The Spurs Youth Thread - 2017/2018

josh just scored, leapt like a salmon and headed home.

Blake Griffin said:

josh just scored, leapt like a salmon and headed home.

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Is he in attack or in midfield?

chinaman said:

Is he in attack or in midfield?

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left wing in a 4231/4411.

Bring back Josh next week and stick him in the first team squad, please Poch. We need another central midfielder for the second half of the season, and we've got one ready to go on our books already.

Anuth said:

Onomah's Goal

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Finished like a centre forward. Nice one Josh.

scat1620 said:

Bring back Josh next week and stick him in the first team squad, please Poch. We need another central midfielder for the second half of the season, and we've got one ready to go on our books already.

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Toby and victor are coming back. Josh wont get many games with us. Better to leave him where he is or to another club on loan.

Again I'm aware I'm late but there's a few more bits in the book I found interesting and I dunno maybe they'll be of interest to someone

In the debate there's about youth and Edwards, in particular, there's been conversation about his attitude etc and I'm suprised I haven't seen anyone quote it before but poch explicitly says Edwards has "authority and behaviour problems"

More positively he says that if you "ask CCV to run into a wall, he'll say, do you want me to do it twice?" and that that attitude is rare in young players so I could imagine CCV very much being in pochs plans considering how much emphasis he puts on attitude

Also talks in great detail about the challenges with money, technology and fame with young players, it seems to be something that really bugs him

Streetspur77 said:

Again I'm aware I'm late but there's a few more bits in the book I found interesting and I dunno maybe they'll be of interest to someone

In the debate there's about youth and Edwards, in particular, there's been conversation about his attitude etc and I'm suprised I haven't seen anyone quote it before but poch explicitly says Edwards has "authority and behaviour problems"

More positively he says that if you "ask CCV to run into a wall, he'll say, do you want me to do it twice?" and that that attitude is rare in young players so I could imagine CCV very much being in pochs plans considering how much emphasis he puts on attitude

Also talks in great detail about the challenges with money, technology and fame with young players, it seems to be something that really bugs him

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Heard that before about ccv. His father who is a professional basketball player installed it into him.

Streetspur77 said:

Again I'm aware I'm late but there's a few more bits in the book I found interesting and I dunno maybe they'll be of interest to someone

In the debate there's about youth and Edwards, in particular, there's been conversation about his attitude etc and I'm suprised I haven't seen anyone quote it before but poch explicitly says Edwards has "authority and behaviour problems"

More positively he says that if you "ask CCV to run into a wall, he'll say, do you want me to do it twice?" and that that attitude is rare in young players so I could imagine CCV very much being in pochs plans considering how much emphasis he puts on attitude

Also talks in great detail about the challenges with money, technology and fame with young players, it seems to be something that really bugs him

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I'm not sure CCV could run into a wall twice. Pretty sure it would've fallen down first time round.

Lilbaz said:

Heard that before about ccv. His father who is a professional basketball player installed it into him.

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Not sure why you think that's creative @Kspur ?

Streetspur77 said:

Again I'm aware I'm late but there's a few more bits in the book I found interesting and I dunno maybe they'll be of interest to someone

In the debate there's about youth and Edwards, in particular, there's been conversation about his attitude etc and I'm suprised I haven't seen anyone quote it before but poch explicitly says Edwards has "authority and behaviour problems"

More positively he says that if you "ask CCV to run into a wall, he'll say, do you want me to do it twice?" and that that attitude is rare in young players so I could imagine CCV very much being in pochs plans considering how much emphasis he puts on attitude

Also talks in great detail about the challenges with money, technology and fame with young players, it seems to be something that really bugs him

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it was posted and discussed at length a while back.

with regards to the fame bit, i wonder if that's why spurs no longer upload any youth footage?

Blake Griffin said:

it was posted and discussed at length a while back.

with regards to the fame bit, i wonder if that's why spurs no longer upload any youth footage?

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Thought that too. I can't believe we're that bad especially even compared to some Championship club. Must be a conscious decision

josh wasn't good tonight, bar the goal, but then it'd be a challenge for any player to look decent in that team. all villa do is sit off and hoof it forward for players to chase, josh needs to try and get himself into games more but it's not easy when the ball is ping-ponging over you.

here's pritchard looking quality for norwich today, he's just back from injury but hopefully he can stay fit this time. still think he has way too much ability not to make it as a decent pl player at least -

http://www.skysports.com/watch/video/sports/football/11185696/birmingham-0-2-norwich

Just watched the Norwich highlights from today on C5, Pritchard scored a belter, nearly scored a couple more, played an absolutely beautiful through ball for their other goal.

I watched most of the Brentford v Villa game earlier. Onomah stuck out on the left wing, was a horrible game, Villa play zero football. Onomah scored but with his head from a cross but wasn't involved in the game at all. Really hard to see what he's learning apart from how to watch the ball fly around from various peripheral angles.

Cornpattbuck said:

Finished like a centre forward. Nice one Josh.

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Wonder who spotted that in him

Blake Griffin said:

josh wasn't good tonight, bar the goal, but then it'd be a challenge for any player to look decent in that team. all villa do is sit off and hoof it forward for players to chase, josh needs to try and get himself into games more but it's not easy when the ball is ping-ponging over you.

here's pritchard looking quality for norwich today, he's just back from injury but hopefully he can stay fit this time. still think he has way too much ability not to make it as a decent pl player at least -

http://www.skysports.com/watch/video/sports/football/11185696/birmingham-0-2-norwich

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Did you see James Maddison 23 for Norwich put the ball through to Pritch for the first goal. Pleaty wanted to sign him 18 months ago from Cov. He went to Norwich only 2 or 3 mill. Been on loan at Aberdeen. He does look a class player.

Westmorland said:

Did you see James Maddison 23 for Norwich put the ball through to Pritch for the first goal. Pleaty wanted to sign him 18 months ago from Cov. He went to Norwich only 2 or 3 mill. Been on loan at Aberdeen. He does look a class player.

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yeah, he and pritchard seem to link up really well. think norwich would be a decent side to send any of our lads to.

Streetspur77 said:

With the debate in his thread recently I've started to doubt poch in this area, as youth watchers have made some very good points about the seeming stagnation of the academy. However reading the book I think it's hardened my view that poch doesn't just randomly have a reputation for being good with youth, he truly does care about it and believes it's key. I think it says during his time at espanyol he promoted 20 youth players and also he says explicitly that it provides an affinity between club and fans. I don't know why it's slowed down here but surely there's an explanation as it's unlikely he's just decided to give up on it now.

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As BG said he was at a club and in a league more well-renowned for giving academy players chances. He hasn't come close to translating that here due to the different conditions. I don't know but it wouldn't surprise me if the 20 players were brought through more out of necessity. Regardless and without sounding like I'm tarring his achievements at the end of the day he hasn't done it here, and is just as bad as the other managers, which is exactly what I'm annoyed about. The country that is producing the best players is also giving significantly less chances. If Poch had even brought through a 5th of what he did at Espanyol I'd be jumpinig for joy and say he has done excellently as that would have equated to one per season which I think is very very plausible. He has only done a 20th of that in 4 years, that type of drop-off indicates that it wasn't because he was some trend setter but like I said suggests like his hand was more forced. That reputation stuck with him and now we're just expected to accept that he will make the right decisions. Either way I will let his output in this area speak for itself. Whether or not people want to believe that the crop he has had under his control is the best we've had, regardless even if it is the same, we are still bringing through less than the previous 4 years.

Streetspur77 said:

He also constantly talks about youth players and their progress, so the academy must be on his mind a lot as the book is a kind of diary. He calls Edwards a "rare" player and talks about THAT run from Edwards against gillingham in detail so you'd guess he's just as desperate for him to make an impact in the first team as us.

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Maybe and but he may not want to risk the repercussions if he has a bad game. People don't mind a bad game or poor form form a signing as it is seen as a calculated risk,and not much else he could have done, if it is from an academy player it is seen as an avoidable risk, and people will ask questions like, why we didn't sign more players to cover the risk, if it didn't come off.

At least we can all agree that Edwards is a rare talent and my bet would be the best he has had at Espanyol, Southampton and us. So no reason he shouldn't be at least getting minimal chances under Poch's tutelage. Otherwise it's a failure on Poch's part if he didn't even see if he could be good enough no?

Streetspur77 said:

But then he also says about he doesn't like just throwing players in and that sometimes the bedding in period with the first team can take up to 6 months. That's probably what we're experiencing ATM especially with KWP and TOB, who seem to be in and around first team squad but getting limited first team chances, still frustrating though. I think Edwards and onomah are separate, more complicated cases.

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Again it all sounds good, and I can only hope you're right. I feel though this process just makes things take longer than usual and produces less which means we are missing out on potential fees from selling players. Still this bedding in process he believes that is so important didn't stop him from bringing through 20 players in his 4 years at Espanyol, so I wonder why it is affecting us so much here.

Streetspur77 said:

Yeah there could be a range of factors but whatever they are I'm sure he still has the same feelings about youth and it's importance

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I bet every manager believes that youth is importance. If no one used an academy player there'd be no players to watch. Every manager talks about how they would like to use the academy more or mentions youth players in press conferences and yet here we are in the PL with no changes. Again I'll guess have to keep waiting,and continue to be patient. I really hope Poch repays your faith, would love nothing more than to be wrong

V Wimbledon it should only be little playing fringe players and youths who appear, no regulars. I wouldn’t have any of the regular defenders, full backs included, nor any of Dembele, Sissoko, Dier, Winks. Maybe Wanyama as he needs fitness, plus a player like him would offer some protection and assurance to the kids. I’d hope to see something like: