Jonker alluded to this in the Breakdown special with him, but I think English youth football suffers from how late the kids start to play competitive games here. I think competitive football starts here at the age of 16 btw. Even at that, the U-21 league, or whatever it is called, is not very good when it comes to preparing young players for first team football IMO. I am not talking about only British players either, but ALL youth players coming through here.

If PL clubs could have their youth teams in, say, League 1 or the Championship I think it would be a good start. You would have young players playing senior football, they would be part of the culture where relegation and promotion matters, and clubs would have a chance to better prepare youngsters for the first team by having the youth team playing the same style as the first team in a competitive environment.

Imagine if we could have all our players on loan, and a few more of course, playing together in League One or the Championship; it is difficult to see how that wouldn't be beneficial to their chances of breaking into the first team properly. We would also be able to give players like Campbell, Adelaide, Chambers and Iwobi proper games to develop without leaving the first team exposed in case of an injury crises or something similar.

It's not about the Champions League. It's about these teams. Erratic and incomplete.
City - sit first, a week after being abused by West Ham and then shellacked by Spurs
Arsenal - sit second, having lost to West Ham, Olympiakos and Dinamo this season. and being one of only 2 English teams to have succumbed to relegation-threatened Chelsea
United - third. but they just had shit dumped on their faces by Sanchez and Ozil.
... and so on

These are not particularly strong teams, despite the record spending. All that the spending is showing is insane inflation driven by rising commercial revenues. We are not necessarily bringing in better players as a league.

@ Rex, again what has youth training got to do with with top English clubs whose star players weren't even trained there?

Firstly, it isn't only the top 4 clubs in England who play in Europe. Secondly, the bigger problem is why England fail to produce/develop enough good players domestically. Then it BECOMES a problem for the top clubs that there are so few British players who are good enough to play for the top teams; we have seen it is a difficult market to buy ready made, top quality in. Despite more money in the PL than in any other league, the English clubs look worse in Europe than in many, many years. Personally, I think there being something wrong with the set up in English youth football is the root cause why we see so few really good players developed here. I am NOT just talking about British kids either, but foreign kids being developed at the English academies as well. To me, it looks like Germany, Spain and Italy for instance are doing much better.

Rex wrote:

Jonker alluded to this in the Breakdown special with him, but I think English youth football suffers from how late the kids start to play competitive games here. I think competitive football starts here at the age of 16 btw. Even at that, the U-21 league, or whatever it is called, is not very good when it comes to preparing young players for first team football IMO. I am not talking about only British players either, but ALL youth players coming through here.

Rex I've heard quite a few coaches and players say that youth football in England and that is why the technical level is lower than in Europe. Its not quite in the same age group as what you're saying though. I remember Heskey saying that he felt he never reached his potential because at a young age he was a skillful, quick winger compared to his peers but then when he had a growth spurt he stuck at centre forward and had the ball lumped at him all game. No one ever tried to develop his talent instead relying on his physicality. That was just to win youth games. Its a difficult balance trying to focus on building skills and instilling a real competitive edge in youngsters.

Sure it's a number of factors, but I really don't think the style of football played in the Premier League lends itself to being successful in Europe. The league has definitely gotten generally more open in recent seasons. But even when the Premier League was the predominant force there was never a truly outstanding team. Most of the English sides that did well defended deep and played on the counter and threatened at set pieces.

I thought the United team fronted by Ronaldo was pretty good. 3 CL finals in the space of 4 years was very impressive and certainly better than any of the CL winners in the years preceding them.

Pretty good, functional, experienced...sure. They didn't exactly trailblaze around Europe playing dominant football though did they?

Technical level in general I feel has improved, but not to the level of the Italian, the German or the Spanish leagues. I think this is mostly about what is emphasized in the education of youth players, and I feel more effort overall nationwide has been put into developing the technical level of kids. However, it still doesn't look to me as if technical ability is THE focus when it comes to very young kids, and that is a problem; to get to a European top level I think the foundation here needs to be established already when the players reach the age of 13-14. After that, it is very, very difficult to make up for lost time according to Wenger, for instance, and he is certainly knowledgeable in this respect. Generally, players coming through the ranks at Arsenal these days are at a very good technical level, and that is no doubt because the emphasis here is on just that. That still doesn't seem to be the case for a lot of other clubs though! There still mostly seems to be too much emphasis put on stamina, strength, combative mentality, and tackling from a young age. Those are important traits, of course, but IMO these things should be near the end of players' education. This is where playing for points in league football could be an advantage I think.

I think play in England is mostly deficient from a tactical point of view as well, and I agree with what Tim writes. U21 teams in league football could help in that respect as well I think, but the main problem here seems to be the relative lack of education with coaches and managers. English football is miles behind Italy for instance in this regard.

I don't really know which steps have been taken by the FA to improve the quality of the education of coaches and young players, but it doesn't seem to be either effective or enough. Germany is a good example of an FA which managed to change these things on a national level, and they are currently reaping the rewards.

In short, what I am trying to say is that it is not sustainable what the English clubs are doing; they are signing foreign players who are actually not very good, and yet they improve their respective teams. These slots really should be taken up by British players, and players educated in England, but right now they simply don't seem to be good enough. If the general level of young players educated in the country is better, then some top players are bound to follow as well. Right now it seems as if English teams are dependent on importing both decent players and top quality players, and there is something not quite right there.

Rex wrote:

Technical level in general I feel has improved, but not to the level of the Italian, the German or the Spanish leagues. I think this is mostly about what is emphasized in the education of youth players, and I feel more effort overall nationwide has been put into developing the technical level of kids. However, it still doesn't look to me as if technical ability is THE focus when it comes to very young kids, and that is a problem; to get to a European top level I think the foundation here needs to be established already when the players reach the age of 13-14. After that, it is very, very difficult to make up for lost time according to Wenger, for instance, and he is certainly knowledgeable in this respect. Generally, players coming through the ranks at Arsenal these days are at a very good technical level, and that is no doubt because the emphasis here is on just that. That still doesn't seem to be the case for a lot of other clubs though! There still mostly seems to be too much emphasis put on stamina, strength, combative mentality, and tackling from a young age. Those are important traits, of course, but IMO these things should be near the end of players' education. This is where playing for points in league football could be an advantage I think.

I think play in England is mostly deficient from a tactical point of view as well, and I agree with what Tim writes. U21 teams in league football could help in that respect as well I think, but the main problem here seems to be the relative lack of education with coaches and managers. English football is miles behind Italy for instance in this regard.

I don't really know which steps have been taken by the FA to improve the quality of the education of coaches and young players, but it doesn't seem to be either effective or enough. Germany is a good example of an FA which managed to change these things on a national level, and they are currently reaping the rewards.

I read a few good articles a couple of years ago about how Germany transformed their youth system post Euro 2000 which is widely believed to have resulted in them producing the likes of Muller, Kroos, Gotze, Ozil and Hummels. I’m sure you know about it, but their going back to basics and all parties being involved in it is what I think is lacking in England (and the wider UK countries by extension).

I see plenty of talk by successive FA chairmen and the likes of Scudamore at the Premier League about grassroots investment but throwing money at the problem without the correct strategy isn’t going to amount to any substantial change. Like grassroots investment, much was made about the St George’s Park complex which appears to be a step in the right direction, but finding a winning philosophy is only going to benefit the country if it’s adopted and implemented nationwide and not by a single training complex. It needs to run through clubs and academies and be the standard. Now I’ve no doubt clubs do their best and want to bring through youth players, but priorities lie in winning promotion, avoiding relegation and cup runs to survive financially for most. Developing coaching teams to sustain a high quality youth development structure is often an afterthought when money is tight and needed to fund the core aims of the clubs. Coaching structures are too fractured throughout the country and at the mercy of individual clubs priorities to provide anything more than sporadic success for clubs with small numbers players being developed. Without an overhaul and a plan nationwide it’s always going to be so.

Then there is the individual coaches themselves, the ones in charge of producing the superstars of the future. In the UK there’s also too much reliance and focus in general on physical attributes and on picking teams which can get immediate results at the expense of development or talent. One of the Scottish coaches (Ricky Sbragia – one time failed Sunderland manager post Roy Keane) recently left out Jack Harper, a highly rated youth player schooled at the Real Madrid academy, from a youth squad because he was too small and the coach’s focus was on bigger players and runners. Now I might be overdoing it a bit, but if you’re you are a teenager and you’re called up to a squad with a player who has come from Real Madrid, would that not be inspiring to some degree? To talk about the club, the players and the lifestyle? Have some hope that maybe one day working on your touch and weaknesses might see you improve and get a shot at a bigger club? But no, that’s thrown out the window because Jack Harper is too small and Ricky Sbragia needs wins to justify his continued employment with the SFA. Ricky Sbragia symbolises much of what I think is wrong here. Dinosaur coaches, schooled in the past when Graham Souness type hatchet tackles were the order of the day and physicality was prized by the coaches, who need results to keep their jobs. It’s slightly different at national than club level but the point remains, coaching needs to be seen as a profession which provides and readies players for the next level, not one which produces wins and trophies at the expense of development.

I think the Dutch focus very much on this, that winning isn’t the end game for kids but well-rounded players are, and that mentality here needs to change. I believe I read that the Dutch, or possibly Ajax, focus on coaching technique in players early years, then slowly introduce a more competitive aspect as they move through the age groups into their mid-teens. By the time they are late teens they’ve had the technical schooling at an early age then experienced competition as they’ve grown. Coaches may have gone through all their badges and have the qualifications, but if the mentality is still one of winning at any cost, we're not going to catch up with other countries.  

The problems are far and wide. The philosophy, structure, facilities and coaching set up all need radical overhaul, and on a national level with consistency across the country before there will be any real change. Soundbites from the powers that be about pumping money at the problem mask their poor attempts at any real reform.