Spot on. We seem to have stopped bringing youngsters through for ourselves - plenty seem to go elsewhere. Apart from Hungbo, I can't remember the last one to make the grade.
Explains a lot I hope he can give one more reasonable season so we have time to find a long term replacement I wonder if he could do a good job at Birmingham in the future as player coach unless of course we offer him that role here
Well, it's more complicated. we could only attract good ones (competing with Arse, spuds Chelski etc locally ) when we got into to EPL. I So it takes a couple of years - then takes 3-5 years to get them up to first team standard. And only 3-4 will make it just to Championship level. I think we have a crop that might yield 2-3 now. Hungbo came from Palarse remember. Anyway - we had Sancho. Losing him might have put the management off even bothering ! I think they are trying , but find it a better risk /reward model to look abroad to nearly developed talent.
Until the footballing authorities stop youth poaching (Sancho a case in point from a fairly recent Watford perspective) the clubs like ours are never going to be able to develop talent to sell on properly. Crewe under Dario Gradi were famous for their academy, churning out players like newspapers write Op Ed's, and yet how they've struggled as a club.
I know it comes down to finances, but I am not sure that pitting our U18 development squad against the likes of Lincoln and Colchester instead of the larger clubs with the better players is the right approach.
Yes, Hungbo from Palace. Dele-Bashiru from Man City, Pochetino from Spurs. In fact almost all our u23 players are imported and this is due to the Academy category system and the fact that in 2012 we only had Academy players up to 18 so a big gap to fill which is still only partially made up.
I think that is why we want to be Cat One but yes can you really learn much against such team when you are trying to develop a team for a Premier league/top Championship squad.
So from the first article -. He doesn't want / feel that he will be a bit part player next season, he may have to swallow a bit of pride. From the 2nd - suffered with COVID in May and it knocked him before the re start of the season. Strange he didn´t say at the time really given how outspoken he is. He was playing post COVID with injuries and we went down by a thread. That is not great despite knowing he wanted / wants the best for the club. I wonder how he´ll do next season. Would he fit into our 4-3-3 as the central striker. I know his link up play is good but he never really got into the box enough when he was playing this season (under Ivic) I know. Maybe, just maybe, he'd fit better into an attacking 4-3-3. Dream on I say, he is an option from the bench if he can prove that. Pens and a tap in don´t really contribute enough this season. Another player can take pens. Better option than other strikers ATM though. Has Prem experience etc. Not enough if we are to push on and stay up though. The jury is out on Troy and next season, if given the chance it is make or break for him I feel. As much as his contributes to the Club I feel he is not cut for the Prem anymore. We need a new, younger, Troy. I think he had been great mind. He really had. When is his contract up?
I am not knocking what he has done for the club. I am sure he puts in a lot behind the scenes too. He turned a bit marmite at the end of last season and we need to push on. That is my personal opinion. I'd love him to prove me so wrong though with a good 15 goals next season from open play.
The first plan has to be get a striker who can actually trap a football and hold it up bringing others into play as we won’t have much of the ball so will need to use it wisely. None of our current strikers can do. Also guys like WTE need to be better on the ball. Cannot afford to be sloppy and gone cheap passes away. Deeney did play with an injury but that is because the manager choose him over Gray (who was having a good time with his lockdown parties ) and Pedro who I guess Pearson didn’t trust. He was a bit damned either way there - people didn’t like him playing unfit but then had he not made that effort others would have criticised him for refusing to play his part.
Certainly going to be an interisting few months.... and TD cant be a main hope for us any more......a squad player really... so as we are all saying we need a good free scoring striker
Well if we still have Troy, Gray and Success as our main 3 strikers then we are stuffed ! Pedro will probably have the same issues as this. Be good skill wise but get kicked about and physically struggle.
stuffed with three duffers. sadly.... TD by far the best... but past his best by far and really injury prone
You have to scroll a long way down before you come to WFC. https://fanengagement.net/fan-engagement-index/
Club will be disappointed with that . They have rung a lot of fans during lockdown who have been at home alone .
Ah - during a bad season for the club on the pitch so they were getting a lot of stick from fans which won’t help people’s impression of them .
