The All New Spurs U21, U18 & Other Youth News Thread

[DEFchenkOE]

Thanks for that great write up. You see, I knew it wasn't me being crap at football that prevented me becoming a professional. It was because my bloody Birthday is in June!

It actually makes a lot of sense.

I'm born in April 84 and have always been short anyway but quite quite a technical player. The type that wasn't really appreciated in this country.

In school I remember in my first year of secondary seeing this giant of a guy playing in the playground. To my amazement I found out he was in the same year as me, born in September and was already well over 6ft. Turns out he was at qpr and stayed there throughout our school years. Never did make it though think he's a bus driver now.

Been only 5ft6 I was always told I was too small so I'm happy that things have been changing over the recent years.

 

[yankspurs]

What a brilliant post @KingSRV thanks a ton for that! Hope to see you stick around mate and chime in from time to time even though you are a Chelsea fan.

You're post ties into what one kf our our former directors said in his talk about the new academy. It's not so much about results as it is about development. Also, good to hear that we are going after smaller, more technical footballers. Means that we have the goal of getting our players into first team football somewhere in the world, either in England or elsewhere.

 

[IGSpur]

Hi I'm new here (and a Chelsea fan, though I'm predominantly neutral when it comes to youth football, and a massive fan of your academy, which is how I ended up on this board, silently observing for the last year or so).

One of the things about this board is that is fairly insular and having been round the country watching youth football for the last five years or so I'd thought I'd widen the context to give you a better view of where your academy stands in comparison to everyone else. Particularly, considering the upcoming FAYC tie, your south west London neighbours.

I first attended a Chelsea reserve game as a twelve year old in 2004 and was appalled by the standard. I had a youthful idea that between the ages of 18 and 21 some enormous improvement would take place and they would blossom into premier league footballers. It was informative to watch them disappear below conference level, retire, and a few end up in lowly Scandinavian leagues. The poor quality I'd observed then made sense. The matches I'd seen had looked like sub-conference football. (Incidentally a number of that period's players are now progressive coaches, such as McKenna and Chelsea's U18 manager Joe Edwards. Both of whom at 28 are the countries youngest tier 1 youth team managers.)

Ten years later I cannot believe how good academy football currently is and the full story, of which Tottenham is a part, is too complicated to cover here. It takes in the FA youth development, under Trevor Brooking, which prioritised the ages of 5-11, the thinkers of that period employed at the FA (including Terry McDermott) the rise of young innovators slowly pushing out the old boys in academies, the predominance of Spanish, Dutch, German, and Belgian youth development showing the way forward and accelerating the innovators advancement, and finally the club's internal stories. Since 2005 elite youth football has undergone a revolution in talent ID, coaching, infrastructure, and culture. The two main clubs who haven't progressed at such a startling rate were both youth football powers in 2005: Arsenal and Man U. While the latter are still generally strong, although far surpassed by their neighbours, and the former desperately trying to make up lost ground having realised too late they were being left behind, both are significantly behind the modernism of youth football's big three.

EPPP classifies academies over all areas from facilities to general welfare provision but if you were to take the three most important criteria: the quality of talent ID, players and coaches across all age groups; you would get three academies who stand out far above the rest: Chelsea; Tottenham; and City. I saw people saying the difference between Arsenal and Tottenham is the facilities, but they are only a symbol of Tottenham's attitude towards youth development. Facilities mean nothing compared to what goes on inside them.

Over the last decade elite youth coaching in this country has divided into the new school and the old, with the new spectacularly winning. Its culture emphasises intelligence, understanding of psychology, the importance of education and above all the focus on developing technique and character with the understanding this will lead to success in the long term, even if the smaller less physical, but more talented, boys are not able to win everything in junior groups. This is something that for ages has been antithetical to English football. Simultaneously in talent ID the focus has moved from early physical developers (who win youth football matches) to skilful late developers (who win senior football matches) to the extent Tottenham now effectively reject boys who are too big by telling scouts to prioritise on smaller boys. Just as Chelsea do. This also comes with an understanding that just because a boy is tiny or average compared to his peers aged eight doesn't mean he won't grow to be 6'4' like Ruben Loftus-Cheek while still retaining their technique.

In Arsenal's case they have become outdated because Brady wouldn't remove the coaches and scouts who were once regarded as the best but whose methods didn't advance. He couldn't bring himself to be disloyal to them having been made so successful by them. They haven't got worse, they've stayed the same (which of course, when everyone else is improving, is equivalent to getting worse.) They have some excellent internally produced players such as Chris Willock and Reiss Nelson (U15) but these came about more from the advance of grass roots football beneath them than any improvements on their behalf. It may be strange to hear but in many cases Tottenham's facilities were not decisive in swinging a boy's decision to come to Spurs over Arsenal, as they hadn't even been to Arsenal, whose scouts saw and overlooked them.

Talent ID is not as simple as it appears, spotting talent aged eight, is much harder than when they are twenty eight and everyone on the pitch has physically matured. Equally challenging is the age old problem of the academic year group, 75% of youth players above the age of sixteen were born between September and December, why? Because when they were scouted they were between 8-15% older and more advanced than their peers born in August so naturally they looked better than them. When they are seven or eight, that gap is the same as pitting your U14's against your U16's. This is a problem which still persists but it is noticeable Tottenham were one of the first in realising it and you now have one of the most widely spread age ranges, so you're not limiting yourselves to 33% of the talent pool. For example even if clubs had been focused on small technical boys fifteen years ago they would have missed KWP (July births are still very rare.).

I could go on and on about the changes but that's enough for an overview. Sufficient to say Tottenham are right at the forefront of improvements.

Now to Chelsea. 2005 is an important year for them because it was when Abramovich's demands for a successful youth policy were formulated by the newly appointed head of academy Neil Bath. All the contracted age groups from reserves down were formed of players, apart from a few notable exceptions, who weren't good enough. To make up for this at U18 level massive recruitment from abroad was instituted to raise the standard. For this Frank Arnesen was chosen at geriatric Dutch super scout, and Abramovich advisor, Piet De Visser's behest. The most successful of Arnesen's signings were Fabio Borini, Gael Kakuta, Patrick Van Aanholt, Gokhan Tore, Miroslav Stoch and Jeffrey Bruma, all of whom failed to become Chelsea regulars but are now playing in top tier European leagues (if you use the Harry Redknapp definition of top, ie a few are not playing in top top top leagues, such as Stoch who is on loan from Fenerbahce to Al Ain, who play in a bottom bottom top league.)

Far more rewarding for Chelsea was the focus placed on the young age groups from which the team on Thursday has largely been reaped and means that Chelsea's reputation for producing foreign youth teams is slowly lessening. This was where the real hope was placed ten years ago and the standard of the youngsters at U18 level is the highest it ever has been. Chelsea have never judged their performance on the league table since the league side changes from week to week, but the FAYC. In the last three years their worst result has been the semi finals in 2011, where they lost against the Pogba, Morrison, Lingard, Will and Michael Keane, Man U side. They've reached four finals in five years and only lost one of those. This hasn't been done since the Busby babes.

The trouble is no player has gone on to the first team despite a few who have merited the chance. This is not an issue confined to Chelsea as those who until recently have lamented Tottenham's failure to realise the un-glistening riches in the youth teams shadows that begin to sparkle when exposed to light, can attest. It is for that reason Pochettino is one of my favourite manager's right now. At last one of the big three academies has a manager who will trust its produce.

While my fondness for Poch isn't completely disinterested as I forlornly hope Chelsea may be encouraged by his success, my main focus is that talented people are being allowed to fulfil their gifts.

The famous Michelangelo quote is that every block of stone has a sculpture inside it and it is the sculptor's task to find it. The task of dealing with youngster's of immense potential is similar.

For too long English youth development has been wantonly smashing up pieces of stone then wondering why so few of them turn into perfectly crafted sculptures, before finally deciding it was because there are only a few pieces of very special stone that when smashed become elegantly arranged, rather than finding their regressive treatment of the materials to be at fault.

The fact is of those born between 1982-92 there were somewhere between 5-20 boys who had Marcus Edwards' level of talent and 20-40 of Josh Onomah's but they were not allowed to fulfil it because of the backwards system it was filtered through. Considering the financial fortunes swilling around in clubs at the time, to me that is a crime against human talent, that there are people who have that talent in them but will never be able to fulfil it, not because of their own failings, but that of a system designed to extract it from them. That still infuriates me, because that, to me, is the greatest abandonment of the community these clubs were originally set up to serve. That fulfilment of their own members potential should be their greatest priority (not to mention Barcelona, Munich, and Ajax have proved it's the only way to build a truly great football team).

I echo everyone else's sentiments, great post mate.

One of the things about this board is that is fairly insular

I think this is quite harsh, I wouldn't think we are any different to most football fans. Those who follow our academy closely have acknowledge and given plenty of credit to Chelsea and also Man City (but not quite as much) when we were discussing a few pages back. I think to the casual and even those who do watch, the issue from the outside looking in is that despite Chelsea's youth success and massive improvements most stereotypically assume it's because you guys are chucking money around and buying loads of foreign youngsters and are loathe to give you credit to your training/coaching. Additionally it doesn't help that any talented youngsters are guaranteed next to no significant first team action and so unfortunately noone can really see the successes of your academy.

I would really like to see Mourinho stick to his guns and try and bring through some of your talented players, I specifically like RLC and Solanke (reminds me of Costa) as it would really be good for England. Apart from our obvious history, some of your players/fans really do your club a disservice and seeing Chelsea bring through young English players, despite having all their money, and still being successful would go some way (not that you probably care) to me liking/respecting your club a lot more. O and fans like you help.

While you're here how much of us do you watch and while we have our favourites or players we belibe will make it are there any of ours you like. I assume Onomah and Edwards as you mentioned them.

Also hope you continue pop your head in now and then

 

[IGSpur]

i asked @chelseayouth about the game today. obviously he's pro-chelsea but he has an interest in all things youth football and gets to see a lot of our lads too. here's a quick summary:

- said sterling was our standout performer, played aml and fw and was always a threat. was impressed by his poise and intelligence
- edwards was quiet, game passed him by
- glover is huge, very commanding and he actually mistook him for one of the coaches in the warmup
- loft was decent, good hold up play and chelsea defenders struggled with him
- jaden brown was better than tanganga
- daly did well when he came on
- roles only got a few minutes
- conditions were bad, very windy, some rain, heavy pitch affected the quality of the game

Thanks mate.The 2 bits that stand out for me:
1.Sterling he seems to be gaining in confidence, does he remind anyone else of a more composed and stlyish Coulthirst. I'm thinking NextGen days. That's good news as Coulthirst had plenty of ability but what he lacked was the football brain or composure when finishing and Sterling seems to display both of those so far
2.Brown was better than Tanganga -not going to act like I've seen a lot of Brown bar him playing for u15s last year and he looked like a strong and energetic left back who was decent on the ball. Didn't know he could play CB so for him to out perform Tanganga (who I like), even though it was for only one game shows he is another to be taken seriously for the future. Again the England caps can only have improved his confidence.

 

[Spursidol]

Hi I'm new here (and a Chelsea fan, though I'm predominantly neutral when it comes to youth football, and a massive fan of your academy, which is how I ended up on this board, silently observing for the last year or so).

One of the things about this board is that is fairly insular and having been round the country watching youth football for the last five years or so I'd thought I'd widen the context to give you a better view of where your academy stands in comparison to everyone else. Particularly, considering the upcoming FAYC tie, your south west London neighbours.

I first attended a Chelsea reserve game as a twelve year old in 2004 and was appalled by the standard. I had a youthful idea that between the ages of 18 and 21 some enormous improvement would take place and they would blossom into premier league footballers. It was informative to watch them disappear below conference level, retire, and a few end up in lowly Scandinavian leagues. The poor quality I'd observed then made sense. The matches I'd seen had looked like sub-conference football. (Incidentally a number of that period's players are now progressive coaches, such as McKenna and Chelsea's U18 manager Joe Edwards. Both of whom at 28 are the countries youngest tier 1 youth team managers.)

Ten years later I cannot believe how good academy football currently is and the full story, of which Tottenham is a part, is too complicated to cover here. It takes in the FA youth development, under Trevor Brooking, which prioritised the ages of 5-11, the thinkers of that period employed at the FA (including Terry McDermott) the rise of young innovators slowly pushing out the old boys in academies, the predominance of Spanish, Dutch, German, and Belgian youth development showing the way forward and accelerating the innovators advancement, and finally the club's internal stories. Since 2005 elite youth football has undergone a revolution in talent ID, coaching, infrastructure, and culture. The two main clubs who haven't progressed at such a startling rate were both youth football powers in 2005: Arsenal and Man U. While the latter are still generally strong, although far surpassed by their neighbours, and the former desperately trying to make up lost ground having realised too late they were being left behind, both are significantly behind the modernism of youth football's big three.

EPPP classifies academies over all areas from facilities to general welfare provision but if you were to take the three most important criteria: the quality of talent ID, players and coaches across all age groups; you would get three academies who stand out far above the rest: Chelsea; Tottenham; and City. I saw people saying the difference between Arsenal and Tottenham is the facilities, but they are only a symbol of Tottenham's attitude towards youth development. Facilities mean nothing compared to what goes on inside them.

Over the last decade elite youth coaching in this country has divided into the new school and the old, with the new spectacularly winning. Its culture emphasises intelligence, understanding of psychology, the importance of education and above all the focus on developing technique and character with the understanding this will lead to success in the long term, even if the smaller less physical, but more talented, boys are not able to win everything in junior groups. This is something that for ages has been antithetical to English football. Simultaneously in talent ID the focus has moved from early physical developers (who win youth football matches) to skilful late developers (who win senior football matches) to the extent Tottenham now effectively reject boys who are too big by telling scouts to prioritise on smaller boys. Just as Chelsea do. This also comes with an understanding that just because a boy is tiny or average compared to his peers aged eight doesn't mean he won't grow to be 6'4' like Ruben Loftus-Cheek while still retaining their technique.

In Arsenal's case they have become outdated because Brady wouldn't remove the coaches and scouts who were once regarded as the best but whose methods didn't advance. He couldn't bring himself to be disloyal to them having been made so successful by them. They haven't got worse, they've stayed the same (which of course, when everyone else is improving, is equivalent to getting worse.) They have some excellent internally produced players such as Chris Willock and Reiss Nelson (U15) but these came about more from the advance of grass roots football beneath them than any improvements on their behalf. It may be strange to hear but in many cases Tottenham's facilities were not decisive in swinging a boy's decision to come to Spurs over Arsenal, as they hadn't even been to Arsenal, whose scouts saw and overlooked them.

Talent ID is not as simple as it appears, spotting talent aged eight, is much harder than when they are twenty eight and everyone on the pitch has physically matured. Equally challenging is the age old problem of the academic year group, 75% of youth players above the age of sixteen were born between September and December, why? Because when they were scouted they were between 8-15% older and more advanced than their peers born in August so naturally they looked better than them. When they are seven or eight, that gap is the same as pitting your U14's against your U16's. This is a problem which still persists but it is noticeable Tottenham were one of the first in realising it and you now have one of the most widely spread age ranges, so you're not limiting yourselves to 33% of the talent pool. For example even if clubs had been focused on small technical boys fifteen years ago they would have missed KWP (July births are still very rare.).

I could go on and on about the changes but that's enough for an overview. Sufficient to say Tottenham are right at the forefront of improvements.

Now to Chelsea. 2005 is an important year for them because it was when Abramovich's demands for a successful youth policy were formulated by the newly appointed head of academy Neil Bath. All the contracted age groups from reserves down were formed of players, apart from a few notable exceptions, who weren't good enough. To make up for this at U18 level massive recruitment from abroad was instituted to raise the standard. For this Frank Arnesen was chosen at geriatric Dutch super scout, and Abramovich advisor, Piet De Visser's behest. The most successful of Arnesen's signings were Fabio Borini, Gael Kakuta, Patrick Van Aanholt, Gokhan Tore, Miroslav Stoch and Jeffrey Bruma, all of whom failed to become Chelsea regulars but are now playing in top tier European leagues (if you use the Harry Redknapp definition of top, ie a few are not playing in top top top leagues, such as Stoch who is on loan from Fenerbahce to Al Ain, who play in a bottom bottom top league.)

Far more rewarding for Chelsea was the focus placed on the young age groups from which the team on Thursday has largely been reaped and means that Chelsea's reputation for producing foreign youth teams is slowly lessening. This was where the real hope was placed ten years ago and the standard of the youngsters at U18 level is the highest it ever has been. Chelsea have never judged their performance on the league table since the league side changes from week to week, but the FAYC. In the last three years their worst result has been the semi finals in 2011, where they lost against the Pogba, Morrison, Lingard, Will and Michael Keane, Man U side. They've reached four finals in five years and only lost one of those. This hasn't been done since the Busby babes.

The trouble is no player has gone on to the first team despite a few who have merited the chance. This is not an issue confined to Chelsea as those who until recently have lamented Tottenham's failure to realise the un-glistening riches in the youth teams shadows that begin to sparkle when exposed to light, can attest. It is for that reason Pochettino is one of my favourite manager's right now. At last one of the big three academies has a manager who will trust its produce.

While my fondness for Poch isn't completely disinterested as I forlornly hope Chelsea may be encouraged by his success, my main focus is that talented people are being allowed to fulfil their gifts.

The famous Michelangelo quote is that every block of stone has a sculpture inside it and it is the sculptor's task to find it. The task of dealing with youngster's of immense potential is similar.

For too long English youth development has been wantonly smashing up pieces of stone then wondering why so few of them turn into perfectly crafted sculptures, before finally deciding it was because there are only a few pieces of very special stone that when smashed become elegantly arranged, rather than finding their regressive treatment of the materials to be at fault.

The fact is of those born between 1982-92 there were somewhere between 5-20 boys who had Marcus Edwards' level of talent and 20-40 of Josh Onomah's but they were not allowed to fulfil it because of the backwards system it was filtered through. Considering the financial fortunes swilling around in clubs at the time, to me that is a crime against human talent, that there are people who have that talent in them but will never be able to fulfil it, not because of their own failings, but that of a system designed to extract it from them. That still infuriates me, because that, to me, is the greatest abandonment of the community these clubs were originally set up to serve. That fulfilment of their own members potential should be their greatest priority (not to mention Barcelona, Munich, and Ajax have proved it's the only way to build a truly great football team).

Great read, thanks for posting - oh and welcome !

Only point I'd perhaps disagree with is that the FA can take much credit for the change in youth development - imo several clubs have decided that they need to produce their own youth players and after looking at how Ajax, Barcelona and other clubs with a history of producing generations of good youth, and developed their own youth systems (Spurs being one of them). FA seem to be producing policies after some clubs have shown the way forward - the only thing Spurs have got from the FA was the likes of John McDermott (Academy Director) and a few coaches who seemed to have become bored at the FA and liked the challenge of the likes of Spurs !

Southampton have had a good academy for years - imo a large part due to their catchment area which has been enhanced by their Bath centre which picks up most of the south west, south wales and the M$ corridor up to Reading. However in addition to their success over the years, a number of their coaches have left and developed other clubs - look at Fulham's academy which is staffed by ex Southampton Academy coaches as an example.

I'd agree with you on Arsenal falling behind, but IMO ManU seemed to decide to change, so they now seem to have a bigger focus on 'buying in' good youth at about the age of 18/19 to further develop them, rather than developing their own youth (and hmmmm Chelsea have a similar policy, but bigger scale, of hoovering up some of the best younger players - say aged 18/19/20/21 - in europe to loan out and develop in parallel to their Academy).

You are correct that our new training facilities had nothing to do with the re-emergence of our academy, from approx 2005 until end 2012 it operated out of the a few portacabins in our Spurs Lodge training Ground. However as a youth watcher, you might be interested in how our youth policy and its needs affected the development of our training facilities - this (slightly lengthy) video produced jointly by the Architects (KSS) and Spurs describe how the 'soft' elements were considered.


Southampton have recently opened new training facilities and produced a video, which seemed to have considered many similar points, so both academies seem to have many similar viewpoints which are different to how youth was being developed a decade ago.

Anyway, in summary, I'd suggest that there are now many good young players being produced by Chelsea, Spurs, Southampton (and others such as Aston Villa) - a very different story to a decade ago - and other clubs and the FA has now started to follow that approach, the FA seeing how much better the young England players are becoming.

I'd suggest that innovation in developing young players is still continuing so in the next decade there will be both more and better young players coming through UK academies.

 

[Spursidol]

Monday @12 am

Spurs u21 v Everton u21's

 

[IGSpur]

Monday @12 am

Spurs u21 v Everton u21's

Very early KO? and you mean tomorrow?

 

[Spursidol]

Very early KO? and you mean tomorrow?

Monday 2nd March, so yup [ tomorrow (if you read this on Sunday !)

Not sure why its so early - but might one or two youngsters on the bench for Wednesday's match v Swansea ?

 

[IGSpur]

Monday 2nd March, so yup [ tomorrow (if you read this on Sunday !)

Not sure why its so early - but might one or two youngsters on the bench for Wednesday's match v Swansea ?

Thanks. And I was joking about the early thing, as you posted 12am.

Hopefully we do see some but I won't hold my breath

 

[npearl4spurs]

Monday 2nd March, so yup [ tomorrow (if you read this on Sunday !)

Not sure why its so early - but might one or two youngsters on the bench for Wednesday's match v Swansea ?

Give Onomah, Lameiras, Georgiou or Azzaoui a nod Wednesday, at least a late sub. I'd love to see another option on that left side.

 

[DaSpurs]

Give Onomah, Lameiras, Georgiou or Azzaoui a nod Wednesday, at least a late sub. I'd love to see another option on that left side.

Agreed. I think an injection of a bit of youthful energy and hunger would be immense for our AM positions. Otherwise the complacency and staleness will only continue and further fester the rot. Something new has to be tried.

 

[kmk]

Give Onomah, Lameiras, Georgiou or Azzaoui a nod Wednesday, at least a late sub. I'd love to see another option on that left side.

Won't some of them be playing in the FA Youth Cup semi against Chelscum?

 

[nightgoat]

Presumably the home leg of the Youth Cup semi will be at WHL again?

Also, just noticed that it'll be on ITV4 on Thursday.

 

[0-Tibsy-0]

Tottenham Hotspur ‏@SpursOfficial 34s35 seconds ago
Spurs U21s (v Everton): McGee, McQueen, Ogilvie, McEneff, Khumalo (C), Lesniak, Lameiras, Winks, Coulthirst, Ward, Miller. #COYS

Tottenham Hotspur ‏@SpursOfficial 12s13 seconds ago
Spurs U21s subs (v Everton): Akindayini, Muscatt, Paul, Daly, Miles (GK). #COYS

 

[0-Tibsy-0]

Assuming Onomah, KWP saved for Chelsea?

CCV too?

 

[IGSpur]

Tottenham Hotspur ‏@SpursOfficial 34s35 seconds ago
Spurs U21s (v Everton): McGee, McQueen, Ogilvie, McEneff, Khumalo (C), Lesniak, Lameiras, Winks, Coulthirst, Ward, Miller. #COYS

Tottenham Hotspur ‏@SpursOfficial 12s13 seconds ago
Spurs U21s subs (v Everton): Akindayini, Muscatt, Paul, Daly, Miles (GK). #COYS

So from that team and bench looks like the same team against Chelsea as we used for Man U.

McGee,
McQueen,Khumalo (C), Lesniak, Ogilvie, McEneff, Ward
Winks,
Lameiras Coulthirst, Miller.

Initially assumed that line-up but Ogilvie and Lesniak could switch.

Winks I actually think will most likely go CM as I believe McEneff can play on right and either Lamerias or Miller no.10

Hope Muscatt and Daly get on

 

[0-Tibsy-0]

Tottenham Hotspur ‏@SpursOfficial 5m5 minutes ago
U21s: GOAL! Ward picks out Coulthirst on right of box, he cuts in and fires low inside the near post. 1-0, 6mins #COYS

 

[wiggo24]

Is the youth cup game vs Chelsea being televised?

If so, when and where?

Cheers, great thread, especially with so many youngsters coming through.

 

[0-Tibsy-0]

Tottenham Hotspur ‏@SpursOfficial 33s33 seconds ago
U21s; GOAL! Great move as Coulthirst plays McQueen in behind full back, Miller helps on his cross and Ogilvie slots home. 2-0, 20mins #COYS

 

[TottenhamLegend]

Ginger Pele, Ginger Pele wooooahh wooooahh