Question Youth team set up - To sell or not to sell?

DTS · Sep 12, 2009

Hats off to Ricky Duncan. Assuming the story about Ngoo going to Liverpool are true thats the third youth player we have sold to upper leagues opposition ths past calander year with Orunga (?) going to Everton and Medi going to Derby. If the fees are to be believed he must have brought in close to £300,000 for the club already. More than Tilly in the same calender year I expect.

Whilst I am loving the extra cash coming in there is a selfish part of me that thinks if these lads are as good as Liverpool and Everton seem to think they are could we not keep them and try and build them ourselves?

If we could have got one of these lads into a first team star we could have been looking at bib big money potentially. Plus we have got the benefit of getting a quality player for a bit.

I guess in fairness if Liverpool come in for you at 16 and Southend say No your not going to be the most motivated. I also think in the past when we have turned down decent money for a "promising youth" and tried to groom them ourselves say Jae Martin - its not always worked.

It does rather beg the question is the youth set up really set up to groom players for the top clubs and we try and progress with what is left?

loz · Sep 12, 2009

It's not going to come down to anything other than economics at the moment, unfortunately. Big clubs in the Prem have the resources to sign up any kids they think look promising and spend a couple of years taking a punt on them (not literally, obviously). One silver lining is that a lot of them will probably end up back in the lower leagues eventually- hopefully not against us..

in any case, it's something the club should be proud of.

shrimpfan · Sep 12, 2009

that is the question!!!

EastStandBlue · Sep 12, 2009

When I interviewed Ricky last year he was firmly of the belief that the purpose of a Youth Academy is two fold. More than just bringing players through for use in the first team, the Academy can pay for itself, or even make a profit for the club, by selling players. Whether this is to clubs lower or higher in the league spectrum, it makes sense...

fredheim_holm · Sep 12, 2009

When someone offers £250k for an unproven youngster I think you've gotta bite their hand off. Especially if you've got a % of their future sale.

As you say Dave, you can't really say no if they match your asking price as you'll have an unhappy, demoralised player on your books.

On the flip side, if you let him go, you've got £250k, hopefully more money coming in in the future and a further line to add to the youth system CV.

Look at it this way, if you were a promising youngster who had to choose between a few teams and you saw a team that is starting to churn out youngsters and allow them to progress to higher, in some cases top class premiership sides then I know I'd find that a massive plus.

If we didn't let them go though, then we would have a lesser reputation (for at least a year or two until they break through?) and possibly a reputation of not letting players move on to bigger and better things?