Youth Better than Transfers in?

[Professor]

It has been said that you never win anything with kids but many players who go on to have international careers are already worth a Premier League first team place at 18 or even younger. We have the obvious cases in point of Walcott, Bale and Chamberlain. The limit on subs in the Championship has restricted the opportunities to try out the current young players in any meaningful way and in the Prem its may be unlikely that Adkins will risk more than one young player at a time in a starting role. As I recall, I don't think Walcott and Bale played together very much in the first team, if at all.

 

But if its true that we do have 3 or 4 players coming on with Premier League potential, how can the club go about giving them a try, because if players are brought in at a fee for the relevant positions the opportunities will become even more limited. Not sure how this is going to work, or what risks are involved.

[Thedelldays]

if we don't sign anyone....we will go down

[Supersubpuckett]

relying on our academy would be suicide, we need to upgrade the team - i'll let adkins and co worry about introducing the youth but the priority has to be establishing ourselves as a strong premier league side.

[The Kraken]

Everyone raves about our youth system; and it has produced a lot of talent. If we try to rely just on that though we'll have enormous problems. You just need to look at what our best team would be of academy graduates playing today to see that, while we've produced some great players, its not going to provide us with an all-conquering team. Arguably our best lineup could look like this:

Michael Poke

 

Chris Baird - Mike Williamson - Martin Cranie - Wayne Bridge

 

Adam Lallana - Alex Oxlade-Chamberlain - Andrew Surman - Gareth Bale

 

Leon Best - Theo Walcott

 

Without wishing to enter into a debate about our best ex-academy XI, that team wouldn't hold up to much in the Premier League (even though it has provided us with a huge amount of revenue). Its great to have a youth system to rely upon, but it very much needs to be backed up with a strong transfer policy to achieve any form of success.

[Doctoroncall]

It's difficult to gauge without the youngsters at least getting some first team action as to whether they can make the grade. Some will of course progress faster than others and it's always been a challenge of how they get the first team experience - loan, sub appearances or straight into the team. Also how long do you keep hold of them before they are ready.

 

Complete different for transfers where the club should have done enough scouting of the player to see he has the footballing skills to contribute and enhance what the team already have. Only a question of whether he likes a change, the club and can get along with the other players.

[PhilippineSaint]

Everyone raves about our youth system; and it has produced a lot of talent. If we try to rely just on that though we'll have enormous problems. You just need to look at what our best team would be of academy graduates playing today to see that, while we've produced some great players, its not going to provide us with an all-conquering team. Arguably our best lineup could look like this:

Michael Poke

 

Chris Baird - Mike Williamson - Martin Cranie - Wayne Bridge

 

Adam Lallana - Alex Oxlade-Chamberlain - Andrew Surman - Gareth Bale

 

Leon Best - Theo Walcott

 

Without wishing to enter into a debate about our best ex-academy XI, that team wouldn't hold up to much in the Premier League (even though it has provided us with a huge amount of revenue). Its great to have a youth system to rely upon, but it very much needs to be backed up with a strong transfer policy to achieve any form of success.

 

You could have put MLT, Stevie Williams, a couple of Wallaces even Shearer at a push with these additions you could get a reasonable team that would hold it's own in the 1st division or what ever itis called these days.

[BadgerBadger]

Loan deals will be required to get them match experience plus don't we get access to a better reserve league inthe Prem?

[JPTCount]

is both an option?

[Give it to Ron]

Isnt that what the Carling Cup is for???

[Doctoroncall]

You could have put MLT, Stevie Williams, a couple of Wallaces even Shearer at a push with these additions you could get a reasonable team that would hold it's own in the 1st division or what ever itis called these days.

 

I think he's going for players that are currently playing rather than a best XI over the decades.

[70's Mike]

You could have put MLT, Stevie Williams, a couple of Wallaces even Shearer at a push with these additions you could get a reasonable team that would hold it's own in the 1st division or what ever itis called these days.

 

problem with all this listing a team spanning 30 plus years, if you include Steve Williams, proves that Academy alone will not work

[The Kraken]

I think he's going for players that are currently playing rather than a best XI over the decades.

 

Indeed. As I said "academy graduates playing today", so in theory if we kept hold of all our academy players, the best team we could put out for the Premier League.

[The Kraken]

Has anyone ever suggested academy alone? If they have they're insane.

 

No, of course they haven't. I put that team down just to highlight how much the team will need to be backed up by transfers.

 

In reality if we get one graduate per year who can make the first team squad, that will be a fantastic achievement.

[buctootim]

I'd understood from interviews over the last two years that the aim was to eventually have half the first team made up of academy graduates. In the most recent interview on Saintsplayer Adkins talks about 50% of the academy graduates becoming professional footballers. Dont know if this is a separate aim, backing away from 50% of team aim, or just a slip of the tongue.

[PhilippineSaint]

problem with all this listing a team spanning 30 plus years' date=' if you include Steve Williams, proves that Academy alone will not work[/quote']

 

Well unless they increase the size of the academy (which they are doing now) how many pupils/ trainees apprentices will actually be there ? for the last few years each year 1 or 2 players have come through that are good enough for the first team. To extrapolate that to get a complete team you probably need 10 times the amount of students the academy is never going to accommodate that amount of people so you will still have to look at buying some players in to get a proper team even Barcelona do actually buy players they are not all home grown.

[hutch]

I'd understood from interviews over the last two years that the aim was to eventually have half the first team made up of academy graduates. In the most recent interview on Saintsplayer Adkins talks about 50% of the academy graduates becoming professional footballers. Dont know if this is a separate aim, backing away from 50% of team aim, or just a slip of the tongue.

Means one player breaking through every season & hanging on to your graduates for an average of 5 years after they make the first team. That's not out of the question.

[The Kraken]

Means one player breaking through every season & hanging on to your graduates for an average of 5 years after they make the first team. That's not out of the question.

 

Not out of the question, but bloody difficult. Just bringing one player through per season capable of playing in the first team would be a remarkable achievement. Then getting them to stay for an average of 5 years would be, frankly, astonishing. I don't think you could point to any Premier League club in the past 10 years who has been capable of getting anywhere near that on a year-on-year basis.

[Frank's cousin]

Not out of the question, but bloody difficult. Just bringing one player through per season capable of playing in the first team would be a remarkable achievement. Then getting them to stay for an average of 5 years would be, frankly, astonishing. I don't think you could point to any Premier League club in the past 10 years who has been capable of getting anywhere near that on a year-on-year basis.

 

To be fair though, not many have tried preferring to splash cash, especially on cheaper foreign imports. Need to try and create a culture that they have in many Bundesliga clubs where young players will generally see out their first contract at least.

[Thedelldays]

To be fair though' date=' not many have tried preferring to splash cash, especially on cheaper foreign imports. Need to try and create a culture that they have in many Bundesliga clubs where young players will generally see out their first contract at least.[/quote']

of course they have tried...just look at aston villa right now

[Frank's cousin]

of course they have tried...just look at aston villa right now

 

 

What part of 'not many' did you not understand? had I said no one, you would have been correct

[Alanh]

of course they have tried...just look at aston villa right now

Villa, Everton, Arsenal and Man Utd are probably the best examples of prem clubs bringing through players from their academy in the last 5 - 10 years. They have shown it's possible, you've then got to blend them into the squad along with transfers and have a manager that is committed to the whole system. I think we've got the manager to do it, and I think that the new acadamy will attract the players so we should achieve the objective given time.

 

The thing that each of those clubs have in common is their long established status in the Prem which makes them more secure in terms of not panic buying players. It might therefore take us a few years to get established (possibly with some relegation and promotion) before we can also have the same number of players coming through.

[david in sweden]

Everyone raves about our youth system; and it has produced a lot of talent.

 

Michael Poke

 

Chris Baird - Mike Williamson - Martin Cranie - Wayne Bridge

 

Adam Lallana - Alex Oxlade-Chamberlain - Andrew Surman - Gareth Bale

 

Leon Best - Theo Walcott

 

[/center]

Without wishing to enter into a debate about our best ex-academy XI, that team wouldn't hold up to much in the Premier League (even though it has provided us with a huge amount of revenue). Its great to have a youth system to rely upon, but it very much needs to be backed up with a strong transfer policy to achieve any form of success.

 

 

..but of course you just have, and several times more, too I note. .

However, you're right of course. Threads like this read like ....the Greatest Saints XI ever, but they are pointless because they span large periods of time and some of the players weren't even at the club at the some time. Those listed on #1 cover more than a decade, and even the styles of play and League status at the time, were different .

 

The one common factor is that most of our successful " nursery/ youth / Academy" sides (whatever you want to call them) over the last 50 years were talented youngsters coming into moderately successful sides at a good time and who were allowed time to play themselves into the first team squad.

Very rarely have more than a couple of "young-ish" players come in and established themselves in the same era. The one generation that produced the most

-though not all in the same period was Dave Merrington's youth squads from the mid 1980's for almost 10 years, and the list is well known to older fans; Le Tissier, Shearer, Maddison, Jeff Kenna, the three Wallace Brothers, George Lawrence, Graham Baker, Steve Baker, Maskell, Puckett, Benali , Banger, all impacted the first team to a greater or lesser degree, and many went on to make careers in other clubs.

 

Exceptions were Ted Bates' sides in the early 60's.. and Lawries Mac's early 80 sides where the team included numerous Internationals, which made it easier for youngsters to play themselves in.

 

The same is not true today. Few players who haven't debuted by the age of 20 ,have much chance of even being retained, let alone becoming a regular .

It's interesting to have so many Academy lads currently mentioned in the same breath, but only time will tell which ones will make it ..especially in the Prem.

 

NA will "experiment " a bit, particulary in Cup comps, I expect to see 4 or 5 getting a game once in a while, but very lucky to see even ONE get regular games.

Edited 19 May, 2012 by david in sweden

[The Kraken]

To be fair though' date=' not many have tried preferring to splash cash, especially on cheaper foreign imports. Need to try and create a culture that they have in many Bundesliga clubs where young players will generally see out their first contract at least.[/quote']

 

I don't think you can say that many clubs have made a rational choice to "not try". Its just that it is fantastically difficult to have only 1 youth team player break through every single year and be a Premier league star. If it was relatively easy then everyone would do it. Clubs will try and bring through as much talent as they possibly can, but as good as any youth setup is it will be need to be significantly supplemented by transfers in. Its why some clubs simply don't see the value in a top academy and have gone to such measures as to reduce the youth team, scrap the reserve team etc. Top clubs simply have to have a decent academy setup, but any player that comes through to the first team is seen as a bonus rather than significantly relying on the youth setup to build the squad.

Edited 18 May, 2012 by The Kraken

[eelpie]

An interesting thread. My squad list below of possibly the best players from the past who came through Saints youth systems (whether from schoolboys or as apprentices or the Academy) over many years show how few quality defenders we have produced. (And I wouldn't really include Poke who has not yet proved himself at first team level, so we really haven't ever produced a keeper).

 

We have though been awash with top quality forwards and midfielders, many great legends. So it's no surprise we are well known over the years for producing players who play attractive, attacking football -the Southampton Style - yet we have not generally been strong defensively.

 

The point about showing a list from a long period of time is to show how few really good players emerge from the ranks each season. And although there are impressive names here, we should not delude ourselves. Over 50 years we have produced about 24 very decent players on my reckoning. On average just under two a year. How many prospects are there now in the pipeline and ready to move up to Premiership level? A big ask. It's almost certain that despite a lot of promising academy and development squad performances we have not yet enough up and coming youths to eventually sustain a Premiership squad without strengthening from outside. It takes some years to reach their full potential, and yet we must not be impatient.

 

I do reckon most of our current team are good enough to do well - probably Kelvin, Chaps, Jack Cork, Frazer, Guly, Jose, Dan Seaborne, Danny Fox, Jos, Adam, Rickie, Tad, Morgan and Billy. Also from the development squad, Luke and JWP are good enough to be given opportunities. Mostly on the bench I reckon will be Deano, Aaron, Dan Harding, Steve, Dan and Lee Barnard who deserve the chance to prove themselves, but will all have to work hard to make the grade. But there are weaknesses.

 

We simply do not have strength in depth at the back, and we have not been successful in producing enough good defenders. As we all know, here is where we must bring in experienced top level players that are better than we already have, because it will be a while before the younger players will be ready for the Prem. We can't take chances in this first season when we must consolidate our place at the top.

 

Past top 24 alumni:

 

 

. . .. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .. . . . . . (Poke - were there no other keepers?). . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

 

. . . . . . . . . . . . Baird .. Andrewszewski .. M Cranie .. Benali .. Waldron .. Bridge . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

 

Lallana .. Paine .. AOC .. MLT .. S Williams .. Oakley .. G Baker .. Surman .. N Holmes .. Sydenham .. Bale

 

. . . . . . . . . .Chivers .. Channon .. D Wallace .. R Wallace .. Shearer .. L Best .. Walcott. . . . . . . . . . . .

[PhilippineSaint]

An interesting thread. My squad list below of possibly the best players from the past who came through Saints youth systems (whether from schoolboys or as apprentices or the Academy) over many years show how few quality defenders we have produced. (And I wouldn't really include Poke who has not yet proved himself at first team level, so we really haven't ever produced a keeper).

 

We have though been awash with top quality forwards and midfielders, many great legends. So it's no surprise we are well known over the years for producing players who play attractive, attacking football -the Southampton Style - yet we have not generally been strong defensively.

 

The point about showing a list from a long period of time is to show how few really good players emerge from the ranks each season. And although there are impressive names here, we should not delude ourselves. Over 50 years we have produced about 24 very decent players on my reckoning. On average just under two a year. How many prospects are there now in the pipeline and ready to move up to Premiership level? A big ask. It's almost certain that despite a lot of promising academy and development squad performances we have not yet enough up and coming youths to eventually sustain a Premiership squad without strengthening from outside. It takes some years to reach their full potential, and yet we must not be impatient.

 

I do reckon most of our current team are good enough to do well - probably Kelvin, Chaps, Jack Cork, Frazer, Guly, Jose, Dan Seaborne, Danny Fox, Jos, Adam, Rickie, Tad, Morgan and Billy. Also from the development squad, Luke and JWP are good enough to be given opportunities. Mostly on the bench I reckon will be Deano, Aaron, Dan Harding, Steve, Dan and Lee Barnard who deserve the chance to prove themselves, but will all have to work hard to make the grade. But there are weaknesses.

 

We simply do not have strength in depth at the back, and we have not been successful in producing enough good defenders. As we all know, here is where we must bring in experienced top level players that are better than we already have, because it will be a while before the younger players will be ready for the Prem. We can't take chances in this first season when we must consolidate our place at the top.

 

Past top 24 alumni:

 

 

. . .. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .. . . . . . (Poke - were there no other keepers?). . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

 

. . . . . . . . . . . . Baird .. Andrewszewski .. M Cranie .. Benali .. Waldron .. Bridge . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

 

Lallana .. Paine .. AOC .. MLT .. S Williams .. Oakley .. G Baker .. Surman .. N Holmes .. Sydenham .. Bale

 

. . . . . . . . . .Chivers .. Channon .. D Wallace .. R Wallace .. Shearer .. L Best .. Walcott. . . . . . . . . . . .

 

Thats what I was alluding to only not so eloquently

[SNSUN]

If the youngsters are good enough, they should be played, but in the top league with the most exposure, it's a tough call to make. Without signings we'll go down, but the youth do have bit parts to play. Thank God the bench is 7 players again, and one youngster could get on it every game.

[Pugwash]

Jason Dodd's article on the OS sums it up neatly:

 

"A few of them will become pros, so they will be working a lot closer with Martin [Hunter, Under 21 coach]."

 

"A few of them will hopefully get as close as they can to the First Team squad..."

 

The point is they're not looking at whole teams of players, or even just three or four, coming though every season, just the cream of the crop. If the aim is to have half the squad home grown, then the Academy only needs to produce, on average, one in every year group who is capable of playing first team football with the Saints.

[mattyd]

It has been said that you never win anything with kids but many players who go on to have international careers are already worth a Premier League first team place at 18 or even younger. We have the obvious cases in point of Walcott, Bale and Chamberlain. The limit on subs in the Championship has restricted the opportunities to try out the current young players in any meaningful way and in the Prem its may be unlikely that Adkins will risk more than one young player at a time in a starting role. As I recall, I don't think Walcott and Bale played together very much in the first team, if at all.

 

But if its true that we do have 3 or 4 players coming on with Premier League potential, how can the club go about giving them a try, because if players are brought in at a fee for the relevant positions the opportunities will become even more limited. Not sure how this is going to work, or what risks are involved.

 

Most clubs loan youth players out to get experience and match strengh. The League Cup is another avenue to play these guys. We would have learnt from the dark days of being hammered with youth dominating the team.

[sir_fred]

I know that Cortese is looking at Barcelona with several starters inte first team from the academy. That will take a really long time and probably won't actually happen. I would though be very pleased if our youth development can work as it does in Man U where they though have failed to deliver starting players the last couple of years but have delivered plent of squad players. Own developed players are much more likely to accept a role on the bench and will behave better. I think it is the right step to promote those players as I prefer them to players like Puncheon in the squad anyday. All signings this year should also be better than those we have.

[david in sweden]

An interesting thread. My squad list below of possibly the best players from the past who came through Saints youth systems (whether from schoolboys or as apprentices or the Academy) over many years show how few quality defenders we have produced. (And I wouldn't really include Poke who has not yet proved himself at first team level, so we really haven't ever produced a keeper).

 

We have though been awash with top quality forwards and midfielders, many great legends. So it's no surprise we are well known over the years for producing players who play attractive, attacking football -the Southampton Style - yet we have not generally been strong defensively.

 

The point about showing a list from a long period of time is to show how few really good players emerge from the ranks each season. And although there are impressive names here, we should not delude ourselves. Over 50 years we have produced about 24 very decent players on my reckoning. On average just under two a year. How many prospects are there now in the pipeline and ready to move up to Premiership level? A big ask. It's almost certain that despite a lot of promising academy and development squad performances we have not yet enough up and coming youths to eventually sustain a Premiership squad without strengthening from outside. It takes some years to reach their full potential, and yet we must not be impatient.

 

I do reckon most of our current team are good enough to do well - probably Kelvin, Chaps, Jack Cork, Frazer, Guly, Jose, Dan Seaborne, Danny Fox, Jos, Adam, Rickie, Tad, Morgan and Billy. Also from the development squad, Luke and JWP are good enough to be given opportunities. Mostly on the bench I reckon will be Deano, Aaron, Dan Harding, Steve, Dan and Lee Barnard who deserve the chance to prove themselves, but will all have to work hard to make the grade. But there are weaknesses.

 

We simply do not have strength in depth at the back, and we have not been successful in producing enough good defenders. As we all know, here is where we must bring in experienced top level players that are better than we already have, because it will be a while before the younger players will be ready for the Prem. We can't take chances in this first season when we must consolidate our place at the top.

 

Past top 24 alumni:

 

 

. . .. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .. . . . . . (Poke - were there no other keepers?). . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

 

. . . . . . . . . . . . Baird .. Andrewszewski .. M Cranie .. Benali .. Waldron .. Bridge . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

 

Lallana .. Paine .. AOC .. MLT .. S Williams .. Oakley .. G Baker .. Surman .. N Holmes .. Sydenham .. Bale

 

. . . . . . . . . .Chivers .. Channon .. D Wallace .. R Wallace .. Shearer .. L Best .. Walcott. . . . . . . . . . . .

 

 

really eelpie - your "squad" above goes back over 50 years!

I have seen most of them play at wouldn't doubt their quality (as it was then) but it hardly constitutes a record of success in the youth system as such.

Good players emerge - even in bad times - some survive, others move on, but to consistantly produce a steam of players season after season rarely happens.

Ted Bates did it, and so did Lawrie Mac. But some of the best names that came out of SFC in the last 25 years were during the 9 year period that Dave Merrington was youth team coach. 1984 -1991. (MLT onwards-)

Since then, some names have been notable starting with Wayne Bridge, but there has been little to brag about until Walcott, Bale and Alex - and they - unfortunately left before giving us their best.

 

we can only hope that the present Academy will give us a group of players who will play - and stay, and we'll get the benefit instead.

Edited 21 May, 2012 by david in sweden

[Itchen_block4]

None of our senior players is an immovable object to an ambitious, talented and determined youngster. That's what we need to maintain at Saints if we're going to bring youngsters through. When young players turn into immovable objects, they either move on or you have a brick wall to the next generation of youth. When several players come through and stay at the same time, you get a golden generation. A golden generation can bring great success, but unless some very tough decisions get made, the once-golden generation can turn into a very ragged looking team of 30-somethings. Maintaining success is really tough and I can't help admiring Fergie for managing it.

 

Back to the present rather than whimsically speculating into the future, the 4 lads that have been promoted to the first team will be able to show what they can do in pre-season. If they have the talent and the attitude, there's no reason why we shouldn't throw them in early. We need to assess them and do what's right for them.

[david in sweden]

......... points are desperate to come by ..for at least the bottom half of the Prem. and whilst I would very much like to see some new young faces in the side, I do think that NA will be very cautious in who he selects and when. I don't expect to see any of the famous four introduced into the new Prem. line-up in August.

 

Having made it back to the Prem. the opening games will be crucial to secure points - especially if the computer gives us games v. Man.City and Chelsea in the first month. I expect several new signings, but not too much chance of any of the youngsters getting a regular spot.

[saintjay77]

I think our transfer policy will always take into consideration what we have in our academy. The talk of signing Defoe doesn't fit into what I think the club is trying to achieve. Sure we need signings now to Dd to the squad and give it the best chance of staying up. But if there is no route from the academy into the first team then what's the point of trying to attract the best youngsters? So if we sign people like Defoe IMO it will shut the door to some of the youth at our club.

 

Our biggest problem is signing better than what we have that's good enough to keep us up while also being a realistic target for our youth to try and dislodge. If that level from bottom to top keeps increasing then eventually we may get to the level that barca can produce. It's a long way off though and is probably a level that we can only dream of. Nice target to have though.

[saintjay77]

......... points are desperate to come by ..for at least the bottom half of the Prem. and whilst I would very much like to see some new young faces in the side, I do think that NA will be very cautious in who he selects and when. I don't expect to see any of the famous four introduced into the new Prem. line-up in August.

 

Having made it back to the Prem. the opening games will be crucial to secure points - especially if the computer gives us games v. Man.City and Chelsea in the first month. I expect several new signings, but not too much chance of any of the youngsters getting a regular spot.

 

 

The target for those 4 this season has to be cup games and the occasional sub appearance. I doubt they will be expecting to jump into the starting line-up any time soon.

 

It does at least provide a bridge from youth setup into the 1st team that seems to be missing from so many sqauds. I wonder how many of our youth will be getting loaned out from now on? The loan system seems to be the default model most clubs use for their youth. Will we continue to use that or do we think a new model will do the same job?

[david in sweden]

The target for those 4 this season has to be cup games and the occasional sub appearance. I doubt they will be expecting to jump into the starting line-up any time soon. QUOTE]

 

 

agreed saint jay.

That comment was a response to a couple of contributors earlier who had suggested that we didn't need to sign anyone but should use our up/coming youth!

[saintjay77]

agreed saint jay.

That comment was a response to a couple of contributors earlier who had suggested that we didn't need to sign anyone but should use our up/coming youth!

 

Ah right, I would love to get to the stage where we only need to promote from within but even Barca buy in the occasional players to compliment their own system. We are at the very start of a system that we hope will one day produce a similar outcome. Anyone who thinks we can jump in and just use the youth straight away must have a screw loose. Lol

 

I still think the type of players we do look to bring in will be very important though. They will have a job to do on the pitch but a huge role will be to help the club build the system and encourage the youth.

 

Micheal Owen for example would be good on some levels as he could do a job occasionally on the pitch but pass on so much to the youth coming through, Defoe would expect to be in the starting line up week in week out and I can't see him being happy to move over to allow youth to come through. Both IMO would be a long way outside the pay structure we would want in the first few seasons so I don't think they are who we would be after but what they can bring to the table is what the club will be looking for IMO.

[The9]

Slip or not, what Adkins said related to "homegrown" players, not academy graduates. There is a big difference.

 

As for the general question, academy graduates are better than transfers when the academy graduates are better than the players we could feasibly transfer in. Obvious, but there's no fixed standard for a youth player, just as professionals vary hugely in skills and ability too. There's no one foolproof route of acquiring the best players, but usually investing significant resources into developing young players is a cost-effective return.

[The9]

To clarify "home grown" :

 

- Clubs register a squad of up to 25 players, which must include at least eight 'home-grown' players, at the end of each transfer window.

- Home-grown players do not have to be English; home-grown players are defined as those who "irrespective of nationality or age, have been affiliated to the FA or Welsh FA for a period of three seasons or 36 months prior to 21st birthday"

- Clubs can supplement squad with unlimited number of players under the age of 21.

- Changes can be made only during transfer windows, although in exceptional circumstances (eg goalkeeping injury crisis) moves could be allowed.

- Players loaned to Football League clubs cannot be replaced, but can regain their spot on return to parent club.

- Rules apply only to Premier League matches, not European, FA Cup or League Cup action.

[Gambol2K9]

From the interview pertaining to Jaidi's appointment as a club ambassador it states that we're looking to setup an academy in africa amongst other places.

 

Its clear that over the next ten years we're looking to have a strong global reach for some of the most promising young players, a very different proposition to what we have today.

[david in sweden]

To clarify "home grown" :

 

- Clubs register a squad of up to 25 players, which must include at least eight 'home-grown' players, at the end of each transfer window.

- Home-grown players do not have to be English; home-grown players are defined as those who "irrespective of nationality or age, have been affiliated to the FA or Welsh FA for a period of three seasons or 36 months prior to 21st birthday"[/B]

- Clubs can supplement squad with unlimited number of players under the age of 21.-

Changes can be made only during transfer windows, although in exceptional circumstances (eg goalkeeping injury crisis) moves could be allowed.

- Players loaned to Football League clubs cannot be replaced, but can regain their spot on return to parent club.

- Rules apply only to Premier League matches, not European, FA Cup or League Cup action.

 

 

Nice to see a clear definition "9" .... this is why I use block letters

 

firstly, 36 months ?- so that means thet Morgan S. qualifies as "home-grown" - right ?

and

The four recently signed ex-Academy lads don't have to be included in the 25 - right ?

but can play if and when they are selected... and not be counted until they reach 21...by which time they're "home-grown".

[david in sweden]

From the interview pertaining to Jaidi's appointment as a club ambassador it states that we're looking to setup an academy in africa amongst other places.

Its clear that over the next ten years we're looking to have a strong global reach for some of the most promising young players, a very different proposition to what we have today.

 

 

good long term planning, at least we won't miss "another Drogba " if one turns up - Jaidi can spot him.