@finneh the standard for a Paul Scholes type of player is pretty high and the youngsters might have potential but the need games to fully develop from around 19 to 22 games we do have to invest in them because we'd be in the hunt for trophies and high league finishes and this is why you see clubs like Atletico and Dortmund churning them out by the dozen. It's the nature of the beast we've become and we can't have it both ways.
I agree. In that scenario why don't we have partnerships with smaller clubs who can do it for us, paying them annually for the privilege with a reduced transfer fee upon crystallisation. If accepting mediocrity is the compromise we may as well close the academy down.
@finneh You don't "produce" players like Scholes, you develop them. The problem is that if you don't have those talents in the first place, you have nothing to develop. The question that people should ask is, did we missed a talent in the last 20 years, is there an other local club who developed him?
If we don't have those talents, then we bring them in from abroad. The majority of top talents in aren't going to be from Manchester or possibly even England. They'll be brought in from across Europe and developed from 16 years old; just like Periera, Pogba & Januzaj. Either our academy isn't developing these talents or our scouting department isn't finding them; or more than likely both.
I wasn't referring to the cost, rather the scope, which would be restrictively narrow if the aim was to produce only elite level players: I think it would be unworkable since you cannot find enough elite level talents to populate an academy.
Not saying Pogba is equal to Scholes, but I would argue he is elite level.
We didn't "produce" Pogba, we bought him at 16 and he left 2 and a half years later having barely played for the first team. Credit has to go to either Le Havre for developing him as a younger or Juve for integrating him into their first team setup and developing him.
@finneh
I think your mindset is idealistic and a bit simplistic.
There is a great deal of luck involved in getting world class players out of your academy. Look at Barca, their well has gone dry, they have imported their two most recent superstar players in Suarez and Neymar. Rakatic and Turan being their big imports into midfield.
Again, I'm not just talking about world class players. I'm talking also about the kind of players that we're now spending £15-25m on. If we can't produce a Rojo, Blind, Schneiderlin, Herrera, Memphis, Darmian then what are we producing? I also disagree with your assessment on Barcelona; the likes of Busquets only graduated 7 years ago, whilst players like Rafinha, Adriano and Roberto are coming through at the moment. Saying their well has gone dry is hugely premature when everyone agrees you're only going to get a top player once every 5-10 years. Lets also not forget that Alcantara looks a top class player and he only broke through 6 years ago.
No mate it's not.. But what we have successfully done is give youth players professional football careers. If you look through the 4 leagues I wouldn't be surprised if our academy is one of the top for producing footballers. A fine example Is Drinkwater and Matt James(injured at the minute).
When did the club make a statement that our academy had become a charity whose aim was to help deprived youths find a career? I don't understand who cares if we have hundreds of players littered throughout the lower divisions, or how many players we've helped along the way. The entire point of an academy is to feed the first team with talent and for the last 20 years we've been woeful in this regard.