Kieran Mckenna and Nicky Butt - What is/was their role ?

Luke1995

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Hello youth experts, I wanted to know what kind of work Mckenna did at youth level before he was promoted to work under Solskjaer. He is 33, so a very young coach who spent a few years with the academy.

And what powers exactly Nicky got to shape the academy the way he wants it ? Does he get full control over scouts, who comes in and out and so on, like a Fergie or there is always someone he has to report to ?

In general, just want your thoughts on the state of the academy when Mckenna was there and what Nicky is doing now, plus the potential you see in them for a long term future with the club
 

Drainy

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McKenna coached the u18s. So he held training sessions and managed the games etc. He did a great job playing effective attacking football and by all accounts held really engaging sessions so was promoted by Jose Mourinho.

Nicky Butt was the Head of the academy for a time, he primarily oversaw the restructuring of the staffing of the academy. This seems to mainly been a scouting restructure and once completed he was moved to a new role and Nick Cox heads the academy now, by all accounts Cox is extremely talented having been successful at Watford and Sheffield United previously.

Butt now leads on developing a bridge between the gap from academy to the first team. There has been no confirmation of his day to day duties that I've seen. From the title of the job I assume there is no recruitment responsibility.

We won't see how well the academy is doing for a few more years but generally the feeling is that recruitment has improved, and we're finding and bringing in better players. Like I said, we'll have to wait to see the real difference as its easy to overrate players at u18s level, or not correctly assess individual potential because of physical advantage or team cohesion etc.

I'm glad that we're still a club that keeps smaller boys around and sees how they turn out. There was a fear under Moyes we were going to lose that.
 

Luke1995

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Thanks, @Drainy I did read some articles praising Mckenna. Hopefully he can transition to first team coaching as well as he did in youth. Maybe some coaches are better suited for youth and not first team.

Mourinho for example, given his track record, would struggle badly if he started managing youth teams, you'd guess. Too soon to know for Mckenna.

It's good that the club has put a former homegrown player in Butt at the academy, the class of 92 seems too far away from any involvement with the club now.

Yeah, some of the smaller boys get bigger if they spend more time in the gym. Some can grow from 5ft5 to 5ft8 for example.
 

Cutch

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http://www.irishnews.com/sport/foot...-the-rise-and-rise-of-kieran-mckenna-1889900/

http://www.irishnews.com/sport/foot...n-mckenna-on-working-at-old-trafford-1891745/

There's a couple of links there that probably tell you all you need to know about Kieran Mckenna.

He was a very promising player in his youth, born just up the road from me. Career destroyed by injury just as it looked like he was going to make the breakthrough at Spurs. Luckily he's a very intelligent fella with a serious work ethic that's got him where he is today.
 

Samid

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What does Nicky Butt actually do? Not particularly impressed by his work tonight. People always give Carrick and Fletcher rough treatment on here but their replacements hardly ever make the most of the opportunities given to them.
 

Luke1995

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What does Nicky Butt actually do? Not particularly impressed by his work tonight. People always give Carrick and Fletcher rough treatment on here but their replacements hardly ever make the most of the opportunities given to them.
Well, i'm not a youth expert by any strecht of the imagination, that's why I created this thread. But it's my understanding that Nicky Butt has been around at our youth system for a few years already ?

Since the Van Gaal era, if i'm correct. It doesn't appear the club's got a long term project with him.
 

Luke1995

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Well, Nicky Butt has left the club...

Do you guys think Mckenna will be Ole's main assistant for the future or will he take on another role with the youth system ?