the age of 16, not worrying about which club they should sign for. And create a meaningful link between the youth and the professionals, as Paul Hart has begun to do at Portsmouth – his background in youth football influencing his approach. Lose the ready meals, and we may just start seeing some quality produce.

Pepe LeFrits

The top clubs in Holland do exactly what he's described there. Doesn't seem to be doing them much harm.