How good are our kids really?

[UpWithRivers]

Yeah players mature at different rates but in general does the old adage if you are good enough you are old enough apply anymore? It seems the really class players stand out even at a really young age - Camavinga has over 30 games for Real, Same as Gavi and he is 17! Then there is Pedri, Bellingham stood out a mile etc. Elanga is the exception this season but he is 20 and Im not seeing an elite player just a good one. So question is are our kids top, top level or destined for McTominay level and if they are that good why do they need loans when the kids can do it at Barca etc. Ok as I said their are exceptions - some players need to mature but surely if they are that good then a few should be making a splash next season.

 

[DWelbz19]

The Camavinga’s and Pedri’s of the world really are 1 in 100. We had one of those until January this year. Most young players tend to develop later, especially at bigger clubs where the opportunity to play first team football is much harder.

It’s also worth noting that both Pedri and Camavinga were purchases. Most big clubs just won’t have the space or time to let a young player through so early, unless they are MG/Saka type of level. Gavira seems to be an extreme exception (though I’m not massively convinced by him, tbh)

 

[Mickson]

They are probably not as good as Gavi or Camavinga (although I've seen too little of them). One of the problems is that we cant integrate them. Firstly, they never get their chance under pragmatic managers such as Mourinho and Ole, or the fraud Rangnick. Elanga is a good example, although I don¨t think he's tier 1 in potential, he was the same player under Ole as under Rangnick, but he never got the chance under Ole, which many thought was weird, including big personalties at United. Another problem is that we are not a functional team with a clear identity, making it hard to come in and impress in a 'vibes' style of football. I think it will be a lot easier under ETH. We have a lot of talented youngsters, the best group in the last 10-20 years.

 

[EngimaMK]

I think we are far too reluctant to give them a try. It's all "take it slow" or "not quite ready" but I think that's bullshit.

If you're good enough, you're old enough. As it is we keep playing the same old letdowns.

 

[DomesticTadpole]

Who knows until you play them.

 

[RedBanker]

Nah. They are good players. Not elite.

 

[Banana Republic]

It’s easy to be fooled.
Some kids shine at an early age, look like the next big thing and then fail to develop on that potential, either when breaking into the first team, or during their early and mid twenties. Fading away to nothing.

Other kids look very decent and reliable at the U23 level, but with the correct nuturing and development, really come into their own during their early or mid twenties.
I’d argue most of the “class of 92” fell into this category.

It’s always going to be hard to judge, unless they’re real diamonds.
I‘m not sure we have any in that category.

 

[Classical Mechanic]

It’s selection bias to look at Bellingham, Pedro and Camavinga. They’re the exceptions to the rule rather than players that prove you need to break through by the age of 18 to become a top player. Livramento was the only 18 year old getting regular minutes in the PL this season. It’s something quite rare.

 

[cyberman]

Hard to play kids now with the sheer amount of coaching needed to be able to press etc, its not like 15 years ago when kids could jump in and just play.
England are only just catching up in that regard, i remember European watchers telling us how rare it was for young kids to break through before they're around 20 just for that reason.

 

[Red_toad]

None of them are as good as Giggsy at the same age. But who knows what the future holds for them. They’re off to a good start and should make it in the game, some may make it at United. Think it’s 70% of our FA youth cup winners make it as professionals.

 

[Wheato]

There’s at least 5 players in that under 18’s squad who can make it at the top level. But one really important factor is the athleticism and physically required to play in the first team against elite athletes. You can’t compete on talent alone. It took Greenwood 2 seasons to bulk up. Rashford was the same. Otherwise you will just be brushed aside like a wee fly.

 

[golden_blunder]

We need to remember that out of a class, 1 or 2 May make it to the United squad. The rest will end up playing elsewhere, some PL, some lower leagues and 1 or 2 may drop out altogether.

my personal feeling is that we may be me thinking too much of garner etc and it may actually be the next group that won the cup which may be the group that produces 1 or 2.
whilst we are arguably the best youth producers in the PL, it doesn’t mean that our squad will be full of young players ready to play PL football.

 

[Lentwood]

Probably a controversial opinion but for me, the point of the modern Academy shouldn't really be produce players for the first XI.

The chances of THE best player, or even a 'top 10' player, in THAT position coming through your Academy and perfectly suiting your style of football as an ELITE side are very slim.

For example, Manchester City have Phil Foden, who starts about half of the time, and Liverpool have TAA. They are the only two Academy products who start in the 'best XIs' of those sides.

A realistic objective for the Academy should be to produce players who fill out the 23. So you might expect to produce a 2nd choice GK, or a 4th choice CM, or a 2nd choice wide-forward, for example. This saves you money buying these players in and creates a pathway into the team for the younger lads.

However, for me, in modern football, the primary role of the Academy should be to 'farm' players to sell to other clubs. Now, we have done this very, very poorly in recent years. Primarily because of this old-school philosophy SAF had that we somehow owed these lads a chance to kickstart their careers, meaning we'd let them go for little to no money.

That kind of romanticism might have been fine in the 90s/early 00s but it isn't any longer, particularly with the fees some of these lads go for. We only have to look at some of the fees paid or quoted for lads we have produced to see we are missing out massively. Drinkwater won a league title and then went to Chelsea for £50m. Micheal Keane went to Everton for £30m. We've seen decent fees paid for the likes of James Chester, Ryan Shawcross and Sam Johnstone, plus their are literally 50 more we could all name that are playing in England's top two divisions and top leagues in Europe.

What would our net spend look like if we had maximised the value of these lads, like Liverpool do? What would our net spend have looked like had we been smarter with the likes of Dean Henderson, Scott McTominay, Adnan Janujaz and Marcus Rashford?

For me, the process is simple. IF they are not considered talented enough to play for the first team by the time they are 18, then it should becoming all about marketing them. Get them on 'soft loans' to clubs in leagues were they can pad their stats. Build some hype about them. Give them the odd few minutes in a couple of dead-rubber games, or games that are done and dusted.

Then, we should look to sell them with a buy-back clause inserted. That way, if ever they do really hit the heights, we can just bring them back, The chances are, we never would though. Would we bring back Henderson, McTominay, Rashford or Janujaz now, had we sold them all at 21? Very doubtful.

Harsh, I know. Perhaps not what some fans want to hear. Ultimately though, I think we would be a much better team for it, as the funds can then be used to buy players who genuinely are elite or suited to our system. Plus, arguably it's actually better for the young lads. All of these loans can't help their careers. Look at Tuanzebe. Look at Lingard. Who knows? Both could have been top PL players, had they been moved on earlier.

 

[0le]

I don't know.

 

[Litch]

Only time will tell….

 

[Freak]

The funny thing is as fans it is very difficult to tell if a player will make it or not. A lot of us may think Garner is ready but who knows it might actually be Levitt instead. Difficult to say with young players unless they are Mason Greenwood level where the talent is very very obvious. I didn’t even think Elanga/McT would have made it to the first team squad so quickly but managers obviously see something that as fans we don’t.

 

[golden_blunder]

Probably a controversial opinion but for me, the point of the modern Academy shouldn't really be produce players for the first XI.

The chances of THE best player, or even a 'top 10' player, in THAT position coming through your Academy and perfectly suiting your style of football as an ELITE side are very slim.

For example, Manchester City have Phil Foden, who starts about half of the time, and Liverpool have TAA. They are the only two Academy products who start in the 'best XIs' of those sides.

A realistic objective for the Academy should be to produce players who fill out the 23. So you might expect to produce a 2nd choice GK, or a 4th choice CM, or a 2nd choice wide-forward, for example. This saves you money buying these players in and creates a pathway into the team for the younger lads.

However, for me, in modern football, the primary role of the Academy should be to 'farm' players to sell to other clubs. Now, we have done this very, very poorly in recent years. Primarily because of this old-school philosophy SAF had that we somehow owed these lads a chance to kickstart their careers, meaning we'd let them go for little to no money.

That kind of romanticism might have been fine in the 90s/early 00s but it isn't any longer, particularly with the fees some of these lads go for. We only have to look at some of the fees paid or quoted for lads we have produced to see we are missing out massively. Drinkwater won a league title and then went to Chelsea for £50m. Micheal Keane went to Everton for £30m. We've seen decent fees paid for the likes of James Chester, Ryan Shawcross and Sam Johnstone, plus their are literally 50 more we could all name that are playing in England's top two divisions and top leagues in Europe.

What would our net spend look like if we had maximised the value of these lads, like Liverpool do? What would our net spend have looked like had we been smarter with the likes of Dean Henderson, Scott McTominay, Adnan Janujaz and Marcus Rashford?

For me, the process is simple. IF they are not considered talented enough to play for the first team by the time they are 18, then it should becoming all about marketing them. Get them on 'soft loans' to clubs in leagues were they can pad their stats. Build some hype about them. Give them the odd few minutes in a couple of dead-rubber games, or games that are done and dusted.

Then, we should look to sell them with a buy-back clause inserted. That way, if ever they do really hit the heights, we can just bring them back, The chances are, we never would though. Would we bring back Henderson, McTominay, Rashford or Janujaz now, had we sold them all at 21? Very doubtful.

Harsh, I know. Perhaps not what some fans want to hear. Ultimately though, I think we would be a much better team for it, as the funds can then be used to buy players who genuinely are elite or suited to our system. Plus, arguably it's actually better for the young lads. All of these loans can't help their careers. Look at Tuanzebe. Look at Lingard. Who knows? Both could have been top PL players, had they been moved on earlier.

I agree to an extent though perhaps 18 is too young a cut off point, some develop at different speeds, both physically and mentally.
But yes we should be inserting buy back clauses for every sale

 

[UpWithRivers]

I don't know.

Only time will tell….

Well we dont have time. Everyone is calling for the kids to take up the squad places that are being vacated by the 10 plus players leaving since we cant buy 10 plus players. So we need to decide. Are they good enough or not.

 

[Lee565]

We had rashford before ole played him into the ground and has never looked the same since, then there is Greenwood before the domestic abuse issue, Henderson could have been a possibility but has been rotting on the bench for 2 seasons since his successful loan period at Sheffield United.

There is a bit of a disadvantage with us bringing kids through in the league we play in compared to many other clubs in other european leagues, the likes of Bayern, dortmund, psg, Barca and madrid can get away with blooding young kids because of the lack of competitiveness in their leagues where the worst scenario is they don't win the league title but still finish easily in a champions league spot.

 

[elnorte]

Hints that we're going to use this thread to pretend that Greenwood was already a surefire certainty of being a top class player.

Great stuff.

 

[K Stand Knut]

There’s at least 5 players in that under 18’s squad who can make it at the top level. But one really important factor is the athleticism and physically required to play in the first team against elite athletes. You can’t compete on talent alone. It took Greenwood 2 seasons to bulk up. Rashford was the same. Otherwise you will just be brushed aside like a wee fly.

Have to ask what you class as ‘the top level’??

I don’t see 5 of the u18s making it regularly for a top half Premier League side. Rarely happens and I’ve seen very little this season to indicate that this group will buck the trend.

 

[Litch]

Well we dont have time. Everyone is calling for the kids to take up the squad places that are being vacated by the 10 plus players leaving since we cant buy 10 plus players. So we need to decide. Are they good enough or not.

Is any signing good enough or isn’t it in time that tells us that? Also ‘good enough’ for what?

 

[JPRouve]

The funny thing is as fans it is very difficult to tell if a player will make it or not. A lot of us may think Garner is ready but who knows it might actually be Levitt instead. Difficult to say with young players unless they are Mason Greenwood level where the talent is very very obvious. I didn’t even think Elanga/McT would have made it to the first team squad so quickly but managers obviously see something that as fans we don’t.

It's very difficult for everyone including managers. That's why young players routinely have to change clubs in order to get meaningful playing time or find a coach that sees their potential.

 

[Eleven-Eighteen]

The Camavinga’s and Pedri’s of the world really are 1 in 100. We had one of those until January this year. Most young players tend to develop later, especially at bigger clubs where the opportunity to play first team football is much harder.

It’s also worth noting that both Pedri and Camavinga were purchases. Most big clubs just won’t have the space or time to let a young player through so early, unless they are MG/Saka type of level. Gavira seems to be an extreme exception (though I’m not massively convinced by him, tbh)

Couldn't agree with this more.

 

[TheReligion]

Hints that we're going to use this thread to pretend that Greenwood was already a surefire certainty of being a top class player.

Great stuff.

He was

 

[UpWithRivers]

Is any signing good enough or isn’t it in time that tells us that? Also ‘good enough’ for what?

New signings are bought on the assumption that they are good enough to play first team football at a high level over x number of games. So can we make the assumption that the kids are good enough or not?

 

[Dante]

Ole desperately wanted to sign Camavinga and Bellingham and the club were willing to pay big money to make it happen So they were obviously seen as a massive improvements on the long term options that we had.

But transfers are ALWAYS gambles. The bigger the transfer fee you're willing to pay, the more you think it's likely you'll win that gamble (in terms of quality, adaptation to the league, adaptation to the country, adaptation to the team, etc.).

Someone like Camavinga has a 90% chance of being a star. Garner only has a 5% chance. It may not be likely that Garner can ever match him. But it's not impossible. Which is why you can't really talk in absolutes, especially at this age. These things are always a roll of the dice.

 

[Neil_Buchanan]

I think Hannibal has the ability to be playing more first team football although I can understand not wanting to throw young players into this dogshit team with its terrible mentality. It just seems a bit of a wasted opportunity when there is nothing else to play for. Playing a few games now let’s us actually judge whether he is ready to be part of the squad more for next season or needs a loan, much more than some preseason friendly against Toronto or Sydney fc.

 

[Litch]

New signings are bought on the assumption that they are good enough to play first team football at a high level over x number of games. So can we make the assumption that the kids are good enough or not?

Nope point remains the same, time is the indicator of whether they are good enough. What you want just like new signings is the time to prove that. Kids need more time as they are only at the start of their career, so the measure of good enough needs more time to prove it. Like said, only time will tell…..

 

[Becks00]

I strongly believe Hannibal is likely to be just as good as Bellingham, Pedri, Gavi and the likes if given the opportunity. He was rated just as highly as all of those 2 to 3 years ago, in fact I believe if he where to be at Barca now he would have played just as many minutes as Pedri, Gavi and we'd all be raving about him now as we are doing for those two.

 

[RedRonaldo]

Don’t think we are bad, but we don’t have the best young talent. We are unlucky with Greenwood, and seems we have tendency to overhype our young talents abit over the years too (Rashford, Martial, Mctominay, Henderson, Januzaj). They are not bad but just not as good as we once thought they could be. Saying that I still have high hopes on our upcoming youngster (Mejbri, Garnacho etc)

 

[TenonTen]

Bad. They don't study nearly enough!!

 

[JPRouve]

Nope point remains the same, time is the indicator of whether they are good enough. What you want just like new signings is the time to prove that. Kids need more time as they are only at the start of their career, so the measure of good enough needs more time to prove it. Like said, only time will tell…..

And young players need game time to develop, understanding their game at a higher level and they need a lot of it. People sometimes wonder why the likes of Brazil, France or Spain have been consistently producing players during the past 30 years, it's because they give teenagers game time and a lot of it, young players also leave bigger clubs for game time to smaller clubs. For United a typical mistake is to use Mata isn't of Mejbri, Mata has no place in the club's future, the minutes that we gave him are a total aberration and should have gone to a youth player, your 3rd or 4th option can never be a veteran player.

 

[Bebestation]

Hopefully we can have a manager that can actually well..manage these youngsters to improve and get better.

The fact is that SAF was able to manage and get the best out of players like Cleverely and Wellbeck - ever since that we have arguably only had LVG as a manager that was able to get the best out of some younger players with some improvement added in terms of growth and management.

 

[phelans shorts]

He was

At that age he did, by the time he was outed there were signs that his trajectory was stalling somewhat. Just as might happen to Gavi/Pedri/Camavinga.

 

[Sky1981]

I think we are far too reluctant to give them a try. It's all "take it slow" or "not quite ready" but I think that's bullshit.

If you're good enough, you're old enough. As it is we keep playing the same old letdowns.

This is very false.

Youngster don't need to be given games to see if they're ready or not. We have training and U21 matches for that. CO92 wasn't given games to see if they're ready or not, they're given time because they are fecking ready to step up. Not the other way around. Camavinga getting games at 17 because he has shown in training he's more than ready for what's ahead. Give Laird 10 games he'll probably fumble under the pressure, because technically the manager doesn't see him as ready. The same with most youngster around the world.

Giving them 10 games doesn't make or break them as a player, so if we're not seeing kids getting time the brutal truth is that none of them are ready or deemed good enough to be given a chance. There is a difference given real game time to hone their mentality and readiness, it's another to play them for the sake of it just to see if they're technically ready. Game time doesn't make you technically ready, that's training and development. Proper game time gives you mental development, and maybe a sprinkle of practical skills but you'll be learning most of that in the Academy, you'll either have it or you don't.

Stop blaming the Manager for not playing youth, in a hindsight non of our academy players are top level quality (including Rashford)

 

[Nickelodeon]

Probably a controversial opinion but for me, the point of the modern Academy shouldn't really be produce players for the first XI.

The chances of THE best player, or even a 'top 10' player, in THAT position coming through your Academy and perfectly suiting your style of football as an ELITE side are very slim.

For example, Manchester City have Phil Foden, who starts about half of the time, and Liverpool have TAA. They are the only two Academy products who start in the 'best XIs' of those sides.

A realistic objective for the Academy should be to produce players who fill out the 23. So you might expect to produce a 2nd choice GK, or a 4th choice CM, or a 2nd choice wide-forward, for example. This saves you money buying these players in and creates a pathway into the team for the younger lads.

However, for me, in modern football, the primary role of the Academy should be to 'farm' players to sell to other clubs. Now, we have done this very, very poorly in recent years. Primarily because of this old-school philosophy SAF had that we somehow owed these lads a chance to kickstart their careers, meaning we'd let them go for little to no money.

That kind of romanticism might have been fine in the 90s/early 00s but it isn't any longer, particularly with the fees some of these lads go for. We only have to look at some of the fees paid or quoted for lads we have produced to see we are missing out massively. Drinkwater won a league title and then went to Chelsea for £50m. Micheal Keane went to Everton for £30m. We've seen decent fees paid for the likes of James Chester, Ryan Shawcross and Sam Johnstone, plus their are literally 50 more we could all name that are playing in England's top two divisions and top leagues in Europe.

What would our net spend look like if we had maximised the value of these lads, like Liverpool do? What would our net spend have looked like had we been smarter with the likes of Dean Henderson, Scott McTominay, Adnan Janujaz and Marcus Rashford?

For me, the process is simple. IF they are not considered talented enough to play for the first team by the time they are 18, then it should becoming all about marketing them. Get them on 'soft loans' to clubs in leagues were they can pad their stats. Build some hype about them. Give them the odd few minutes in a couple of dead-rubber games, or games that are done and dusted.

Then, we should look to sell them with a buy-back clause inserted. That way, if ever they do really hit the heights, we can just bring them back, The chances are, we never would though. Would we bring back Henderson, McTominay, Rashford or Janujaz now, had we sold them all at 21? Very doubtful.

Harsh, I know. Perhaps not what some fans want to hear. Ultimately though, I think we would be a much better team for it, as the funds can then be used to buy players who genuinely are elite or suited to our system. Plus, arguably it's actually better for the young lads. All of these loans can't help their careers. Look at Tuanzebe. Look at Lingard. Who knows? Both could have been top PL players, had they been moved on earlier.

This is a beautiful post. I agree and believe in every word written.

 

[Litch]

And young players need game time to develop, understanding their game at a higher level and they need a lot of it. People sometimes wonder why the likes of Brazil, France or Spain have been consistently producing players during the past 30 years, it's because they give teenagers game time and a lot of it, young players also leave bigger clubs for game time to smaller clubs. For United a typical mistake is to use Mata isn't of Mejbri, Mata has no place in the club's future, the minutes that we gave him are a total aberration and should have gone to a youth player, your 3rd or 4th option can never be a veteran player.

I think Utd have produced more professional players than most teams (just not necessarily playing for us). The problem is there a big difference to being Utd ready than most teams in the world because of our history associated with young footballers and the pressure that comes with it. You think if Greenwood played for Norwich, the things he’s allegedly done would name the front and back pages of the newspapers? The FA youth club had a record number of people watching it. You have to protect Utd young players in different ways to any other team, especially from our own fans!!!!

 

[Marwood]

Hard to play kids now with the sheer amount of coaching needed to be able to press etc, its not like 15 years ago when kids could jump in and just play.
England are only just catching up in that regard, i remember European watchers telling us how rare it was for young kids to break through before they're around 20 just for that reason.

Which 17/18 year olds were just slipping into Premiership football 15 years ago?

 

[maximus419]

A lot of it is down to drive and determination to make it. The ones who have good technical skills or physical qualities are often the ones talked up to make it, but often leads to complacency as they don't realise their potential.

I mean utd have a history of players who've made it in the first team that aren't stand outs, they've just maximised their potential and been able to make it as a useful squad player. Likes of O'Shea, Neville's, lingard, mctominay etc, none of them were regarded as top players in their position and even at youth level, few really excelled.

In truth it's just really tough to make it at utd. Players don't get opportunity to develop naturally through the club, they usually have to get a few loans and hope it works out. Unlike clubs like Ajax and others who develop their youth with the sole intention of moulding them into first team players. Utd tend to just hope a few make it but without much real planning.