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General U21s/Youth Team

Foley said:
Very good achievement.
It does seem as if the Academy is improving year on year ( just need some players coming into the first team squad next)
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Fair play to them. Our academy teams seem to be having a fair bit of success. The problem is that none of them seem to be able to make the step up into the professional game. Academy football is a million miles from league football and I would measure success of the academy is based on players that make the step up to professional football.
 
Jimmycarterxi said:
Fair play to them. Our academy teams seem to be having a fair bit of success. The problem is that none of them seem to be able to make the step up into the professional game. Academy football is a million miles from league football and I would measure success of the academy is based on players that make the step up to professional football.
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Next season may well be a breakthrough season for some of the academy players. Playing in the Championship is so much more difficult for them to make the step up, especially in a struggling side. Plus we'll have that godawful Football League Trophy rubbish in which to give game time to fringe players, so you would expect at least a reasonably proportion of those with pro contracts given a go. Fully anticipate players like Aaron Lacey, Kasway Burton, Jack Lee and Mo Missanga to make debuts in the FLT, while there may well be more regular spots on the bench for the likes of Leo Snowden, Louis Griffiths and Aidan Elliott-Wheeler. Or maybe I'm being overly optimistic
 
Boris said:
Next season may well be a breakthrough season for some of the academy players. Playing in the Championship is so much more difficult for them to make the step up, especially in a struggling side. Plus we'll have that godawful Football League Trophy rubbish in which to give game time to fringe players, so you would expect at least a reasonably proportion of those with pro contracts given a go. Fully anticipate players like Aaron Lacey, Kasway Burton, Jack Lee and Mo Missanga to make debuts in the FLT, while there may well be more regular spots on the bench for the likes of Leo Snowden, Louis Griffiths and Aidan Elliott-Wheeler. Or maybe I'm being overly optimistic
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And James Golding possibly?
Yes the Trophy could be really useful for blooding some of the Academy players snd hopefully Snowden, Griffiths, Golding could be on the bench for some league games and hopefully take their chances.
We do need Academy players to start getting into the first team squad and make an impact
 
Just seen this posted on LinkedIn. Are we pursuing the right policy or not...?

In 2016, Brentford made a decision that shocked English football.

They shut down their entire youth academy. Every age group. Gone.
Not because they didn't care about young players. Because the data told them the funnel was broken.

£2M a year spent developing kids only for Manchester City and Manchester United to legally poach the best ones for £30,000 in compensation. The conversion rate from academy to first team was near zero. The ROI was catastrophic.

In analytics, this is called funnel analysis: you map every step from input to outcome, measure the drop-off at each stage and ask is this worth fixing or should we abandon the funnel entirely?

Brentford abandoned it. They replaced the academy with a B-team model signing players already rejected by bigger clubs, at 17-21, much closer to first-team ready.

The result: £90M+ in transfer profits. Premier League promotion. And a blueprint the rest of football is now copying.

Most teams see a broken funnel and try to optimise each step. The best ones ask whether the funnel should exist at all.
 
I don't want the club looking at everything from a purely financial angle. The age group levels are much more important than can be classified simply by GBP. It brings the club to kids all around the county, building ties to communities. It gives kids something to do, something to work to, something to put their energies in to.

What next, get rid of the Ladies Team because they aren't hitting a required turnover level? How about the walking football team?
 
Dr Bob said:
Just seen this posted on LinkedIn. Are we pursuing the right policy or not...?

In 2016, Brentford made a decision that shocked English football.

They shut down their entire youth academy. Every age group. Gone.
Not because they didn't care about young players. Because the data told them the funnel was broken.

£2M a year spent developing kids only for Manchester City and Manchester United to legally poach the best ones for £30,000 in compensation. The conversion rate from academy to first team was near zero. The ROI was catastrophic.

In analytics, this is called funnel analysis: you map every step from input to outcome, measure the drop-off at each stage and ask is this worth fixing or should we abandon the funnel entirely?

Brentford abandoned it. They replaced the academy with a B-team model signing players already rejected by bigger clubs, at 17-21, much closer to first-team ready.

The result: £90M+ in transfer profits. Premier League promotion. And a blueprint the rest of football is now copying.

Most teams see a broken funnel and try to optimise each step. The best ones ask whether the funnel should exist at all.
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SteMerritt said:
I don't want the club looking at everything from a purely financial angle. The age group levels are much more important than can be classified simply by GBP. It brings the club to kids all around the county, building ties to communities. It gives kids something to do, something to work to, something to put their energies in to.

What next, get rid of the Ladies Team because they aren't hitting a required turnover level? How about the walking football team?
Click to expand...

Interesting points.

We are obviously not bringing through that many players, but unless you know how much it costs you and what the other benefits mentioned bring in then it’s hard to know if we get value out of it.

Brentford operate in a very crowded area, so it’s a sensible policy for them to pick up the best of the other London clubs rejects at a later age, saves them money and they are probably getting better than if they tried to bring through there own.

You would like to think we can get the best of the local talent in Oxon, but whether that talent is good enough, not a lot of players go on to be pros from the county as it’s a fairly small pool, is a bit of a question.
 
As well as trying to pick up the best talent in the county (although a number of other clubs - especially Southampton and Chelsea - are also sniffing around) the club has proved adept at finding talent elsewhere, from other clubs' exit trials and so on. Tyler Goodrham and Shandon Baptiste both came from this route, as well as many others who have shone for the 18s even if they've failed to translate that into adults' football
 
holdsteady said:
Interesting points.

We are obviously not bringing through that many players, but unless you know how much it costs you and what the other benefits mentioned bring in then it’s hard to know if we get value out of it.

Brentford operate in a very crowded area, so it’s a sensible policy for them to pick up the best of the other London clubs rejects at a later age, saves them money and they are probably getting better than if they tried to bring through there own.

You would like to think we can get the best of the local talent in Oxon, but whether that talent is good enough, not a lot of players go on to be pros from the county as it’s a fairly small pool, is a bit of a question.
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Brentford do now have a Cat 1 Academy after the Academy was reintroduced in 2022. Got Cat 1 this year.
 
SteMerritt said:
I don't want the club looking at everything from a purely financial angle. The age group levels are much more important than can be classified simply by GBP. It brings the club to kids all around the county, building ties to communities. It gives kids something to do, something to work to, something to put their energies in to.

What next, get rid of the Ladies Team because they aren't hitting a required turnover level? How about the walking football team?
Click to expand...
100% this. Pretty much exactly what I was about to write.
 
Dr Bob said:
Just seen this posted on LinkedIn. Are we pursuing the right policy or not...?

In 2016, Brentford made a decision that shocked English football.

They shut down their entire youth academy. Every age group. Gone.
Not because they didn't care about young players. Because the data told them the funnel was broken.

£2M a year spent developing kids only for Manchester City and Manchester United to legally poach the best ones for £30,000 in compensation. The conversion rate from academy to first team was near zero. The ROI was catastrophic.

In analytics, this is called funnel analysis: you map every step from input to outcome, measure the drop-off at each stage and ask is this worth fixing or should we abandon the funnel entirely?

Brentford abandoned it. They replaced the academy with a B-team model signing players already rejected by bigger clubs, at 17-21, much closer to first-team ready.

The result: £90M+ in transfer profits. Premier League promotion. And a blueprint the rest of football is now copying.

Most teams see a broken funnel and try to optimise each step. The best ones ask whether the funnel should exist at all.
Click to expand...
We may be glad of the kids this season but it has recently seemed a bit pointless having a youth scheme but not giving any of the players a chance even to be part of the squad. As @SteMerritt said, though, it's not all about money - having a youth scheme is an important part of being a local professional football club.

As an aside I'm SO sick of that pompous short-sentences style of AI writing.
 
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