Johan ,wants changes

[john tv]

Reading the Dutch news and Johnan's column in particular,I am delighted to see him questioning the unlimited number of foreign players on the well known teams and those in England in particular.

He reasons that because of this situation the player development by the clubs in some cases and in England in particular is non existant.He recommends that at least 6 players are to be home grown and is looking towards Platine to get this passed through the UEFA. He even suggest that the Dutch coaches get together and decide that at least 6 players are from the home team's development system.

[River City]

Holy crap. Is he really advocating a reduced number of Dutch coaches and players at Barcelona????

[Canuck Oranje]

EU labour laws may make it difficult to stop what is happening. In my opinion, it is more of an emotional issue than one of player development. For example, Arsenal fans would like to see English players on their team and still win.

Player development does not need to happen at the big clubs and does not currently happen at the big clubs exclusively.

[Juby]

I think it is a little suspect though that the richest teams, don't have the most successful youth systems. With all that money they should be investing more into their youth without breaking a sweat but they'd rather be poachers.

[Desigol]

quote:Originally posted by Juby

I think it is a little suspect though that the richest teams, don't have the most successful youth systems. With all that money they should be investing more into their youth without breaking a sweat but they'd rather be poachers.

Here Here!

[Guest Jeffery S.]

quote:Originally posted by Juby

I think it is a little suspect though that the richest teams, don't have the most successful youth systems. With all that money they should be investing more into their youth without breaking a sweat but they'd rather be poachers.

That generalization is incorrect. It depends a lot on the team. And on the moment the team is in. For the past few years Barça regularly has half the team with guys who came through the youth system (Valdes, Puyol, Oleguer, Xavi, Iniesta, Messi, Motta). Madrid has three or four regularly starting (Casillas, Raul, Guti, and Torres, brought up from the third team this year). But it is not always the case, I recall playing under Van Gaal with 8 Dutch players.

The ideal situation is that you have a good youth system, but you sign a few internationals with special conditions to improve your team, and that goes for any sort of side. Teams that are said to be poaching are in fact doing just what all teams do, they look for talent in lesser teams and lower divisions and try to promote it. But that happens with third division teams too, the "poach" lower levels and sides that are weaker economically and sign the better players. So maybe it could be poaching as you say, or maybe it could be called scouting. Ever heard of scouting?

But fans have to want the kind of set-up where the youth teams feed the first team, if they don't care and are happy with results no matter who gets them for the team, well they can't complain.

I did not read Johan's article in HOlland, but his pieces here in La Vanguardia every Monday are excellent, apart from the fact that he has an uncanny ability to see the future. In any case, if he said that in Holland, his point of reference would have been Barça, and perhaps he was taking a poke at some of the Dutch clubs not fulfilling their traditional player-building roles.

Should point out that two of the best clubs in Spain for youth development faced each other in last week's UEFA final. Did anyone happen to notice that Espanyol played with just one non-Spanish starter, and one signed as an u-20?

[Juby]

ummm, when I think of the top youth systems I think Atalanta, Sevilla, Ajax and Partizan, (maybe even southampton and leeds, though leeds probably are gonna slow there own)and none of them are top ten. And by poach I pretty much mean every team that focuses on swooping, like they are a poacher by nature, not every incidence

edit: top ten meaning the biggest clubs in europe, mostly a monetary term.

[Guest Jeffery S.]

quote:Originally posted by Juby

ummm, when I think of the top youth systems I think Atalanta, Sevilla, Ajax and Partizan, (maybe even southampton and leeds, though leeds probably are gonna slow there own)and none of them are top ten. And by poach I pretty much mean every team that focuses on swooping, like they are a poacher by nature, not every incidence

edit: top ten meaning the biggest clubs in europe, mostly a monetary term.

Where Barça and Madrid really poach, to use the term, is from other youth teams, from u-12s and the like. In fact they are working on trying to limit certain blatant cases. As for throwing money at star players, I think you will find that neither tends to spend on Spanish players too much as they are overpriced. So there is no general idea that either are robbing players from rival clubs in Spain.

IN any case, if Johan is right about the Dutch clubs, he is not about the Spanish, which tend to have pretty solid committments to youth with a few exceptions.

[Juby]

well I'm not so sure about that, they do buy very young guys, but generally 17-19 year olds like ramos, messi, higuain, dos santos(barca probably deserve some credit for him as he spent a year in their youth system), Their doing the same thing, they just have more business saavy, I would agree that spains not nearly the worst by alot, especially compared to the likes of chelsea, but they still build their long term team out of other teams youth academy's (as in where were these kids aged 14-17).