What on earth has gone wrong with the youth team? « Untold Arsenal: Arsenal News, supporting the club, the players and the manager

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by Tony Attwood

The Premier Academy League Table: don’t look at it unless you are feeling strong.   We are sixth in the league out of ten, with a goal difference of minus 4.  Won six, drawn two, lost seven.   The last three games were a 0-3 defeat against West Ham, a 1-4 home defeat to Palace and a 0-3 against Charlton.

And in the midst of this, our old pal Mr Wenger said that he could see about five players in the youth set up who could make it big time with Arsenal.

So what’s going on?

You begin to get a bit of a clue when you look at the Youth Cup, in which we beat Darlington 6-1 in the last round.  The team was

Emilio Martinez

Daniel Boateng, George Brislen-Hall, Sead Hajrovic, Ignasi Miquel

Oguzhan Ozyakup, Kyle Ebecilio, Nico Yennaris

Benik Afobe, Chuks Aneke   Nigel Neita

Compare and contrast with the team that played and lost their game against Charlton.

Emilio Martinez

Martin Angha, Elton Monteiro,  Steven Smith, Samir Bihmoutine,

Kyle Ebecilio, James Edge  Jordan Wynter,

Josh Rees, Jeffrey Monakana    Nigel Neita,

What has happened here is that there are only four regulars from the youth team in the cup game – the rest are Reserves, plus one youth player who is so far ahead of the game he is actually out on loan with Huddersfield.

Benik Afobe was given permission by Huddersfield to return for this game.   Afobe was one of the main attractions last season as the Youth Team won the Premier Academy League for the second year running  He scored 20 goals in 25 games, including three in the play off final.  He’s been at Arsenal nine years, and signed a professional contract last year and played for the title winning England team in the Under-17s European Championships last summer.

So let me just make this point.  Here is a player, qualified to play in the youth league, who has already moved up to the reserves and through them into playing for a League One team (he’s started seven times for Huddersfield, plus come on twice as a sub and has knocked in three goals – all since November 2 when the loan started.  He comes home on Jan 8).   Huddersfield (as I write this on Boxing Day morning) are third in the league and recently beat the league leaders Brighton.

This player, this League One player, is actually a member of our youth team squad.   He’s the shining star, but lurking behind him are a bunch of reserve players all of whom are also of such an age that they can drop back into the youth team for the cup games.

Take Chuks Aneke as another example.   He moved into the reserve team last season, and has also played for the England under 17s.

What this shows is that the production line that we have spoken about for so long is now well and truly running.  In fact it is running so fast that it is impossible to hold players back in the youth team.   That might be the right league for them when it comes to age, but they are simply too good for this league, and so have to move up to the reserves, or even the loan squad.

It is tough on the youth team of course, because their best players are being moved up so fast so that the players don’t become stale or irritated by it all being too easy for them.   And although the youth league table looks depressing at the moment compared to the normal high standards, all is not lost – it is something of a warped table because the club at the foot of the table is doing so badly.

There is also the problem of the various rules prohibiting the recruitment of players from  outside the local area in their youth days.   But on the positive side, it also shows that the fast track approach that brought us Jack Wilshere was not a one off.  There is a whole raft of players making their way up quickly.

It is also interesting to contrast this four tier approach (first team 25, on loan squad – usually around 15), reserve squad, youth squad, with that adopted by the noisy neighbours (not Leyton, the other lot).   Arry came in and abolished the reserve team because it did not have this progression of youngsters in it.  As I have mentioned before, I watched Bentley and a host of fellows of a similar ilk play our reserves side made up of the usual 16, 17 and 18 year olds.   Such a situation was of course hardly good for morale among the Lesser Tinies, and ever since then Arry has used his son as a mouthpiece, spouting off about how pointless the reserve league is since no one will ever put in a tackle etc etc.

In fact a revolution is going on, which is leaving the little clubs like our neighbours behind – a revolution that involves finding 17 and 18 year olds who can play for the first team.

But it is a revolution that also has a problem.  As the production line of players who joined the club at nine rolls on and on, we will quickly have a situation in which the reserves will be full of 16 year olds, and there will be another bunch of quality players taking us back to the top of the youth league.

What then?   The number of players we can put out on loan is limitless, but we also need another Arsenal team as a place for our young stars to play.   This can only be a team playing in League One or maybe Scotland’s second division, or something like that – as is done in Germany and Spain.   But of course we’re governed by people whose ability to look forwards without looking back is legendary.   However there is nothing that I know about in the rules that says we can’t have a second youth team.   (If we get one, remember you read it here first.  If we don’t, well, it was Boxing Day, and last night was rather late etc etc, and I will deny ever thinking of it.)

Meanwhile Kyle Bartley, Pedro Botelho, Francis Coquelin, Tom Cruise, Henri Lansbury, and Sanchez Watt are all out on loan, and lurking elsewhere is the likes of Gilles Sunu.  Then there’s Ryo Miyaichi who has just been signed from Japan.  True Nordveit has gone, having impressed naive viewers like me (just shows what I know) but the word on the Young Guns blog is that we don’t need him because of the genius that is Bartley.  And we are still awaiting a decision on Wellington Silva’s appeal.

Maybe its not quite a disaster after all.

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