Mitchell Clark

[DCJonah]

On 03/05/2019 at 15:00, Rob182 said:

Conquering Europe Exaggeration aside, there were a few half-decent players in the nextgen team. I suppose the best we can ever hope for from any academy team is to keep 1 or 2 and sell 3 or 4.

Callum Robinson is a good quality Championship striker that we probably could have sold for £3-4m if we'd kept him and loaned him to Preston instead of being released on a free. Daniel Crowley was a great prospect but ruined his own career by going to Arsenal for a lifetime on their U23 subs bench, although he's now doing half-decent in Holland. A number of others are probably now League 1/ League 2 quality, which we could have sold for a million combined. Then of course there is Jack 'The Brummie Messi' Grealish, who has basically inspired our whole promotion push this year.

That's not too bad for one crop of youngsters, when you think about it 

Regarding Clark, I would have liked us to hold on to him to see if a League One or Championship team fancied him on loan, but I'll trust in Deano's judgement. He's no worse of a loss than that chap from Barnet that Bruce bought for a million.

I didn't criticise the academy, i said as fans we have a tendency to over rate a lot of young players. 

[dont_do_it_doug.]

On 04/05/2019 at 10:45, sne said:

I'm all for reshaping and rebuilding the academy from top to bottom, recruitment included. Not that it's been poor, but I think we need to still.

But still a bit surprised we let him go considering the state of the defense when this season ends.

We have (an injured ?) Chester, Taylor, Elmo and Guilbert.

That's it.

Not only will we have to sign starters, we will have to sign back up players as well. A guy who can fill in all across the back 4 might have been useful.

With that said I've not seen him play senior football so he might be miles away from ever being up to it...

Edit: And Bree

Hause will be purchased. Deal already agreed. He can actually do what Clark does, play left back and centre half. To the standard of a very good Championship team as we have seen

[dont_do_it_doug.]

On 04/05/2019 at 10:45, sne said:

I'm all for reshaping and rebuilding the academy from top to bottom, recruitment included. Not that it's been poor, but I think we need to still.

But still a bit surprised we let him go considering the state of the defense when this season ends.

We have (an injured ?) Chester, Taylor, Elmo and Guilbert.

That's it.

Not only will we have to sign starters, we will have to sign back up players as well. A guy who can fill in all across the back 4 might have been useful.

With that said I've not seen him play senior football so he might be miles away from ever being up to it...

Edit: And Bree

Hause will be purchased. Deal already agreed. He can actually do what Clark does, play left back and centre half. To the standard of a very good Championship team as we have seen

[sne]

29 minutes ago, dont_do_it_doug. said:

Hause will be purchased. Deal already agreed. He can actually do what Clark does, play left back and centre half. To the standard of a very good Championship team as we have seen

Yeah, yeah I heard you the first time 

Not seen it confirmed yet but this will indeed be a good signing when it happens.

[sir_gary_cahill]

Don’t get me wrong, I think Hause has done well for us in the Championship, I think he might struggle in the Premier League. That’s just my view, I’m probably completely wrong as per 

[vreitti]

8 hours ago, sir_gary_cahill said:

Don’t get me wrong, I think Hause has done well for us in the Championship, I think he might struggle in the Premier League. That’s just my view, I’m probably completely wrong as per 

You're not. He's fine for this level. Doubt we will buy if we are promoted. 

[Pez1974]

We seem to be great at bringing through OK-ish players - but not good/great ones.
Jack, Albrighton and Cahill are the real highlights from the last 15 years - I can't think of any others.

We've had some solid journeymen players come through - the Gardner's, Ridgewell, Weiman, Gabby (could argue good, but not overall for me), Clark, Bannan. These can help fill the squad for a few seasons, and keep the cash rolling in - but the academy is there is produce genuine first teamers. And it rarely does. 

Shit - Birmingham have brought through Nathan Redmond, Butland and Demarai Grey in the last few years - so we're really not performing much better than them.

Time for the academy to get a thorough overall in my opinion.

[NIVillan]

These players are 22-23 and I dont doubt they are excellent players as to get to this level you have to be, BUT something just hasnt happened for them.

I think this clearout is to create room for the next batch of players.

As said it is a gamble and some may come back and haunt us but it is too the future we must look.

[NIVillan]

13 hours ago, Pez1974 said:

We seem to be great at bringing through OK-ish players - but not good/great ones.
Jack, Albrighton and Cahill are the real highlights from the last 15 years - I can't think of any others.

We've had some solid journeymen players come through - the Gardner's, Ridgewell, Weiman, Gabby (could argue good, but not overall for me), Clark, Bannan. These can help fill the squad for a few seasons, and keep the cash rolling in - but the academy is there is produce genuine first teamers. And it rarely does. 

Shit - Birmingham have brought through Nathan Redmond, Butland and Demarai Grey in the last few years - so we're really not performing much better than them.

Time for the academy to get a thorough overall in my opinion.

I know Albrighton won the League with Leicester but I honestly think Gabby achieved more and not be written off as a journey man. His last 6 years were fuelled by laziness rather than lack of Talent.

The Championship contains quite a few of our old players in various teams so the Academy has not done a bad job at all in developing players.  What has failed is the coaches/people in charge of the tranisition from Acadmey football to First Team Football.  We have had as proved by the Nextgen win and successful youth/academy set up, but what we dont do is bring many of those players through.

Grealish looked like he was going sideways until he started rooming with John Terry who sorted his attitude out.  That one thing, not in a way football related just who you shared a room with has helped create one of our most exciting players for the past 30 years.

Just think again about Gabby and if he had a pro like Terry looking after him instead of the likes of Dunne.

Sliding doors and all that

[rjw63]

14 hours ago, Pez1974 said:

We seem to be great at bringing through OK-ish players - but not good/great ones.
Jack, Albrighton and Cahill are the real highlights from the last 15 years - I can't think of any others.

We've had some solid journeymen players come through - the Gardner's, Ridgewell, Weiman, Gabby (could argue good, but not overall for me), Clark, Bannan. These can help fill the squad for a few seasons, and keep the cash rolling in - but the academy is there is produce genuine first teamers. And it rarely does. 

Shit - Birmingham have brought through Nathan Redmond, Butland and Demarai Grey in the last few years - so we're really not performing much better than them.

Time for the academy to get a thorough overall in my opinion.

[thabucks]

Albrighton had to go at the time as he was demanding more than he was worth at that present point in weekly wages. For what he offered playing wise he wasn’t worth the reported £40kpw he was demanding. Things turned out great for him and with the benefit of hindsight it looks a bad call at the time no one could predict with certainty how he would develop. 

Clark is a strange one as I had high hopes and maybe he wanted what we couldn’t promise so chose to take his chances elsewhere. 

 

[dont_do_it_doug.]

5 minutes ago, thabucks said:

Albrighton had to go at the time as he was demanding more than he was worth at that present point in weekly wages. For what he offered playing wise he wasn’t worth the reported £40kpw he was demanding. Things turned out great for him and with the benefit of hindsight it looks a bad call at the time no one could predict with certainty how he would develop. 

Clark is a strange one as I had high hopes and maybe he wanted what we couldn’t promise so chose to take his chances elsewhere. 

 

That's not true. We never offered him a contract.

[thabucks]

1 hour ago, dont_do_it_doug. said:

That's not true. We never offered him a contract.

I’m just going on what I was told from a member of the management set up at Leicester when I was at OUFC .. either way at the time him leaving wasn’t a huge loss and maybe that’s what he needed to push on. 

[HanoiVillan]

On 06/05/2019 at 22:51, Pez1974 said:

We seem to be great at bringing through OK-ish players - but not good/great ones.
Jack, Albrighton and Cahill are the real highlights from the last 15 years - I can't think of any others.

We've had some solid journeymen players come through - the Gardner's, Ridgewell, Weiman, Gabby (could argue good, but not overall for me), Clark, Bannan. These can help fill the squad for a few seasons, and keep the cash rolling in - but the academy is there is produce genuine first teamers. And it rarely does. 

Shit - Birmingham have brought through Nathan Redmond, Butland and Demarai Grey in the last few years - so we're really not performing much better than them.

Time for the academy to get a thorough overall in my opinion.

Is this really that different from other somewhat similar clubs? How does our record stack up against Everton, Newcastle, West Ham, Leeds or Sunderland? Maybe worse than some, better than others? 

I'm not trying to suggest that mediocre - if that's what we are - is a cause for celebration, but I don't know that it's a crisis either. 

[Tomaszk]

Should this be in other football now?

[Dr_Pangloss]

Not a good decision IMO

[sir_gary_cahill]

5 hours ago, Dr_Pangloss said:

Not a good decision IMO

I’ve said it on here before but I’ll say it again, I don’t think it’s down to ability, I think there is underlying issue with his attitude. I could be wrong but I don’t think I am. In terms of ability, he’s a Premier League player but I think his attitude let’s him down, I’ve seen him have a go at referees for the youth team, We very rarely get it wrong when we let young players, if he or she are not good enough for us or their attitude lets them down then they are out of the door

Edited May 9, 2019 by sir_gary_cahill

[Pez1974]

On 08/05/2019 at 20:57, HanoiVillan said:

Is this really that different from other somewhat similar clubs? How does our record stack up against Everton, Newcastle, West Ham, Leeds or Sunderland? Maybe worse than some, better than others? 

I'm not trying to suggest that mediocre - if that's what we are - is a cause for celebration, but I don't know that it's a crisis either. 

My comment was more one to address the perception of our academy, rather than the comparison to many others who are probably equally 'OK'. I don't think we're bad - but the measure should be brining through players who spend year in our first team, not make a few appearances.

There are many fans who seem to think our academy is really good - possibly based on the fact we seem to do OK in age level competitions. But the sort of players who make the first team of a premier league club tend to be making the break through at 20, not still playing for the U23s at 22 or 23. There are exceptions I'm sure.

[VILLAMARV]

On 08/05/2019 at 20:59, Tomaszk said:

Should this be in other football now?

 

 

[Villan4Life]

Apparently training with Leicester City.