I think that’s being a bit kind to us, to be honest. The likes of Giggs, Beckham and Scholes were all technically in the youth development stages of their careers just over 20 years ago now, with Beckham and Scholes largely starting to get some first team chances at that point. We had a golden era at that point, but it’s our utter failure since then which is quite worrying.
The likes of O’Shea, Fletcher and Brown were all great servants and offered a lot to us, but they were often squad players, and weren’t really world class as such. Again, Welbeck is a decent player, but he’s not top class. If he was, we wouldn’t have sold him. He’s done nothing to make it look like getting rid of him was a bad idea, either.
Granted, the Premier League has been fairly poor in general with youth development, but that’s not something we should really use to defend our own development. Chelsea, for example, have been the 2nd most successful English club behind us in the past 10 years, but their record is absolutely horrendous. If we’re having to use them to defend our own poor record, then something’s gone wrong.
Other top clubs like Barca and Bayern have shown that it is possible to build a side with top youth prospects in them. Barca are the most successful example, and Bayern follow behind them. Obviously it’s difficult to emulate that, but we need to make a better effort than we currently are.
