Nice story. A self-sustaining club with an annual budget of only €5m. Lovely small town on the IJsselmeer just east of Amsterdam. https://www.bbc.co.uk/sport/football/59954007 Interesting that they have 4 English players in their 38-man squad: Derry Murkin, Josh Flint, Leon Maloney and Darius Johnson. Personally, haven't heard of any of them.
Yeah lovely story. I'd be impressed if you had heard of them, given the highest level any of them reached whilst in England was Portsmouth U21s or Bognor Regis!
Do we scout youngsters at that level (Bognor)? We seem mostly to recruit direct from other teams's academies.
In that example, he was on loan from Portsmouth. I've no idea what level Bognor Regis play at. Thinking back, didn't Cody MacDonald come from Dartford? Don't think he had an academy affiliation. So we've looked that far down before. There's another academy signing from a similar level I can't remember the name of.
Bognor are currently in the Isthmian League, and yes, Cody signed from Dartford. We should have picked Jamie Vardy up from Stockbridge Park Steels ........
Italy fail to qualify for World Cup AGAIN. Incredible to think you can win the Euros but fail to qualify for the tournaments prior and after. Their last world cup knockout game was when they won the thing back in 2006, (just group stage thereafter). And people think Norwich are a bit up and down.