Does the U23 System Work ?

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Very few academy players ever make the step up to the first team and that's true for any club in the world.

The successful academies buy the kids rather than develop them. When you have a academy of half of one cities kids (with Liverpool academy getting the other half) then the pool to choose from is very small and therefore less likely you will get a premier league footballer at the end of it all.

Plus it's worth noting that the club's who bring the most players through are also one club cities so therefore have the pick of any of the kids compared to us who may lose any real talent to Liverpool
 
The aim in our academy seems to be to produce professional footballers and help young working class guys make a living at something they love. All admirable in itself. But the sole aim of our academy should be to produce quality players who can step into the first 11 in their very early twenties, and not look out of place. I don't think there's any pressure or ruthlessness instilled into these kids to succeed. It's all very nice and comfortable.
 
There seems to be no perfect solution sadly, the FA having already extended the final age group from U21 to U23, and allowing 3 over-age players in each XI in an effort to further bridge the gap.
Where we seem to be going wrong is picking the correct loan to suit the player to maximise their development. Perhaps we need a "feeder club" in each division to send our players to (depending on the stage of their development), with all clubs sharing the footballing ideology of our first team.
Liam Walsh immediately stands out as someone who was mismanaged, a youngster with as much talent as Dowell, but a lack of game time at Birmingham (and admittedly an injury the year before at an inopportune time) meant that he wasn't in position to make the step up.
That said, Kenny is already an established deputy to Coleman, Dowell looking like Sigurdsson's understudy, Davies (although still raw) is a solid squad player, Holgate (who spent some time in U23s) is arguably our best centre-half. Furthermore, with Robinson, Baningime and Connolly looking a year away from being established first team options, I'd say we're pretty well-stocked for youngsters who've managed to make the jump successfully.
 
Jeez, we literally give more minutes to U23 players than any other team, won the league, produced 5 members of the U20 World cup winning squad. All of whom praised the coaching they've received from Unsworth.

And suddenly Unsworth is useless and should be punted because our 18-20 year olds aren't as good as Rooney/Barkley were at 18-20.

The youth development at this club is just about the only thing we are good at given we share a recruitment zone with 3 of the world's richest clubs.
 
That is the same team that got torn a new one by France the other day and looked a shambles, so i think the world cup might be a one off, although they did play well at the time no doubt about it.
Wow that is so spectacularly wrong mate. The team that Everton had five in was the England U20s, the team beaten by France was under 19 without a number of their best players, no Everton involvement and essentially last seasons u18.
 

The reserve system before the U23 league bore little resemblance to the Reserves we'd have seen in the 70's, 80's or 90's.

Less and less senior players played regular reserve football and it was only used to get a few minutes under the belt after layoffs or let players know they didn't have a future - off playing with the kids. In many ways it had become pretty much the same as the current U23 system which allows a certain number of overage players for whom it serves the same purpose, minutes after layoff or somewhere to send lockerless Senegalese strikers.

We don't see as much youth coming through now as modern day PL clubs cast a much bigger net much further when signing players. A larger pool of players further restricts opportunity in what was already an incredibly competitive field. Remember, we're looking at youth talent going from schoolboy football to playing in the top flight of one of the best leagues in the world against some of the best, most expensive, players in the world in their prime. I'm not sure that's ever been the case before in English football.

Going out and signing the best players from big European clubs is a relatively new thing in England and when clubs have the spending power that they do then it's inevitable, no matter how much you tweak it, progression from youth to senior is going to be more and more difficult. This is also magnified by the relatively lax work permit system in place for footballers now compared to years gone by and the fact that foreign quotas are not present in the PL.

It wasn't long ago that managers would have to juggle the number of Scottish, Irish or Welsh players in their squad due to them being recognised as foreign in European games where there were restrictions on the number of non-domestic players who could play in a match. That has now being replaced with a much less restrictive minimum of homegrown players rule which is much easier to abide to.

Everton have developed a number of academy graduates because we've often had to give competitive minutes to young players through a lack of money, options or desperation. It's a big reason in why less well of clubs and less well off countries produce more youth products - the resource to go and buy isn't there so you have to make your own.

I'd argue it's not a problem of structure but an inevitable result of immense wealth with less restrictions on those eligible to play. A system that produces more senior players would have to be a system that forces clubs to field young players or severely restricts the opportunity to purchase ready made first team players.
 
..I came through the system a bit like this and was always exposed to playing against older players. It’s not just the physical aspect, it’s the mental challenge.

Everton’s A&B teams played in the Lancashire League against men. Players coming back from injury like Bracewell, van den Hauwe and Sheedy would play in those games. I’ve seen established internationals like Molby and Redknapp playing against our youngsters at Bellefield.

I’m not a fan of age restricted football.
 
Tell PL to follow UEFA squad rules instead, now you are very much forced to hold on your youth products and at least play them until more come out of the line.

Unless you let reserve play in lower leagues, making them U21, U23 or open age should be the last thing you should be worrying about.
 
No it's still not good enough. Making it u23 and having a few men allowed is all well and good but most teams are hardly using squad players in it. The loan system doesn't help the Prem teams either with that stupid one club a season rule.
 
I suspect if you gave our entire youth squad to a German second division side, they'd be promoted and finish a comfortable 8th in the Bundesliga next year.

English talent is the best it's been in decades.

But the Premier League doesn't have the faintest idea what to do with it, least of all us
 

I suspect if you gave our entire youth squad to a German second division side, they'd be promoted and finish a comfortable 8th in the Bundesliga next year.

English talent is the best it's been in decades.

But the Premier League doesn't have the faintest idea what to do with it, least of all us

You honestly think our youth team would finish 8th in the bundesliga?

It Couldnt beat league one/two sides in the checkatrade trophy last year? And that’s with most of those sides fielding weaker teams!
 
There seems to be no perfect solution sadly, the FA having already extended the final age group from U21 to U23, and allowing 3 over-age players in each XI in an effort to further bridge the gap.
Where we seem to be going wrong is picking the correct loan to suit the player to maximise their development. Perhaps we need a "feeder club" in each division to send our players to (depending on the stage of their development), with all clubs sharing the footballing ideology of our first team.
Liam Walsh immediately stands out as someone who was mismanaged, a youngster with as much talent as Dowell, but a lack of game time at Birmingham (and admittedly an injury the year before at an inopportune time) meant that he wasn't in position to make the step up.
That said, Kenny is already an established deputy to Coleman, Dowell looking like Sigurdsson's understudy, Davies (although still raw) is a solid squad player, Holgate (who spent some time in U23s) is arguably our best centre-half. Furthermore, with Robinson, Baningime and Connolly looking a year away from being established first team options, I'd say we're pretty well-stocked for youngsters who've managed to make the jump successfully.
Interestingly enough of those you list I would personally only say two have shown definate signs of making that difficult step up and one of them Holgate made his initial breakthrough elsewhere. The other, Davies, after an excellent first season has faded somewhat. Kenny and Baningime are tantalisingly close but still have much to do. The others are nowhere near establishing themselves in the first team for me.
 
Interestingly enough of those you list I would personally only say two have shown definate signs of making that difficult step up and one of them Holgate made his initial breakthrough elsewhere. The other, Davies, after an excellent first season has faded somewhat. Kenny and Baningime are tantalisingly close but still have much to do. The others are nowhere near establishing themselves in the first team for me.
There’s a correlation between young players making it and the amount of games they play in First Team football from 19-22. I think one of the best ways of tackling this would be using buy back clauses in a planned way. That way the players go to clubs who want to play them and we see if they develop the way we expect. If they do then great, buy them back. If not then nothing really lost. There’s no ideal way under present set up but I’d like to see us giving this a go.
 

Interestingly enough of those you list I would personally only say two have shown definate signs of making that difficult step up and one of them Holgate made his initial breakthrough elsewhere. The other, Davies, after an excellent first season has faded somewhat. Kenny and Baningime are tantalisingly close but still have much to do. The others are nowhere near establishing themselves in the first team for me.

I do think Davies needs a year (or two) on loan, and recall being pretty shocked at how quickly he was promoted into the first team based seemingly on his more developed physique relative to Dowell, Williams and Walsh.
Apart from him, I would say the others I mentioned are ready to make the step up and are definitely good enough to become established squad players, but for the bloated squad comprised of players we are struggling to move on, thereby preventing the younger players from breaking through. Give it a couple of years and I think we'll see a comparatively smaller squad size, beefed out by younger players on lower wages who have either come through the U23s, or been bought at a small fee (Stones, Holgate, DCL etc.)
 
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