Moyes and youth

[mscolari]

I think the fans concerns is more about the people he has left on the ground. Since Jan we have seen injuries and tiredness contribute to a slump and instead of giving some youngsters a go he has opted for a low risk approach (in his opinion) to play experianced injured and ageing players sometimes out of position.

If ever there was an opportunity to run some yongsters I would think it was in this period.

I'd like to say hindsight is 20/20 and if we had not had a slump and sitting in 3rd I'd be praising his tactics.

It's all about results!

 

[LocalNative]

Had a little flick through the Doncaster Rovers fans' forum, they seem to be very impressed with Lundstrum. A few calling him way beyond his years and that there is no chance he will be playing in League 1 next season.

Seems a very promising talent. Hopefully he can come from the shadows into our squad for next season.

 

[Brennan]

Would be typical for Lundstram to end up being better than Barkley.

 

[Joey66]

If you cannot see that DM picks his favourites then go to Specsavers your defence is pathetic - we do not have a ball winner in the centre of the defence in the air most of our goals are conceded that way surly Duffy an Irish under 21 captain should have been used this season!

 

[thisGRAEME]

I thought this thread was going to be a shocking development in the Yewtree saga.
Anyhoos, poor record on youth, bit of a myth about Everton because of the high profile of Rooney and Rodwell.

I'm not sure whether its a poor record, or the same as everyone else's. In terms of top ten clubs within the Premiership, so few actually blend youngsters from their system into the team. Chelsea don't, City don't, United don't, Arsenal do, but given their commitment to their youth, they're still going out and buying players rather than bringing through youth, Spurs don't. There's maybe one or two examples at all of these clubs, so in that respect, its not poor, but standard.

 

[mankers88]

For Duffy though his progression as a footballer is actually being hampered by Moyes. His Dad has posted on here saying that Shane has asked to go out on loan because Trap says he needs to be playing regular football. Moyes tells him he can’t go on loan but will get his chance in the team shortly. No matter how many times heitinga gets bullied and gives goals away, Duffy is still nowhere near the side. It’s been a wasted year for him, players learn from playing first team football because that’s the only football when results count. Duffy looked more than capable when he played last season when we had injuries, but was then taken out for no apparent reason when the experienced players came back.

I would say Barkley is in a similar situation to Duffy. Barkley at the start of last season looked like being one of our most promising players, and already looked like he was going to do good things. 1 mistake giving a penalty away and he got the shepherds hook and was rarely seen again! He has stagnated since and instead of giving him minutes against Cheltenham and the like when the game is won and giving the lad some experience, he’s thrown on when we are 2-1 down against Chelsea or 3-0 down against Wigan! While players like Hitz or Naismith are given a run out in the easier ties.

There is an article from back not long after Moyes first started at Everton and some journo following him and talking about it etc. He mentions a conversation in the car with Moyes and his coaching staff about how a player gave the ball away in training which resulted in a goal (in training) and how they laugh and say he won’t be playing for the first team anytime soon! People later commented on it being Osman because he ‘enjoyed’ a rather lengthy break from first team action round about the same time for no apparent reason.

That same logic fits in with how Barkley has been treated. It’s not a healthy environment for players to mature. The rs this season have players like wisdom, sterling, suso etc. playing regular games in their starting eleven in important matches as well. We could easily be doing the same thing with Duffy, Barkley, Velios. If it turns out the player isn’t good enough, it’s easier to get a fee for him when moving him on when he has first team experience than it is to move a player on with only reserve team football. For a club with limited resources I think the manager needs to start using the Academy more and using the likes of Duffy, Barkley etc. instead of Naismith, Hitz etc. and bring them through.

100% spot on that

 

[barkleys splinter]

I'm not sure whether its a poor record, or the same as everyone else's. In terms of top ten clubs within the Premiership, so few actually blend youngsters from their system into the team. Chelsea don't, City don't, United don't, Arsenal do, but given their commitment to their youth, they're still going out and buying players rather than bringing through youth, Spurs don't. There's maybe one or two examples at all of these clubs, so in that respect, its not poor, but standard.

Thing is with these clubs, they have the money to survive and compete by buying in players - we don't, hence the absolute need for Moyes to be doing more to develop the young players. He's so far failed abysmally on this front.

 

[Little Ralphy]

I'm not sure whether its a poor record, or the same as everyone else's. In terms of top ten clubs within the Premiership, so few actually blend youngsters from their system into the team. Chelsea don't, City don't, United don't, Arsenal do, but given their commitment to their youth, they're still going out and buying players rather than bringing through youth, Spurs don't. There's maybe one or two examples at all of these clubs, so in that respect, its not poor, but standard.

I think you might want to review all your 'donts' there mate. Plus the rs are doing this under rogers with youngsters who are inferior to ours in most aspects.

People are always telling us on this board that we can't compete with the sides you mentioned because of their financial outlay etc. so surely if anything, Everton should be making more use of the youngsters at the club and using them as first team back-up and bringing them through to provide a constant progression without such a massive financial outlay.

Is Caulker at Spurs that much different to Duffy in terms of development? Duffy had the injury of course, but if Duffy had have been at Spurs would he now be playing fairly regularly? Did we really need to be paying Hitz a wage to get a place infront of Barkley? Same goes for Naismith there.

 

[thisGRAEME]

Thing is with these clubs, they have the money to survive and compete by buying in players - we don't, hence the absolute need for Moyes to be doing more to develop the young players. He's so far failed abysmally on this front.

True, we're actually in a bizarre situation where we can consider ourselves lucky that City have all the money. In no way were Lescott and Rodwell worth £40,000,000.

I think you might want to review all your 'donts' there mate. Plus the rs are doing this under rogers with youngsters who are inferior to ours in most aspects.

People are always telling us on this board that we can't compete with the sides you mentioned because of their financial outlay etc. so surely if anything, Everton should be making more use of the youngsters at the club and using them as first team back-up and bringing them through to provide a constant progression without such a massive financial outlay.

Is Caulker at Spurs that much different to Duffy in terms of development? Duffy had the injury of course, but if Duffy had have been at Spurs would he now be playing fairly regularly? Did we really need to be paying Hitz a wage to get a place infront of Barkley? Same goes for Naismith there.

Again, you're not wrong. I don't think its surprising that Liverpool's improved form has coincided with moving back to guys like Downing over Suso, though.

I do agree though, Moyes' fear of cutting these guys loose and letting them make mistakes and learn from them almost certainly delays their development. Osman is a good example and quandry, did his development simply come later, or was he held back?

Regarding the don'ts, who was the last player to come through United's youth? Cleverley? After he was chucked out for a season on loan at Wigan, I'd say that's an option we should certainly be looking at. City... I've no idea, have they any? I guess you could just about include Hart. Chelsea... I find it difficult to include guys like Azpillicueta or Oscar, they're young, but they cost a fortune, relatively. Spurs have Caulker and Livermore, who gets a run out occasionally.

Happy to be proven wrong if I'm missing anything like. It just seems standard, sadly.

 

[Timak]

I think you might want to review all your 'donts' there mate. Plus the rs are doing this under rogers with youngsters who are inferior to ours in most aspects.

When Rodgers played the home grown youngsters they were in the bottom half of the table. Since he has bought back the senior players they are now 7th. You can put lots of youngsters into the team but you have to accept the results would probably suffer.

People are always telling us on this board that we can't compete with the sides you mentioned because of their financial outlay etc. so surely if anything, Everton should be making more use of the youngsters at the club and using them as first team back-up and bringing them through to provide a constant progression without such a massive financial outlay.

But it obviously isn't that simple. We have been in the top 6 of the league all season. To get a youth team player who is good enough to go straight into a top 6 Premier league side is very difficult. That is why very few teams around us are able to do this.

Is Caulker at Spurs that much different to Duffy in terms of development? Duffy had the injury of course, but if Duffy had have been at Spurs would he now be playing fairly regularly? Did we really need to be paying Hitz a wage to get a place infront of Barkley? Same goes for Naismith there.

Caulker played an entire season on loan at a Premier League team, and 70 games on loan in the Championship/League 1, so yes he is ahead. Duffy has played 16 games in League 1. If you are saying we should make more use of the loan system then I'd agree. And yes I'd also have Barkley ahead of Hitz but then again I don't actually see them training every day.

 

[Blue Cheese]

We all hope that the next Rooney is just sitting in our academy, a lot of us get a bit excited when we hear how good one of our youngsters is and so we expect them to be first team regulars by the age of 18-20 it isn't always realistic.

What I do have a problem with is players like Neville and Heitinga performing poorly on the pitch in x amount of games and still the young lads don't get a look in. That's not a dig at them 2 players just an example because they have had prolonged periods of time when they have been out of form and should have been dropped.

I'd like to see Barkley if he is as good as we are led to believe spend a season on loan at somewhere like Wigan(A prem team) to aid development like Wilshire, Cleverly and Sturridge did. Otherwise he needs more game time as he's already behind due to his leg break.

Vellios etc could do with some championship experience but I think it boils down to the fact our squad is just to small and for that reason our young lads aren't getting a decent opportunity to go out on loan.

 

[Pomp]

When Moyes first joined he was watching a youth game on Sky Sports in which Rooney was playing and he said 'there's one player' there who will be involved with the first-team next season. Hardly protective, just putting the spotlight on an emerging Wayne Rooney. But since then he's bottled it so many times. It's clear Vellios has many good attributes but he never gets played. He also picks on every mistake a young player makes. He did the same with Rodwell's backpass in a European home game and he just destroys their confidence. He went backwards after that. He is not protecting young players, he's protecting himself at Everton's expense. Everyone can see from just a handful of appearances that Duffy is more than good enough and if he leaves and goes backwards at another club, doesn't mean he couldn't have bettered Everton.

 

[Little Ralphy]

When Rodgers played the home grown youngsters they were in the bottom half of the table. Since he has bought back the senior players they are now 7th. You can put lots of youngsters into the team but you have to accept the results would probably suffer.

Andre Wisdom has started 14 times (not incl. Euro cos we dont have that option) this season for the rs and they are currently only 4 points behind us. Duffy has come on as sub 3 times (do they even add up to 10 mins between them?) For a side that has barely kept a clean sheet all season, and has conceded a massive amount of goals from crosses etc. not to mention the fact that heitinga has stunk the place out and gifted a fair few goals along the way, that’s an odd statistic given Duffy’s size, stature and ability. Results may well suffer but they also may have improved, do you think Villa would have scored 3 had Duffy been playing instead of Heitinga? The truth is we don’t really know either way, but what we do know is that Duffy will not become a better player while playing in Everton’s reserves, and his strengths do seem to be an apparent weakness in the current defence.

But it obviously isn't that simple. We have been in the top 6 of the league all season. To get a youth team player who is good enough to go straight into a top 6 Premier league side is very difficult. That is why very few teams around us are able to do this.

This point is similar to above. For me we have a very un-athletic midfield in Neville, Gibson, Osman, Pienaar and even Naismith. There are going to be games like in the Wigan game when that will be highlighted more than others. Also given the high work-rate the system demands from the midfield, these players are going to tire after a run of difficult games, if over used. I personally think that Barkley showed enough at the start of last season to be able to slot in and replace certain players for selected games. Same goes for Velios, we have a striker who holds some sort of record for goals/mins on the pitch ratio, yet when our striker was going through a bad run of form and Anichebe was injured, Velios was barely used if at all. I’m not saying he’s the answer for playing 90 mins yet, but he could easily have provided us a different option for the last 10/15 mins in games. He’s also a fairly big lad, and perhaps would be a better option for defending corners than some of the much smaller players we employ, for all of those late goals we’ve been conceding.

Caulker played an entire season on loan at a Premier League team, and 70 games on loan in the Championship/League 1, so yes he is ahead. Duffy has played 16 games in League 1. If you are saying we should make more use of the loan system then I'd agree. And yes I'd also have Barkley ahead of Hitz but then again I don't actually see them training every day.

We both agree here, if Duffy was not going to be used for the first team then he should have spent this whole season out on loan at a Championship club. According to his Dad on here, he has asked for this and been told no by the manager. You could argue he is a year behind Caulker because of the injury, but he’s really much further behind in terms of mins on the pitch etc. because of the way he has been handled. My worry is that the likes of Barkley and Garbutt who are very highly rated will go the same way.

A genuine question to you, bearing in mind you enjoy the financial aspect of football. If you were the manager of the club and enjoyed long term, job security. Would you look to utilise younger players to hopefully increase their market value for either resale or to use in your side regularly, which could at the same time free up wages as these generally have lower salaries than players like Neville, in the hope that you could eventually use money from sales/savings etc. to develop a strong side, which may be able to compete?

Or would you use experienced Pro’s on big contracts with no resale value, maxing out the clubs wage structure, in the hope that you can break the top 4 barrier?

For the record, I think Moyes adopted the first approach until his last contract renewal and then has been using the second ever since as he wants a trophy on his cv, or perhaps he’s misjudged the ability of the side he built up.

 

[riddick]

the thing that irks me a lot also is that when a youngster makes a mistake, moyes highlights it in the press. they know they ****ed up, we know they ****ed up, yet he still makes the comment. it completely ruins any good that the player may have made during the game. yet a complete liability in a game like heitinga or Neville just had an abysmal game completely and there isn't a peep.

the younger player has to wonder if what they did was worse. just a **** way to blood youth into the team.

 

[hullefc]

We need to bring the youngster through, they need to be 'tested' to see if they are up to it.

Would the youngster have 'cost us' games ? We wont know until they are given a go which Moyes needs to do because we have a small squad. The youngster will also add drive and enthusiasm to the cause. Most games some of the youngsters should have had 20 or 30 minutes on the field so as to get up to speed with the prem. If we are not careful Vellios, Duffy, Barkley, Garbutt etc. may become unsettled and want to move.

At the moment youth is not getting a look in at Anfield, Rodgers has gone back to older players. But because he has given the youth a go, they will be better for the experience.

I think Moysey was reluctant to give the youth a go because he believed we could get 4th. and get to the cup final. We need to give them, Vellios, Anichebe, Duffy, Barkley and Garbutt as much playing time as possible between now and the end of the season.