Recruiting young players

[Salopian 1]

From the profiles of the academy players, a somewhat strange sitution is revealed. Of the fourteen profiles, only two did not reach us via other clubs, that is that we recruited only two from our own jnuior teams, or from scouting.Two is a poor return from all the year teams we encourage, but it probably reflects two things, firstly that our recruiting ground has a fairly sparse population and secondly that it is probably difficult to spot outstanding talent at age 11 or 12. This is not to argue against the very junior teams - it is a service to the community and probably a way of creating good will and thus supporters in the future. I am merely pointing out that at the moment relatively few of our academy come from internally or even from Norfolk.So twelve of the academy players profiled, although coming from East Anglia, - Hatfield, Cambridge, Wisbeech, all came to us from other clubs at some stage, including Ireland and Scotland. In some cases it must have been because their clubs released them, that is that they were not considered good enough for the academies of their previous clubs.Perhaps our scouting needs to be beefed up or changed?

[chicken 0]

Part of scouting is looking at other players youngsters. This years accademy players may well be like that but remember that reflects our scouting from the past and not nessisarily the last two or so years.And it would be interesting to see what clubs these youngsters were signed from ie were they small clubs, even amateur clubs?Remember Beckham is not from Manchester - he was spotted playing for a very good youth football set up. Shearer is another example - sometimes people need a "break" and they don''t always get it at the most likely of places.

[BlyBlyBabes 0]

An interesting observation.

I''m going to bump it up before it gets left behind.

OTBC

 

 

[missing in action? 0]

gone are the days of the high wycombe academy where we found the bellamy''s and eadies of this world.....lazy scouts nowadays...

[yellabelly 0]

It is quite possible that some of the academy players came from clubs that did have an academy but then through lack of finances/politics or whatever else- the academy folded and they were forced to go elsewhere, so I dont think it''s fair to say they came to Norwich because their others clubs  released them because they weren''t good enough. I wouldn''t believe all that you read - Ross Kelly who is listed as coming from Hatfield is Danny Kelly''s older brother  (I read this in a match report)and he comes from Huntingdon Cambridgeshire.