By now I would have thought Brands would have made big changes at the academy
Apart from Davies who is only average its a long time( Rooney ) since we brought a first team regular from the academy
We normally buy them in and most do not work out
I would have expected major changes in the coaching staff at least
The reality is, Liverpool is not that big a place. It's surrounding areas are about half as big as Manchester (who because it's inland their academies have a full 360* coverage whereas we can only go 1 we, and we start to merge into Manchester as well). How many scousers have Liverpool brought through? Arnold was the 1st since Gerrard really, and Jones will be the next. Thats 2 in 20+ years.
In that time we have brought through Osman, Hibbert, Rodwell, Anichebe, Rooney, Kenny, Barkley & Davies. We now have Gordon. They are also bookended by Jeffers, Ball, Dunne & Cadamateri who all brought important finance into the club (and were the same age as Gerrard). I make that 3 for them and 12 for us, with us having the best player, and them having players 2 & 3 on the list in terms of quality. I appreicate Dunne was from Ireland, but he was with us before under 16 (a dynamic thats important for reasons below).
If you were generalising, we bring through more, they probably bring through better quality, which again is partly to do with the nature of the 2 clubs and where each has been over the intervening period. It's easier to play for Everton and get games, but you get exposure to better players at Liverpool (so maybe Rodwell & Barkley for example became Arnold level had they broke through there).
I mean we are bringing through 1 localish lad every 2-3 years. It's not bad- we would hope it's better but it's not terrible. Liverpools academy are very worried of the above too, that their catchment is smaller than rivals, and crucially that the demographics they recruit from tend to be overwhelmingly English parents. There's much less migration in Liverpool than say London or Manchester. Without sounding crude, there is an issue of physicality here, in that migrants will often be a big bigger and stronger (from certain parts of the world).
What Liverpool do, is pay big sign on fees and wages to a large number of players to supplement their academy from under 16's and particularly under 18's upwards. Most of the deal contain big sell on fees to previous teams too and often big fees in their own right. They probably do what we've done with Stones, Holgate, DCL but they did do 10+ of those per season. Even though they have reduced this somewhat, it is a big lag on the system, and contributes to the large wage bill they have (their wage bill is City levels of spend).
We are more measured in this. However any attempt to buy has been curtailed until this autumn. There was probably a limited amount we could do before then. This will be a time Brands is judged, alongside the new guy they've got from Derby. Unsworth is far from perfect but I do understand Brands belief in the need to have continuity and people who care and understand the DNA of the club through the academy. People go on about coaching and it's important, but if you're a parent, and club x has coaches from all over the place trying to recruit you, and club y has coaches who have played for that academy, played for the 1st team, had a career and then came back to contribute to the academy afterwards and are from that same area you are probably from, which is more compelling?
One thing we shoud stop, and appear to have stopped is endlessly rolling contracts on. More decisions need to be made at 19/20 on players. If you go much beyond that, with a few exceptional cases, you won't make it here.
