Super Charged Long Term Planning on Steroids!

[Thirsty Lizard 3,184]

So another one of our youngsters has penned a long term contract with the club today. This time it's U18s defender Sean Stewart who has signed on for four years. 

There has been such a blizzard of announcements in the last few weeks that I've probably forgotten a few, but by my reckoning that's Jaden Warner, Joe Rose, Sam Blair, Sean Stewart, Tom Dickson-Peters, Tyrese Omotoye, Lewis Shipley, Abu Kamara, Jonathon Rowe and Andrew Omobamidele who have all signed long term contracts with the club in the last few weeks. 

There has never been a time when we have signed up so many youngsters on such long term contracts. The reality is of course that most of them won't make it with us, but some of them will and that's a thrilling prospect. Given that the post-Brexit transfer rules have made it a lot more difficult to sign promising young players from Europe it is vital that we produce as many home-grown players as possible. 

Once again Norwich City and Stuart Webber are ahead of the curve - I just love the way our club is run these days. 

[TheGunnShow 6,029]

31 minutes ago, Thirsty Lizard said:

So another one of our youngsters has penned a long term contract with the club today. This time it's U18s defender Sean Stewart who has signed on for four years. 

There has been such a blizzard of announcements in the last few weeks that I've probably forgotten a few, but by my reckoning that's Jaden Warner, Joe Rose, Sam Blair, Sean Stewart, Tom Dickson-Peters, Tyrese Omotoye, Lewis Shipley, Abu Kamara, Jonathon Rowe and Andrew Omobamidele who have all signed long term contracts with the club in the last few weeks. 

There has never been a time when we have signed up so many youngsters on such long term contracts. The reality is of course that most of them won't make it with us, but some of them will and that's a thrilling prospect. Given that the post-Brexit transfer rules have made it a lot more difficult to sign promising young players from Europe it is vital that we produce as many home-grown players as possible. 

Once again Norwich City and Stuart Webber are ahead of the curve - I just love the way our club is run these days. 

Key bit highlighted in bold. 

[1902 1,167]

8 minutes ago, TheGunnShow said:

Key bit highlighted in bold. 

Not really, as long as we don't lose a lot of money on them then it's ok. Otherwise, we will just have more ex-youngsters making their way in the league who we can wish our best.... And hopefully make a bit of profit from their sale.

The key thing is that if one in six or seven really makes it then we are looking at a great future for our club.

[TheGunnShow 6,029]

1 hour ago, 1902 said:

Not really, as long as we don't lose a lot of money on them then it's ok. Otherwise, we will just have more ex-youngsters making their way in the league who we can wish our best.... And hopefully make a bit of profit from their sale.

The key thing is that if one in six or seven really makes it then we are looking at a great future for our club.

You don't tend to lose much on youth financially anyway. How much was our overhaul of the training facilities? £5 million? Compare that to the transfer fees going around.

As you've rightly noted in the last point, if we're batting at a 17% strike rate here, we're doing brilliantly. If you've not read Left Foot In The Grave by Garry Nelson, his short section on the YTS section when he was player-coach at Torquay United was eye-opening.

I mainly said that as we often get comments on the lines of "but they weren't given a chance in the first team". By definition, most won't!